In case you didn’t already figure it out, we were those two weary travellers. That was two weeks ago. Since then I have gone into the airport twice to speak to the British Airways people about them. To make a long story short, they sent two bags to Canada that they were supposed to send to Chicago, and they sent one bag to Chicago that they were suppposed to send to Vancouver. We have had to buy all new stuff in one of the most expensive countries we have ever visited. Hopefully we will get reimbursed.

By the way, on the flight where our bags went missing, only five people got their bags. That’s 5 out of an entire flight of people. So here is a warning to all you who will be travelling on British Airways THEY WILL LOSE YOUR BAGS!!!! Perhaps you will be one of the lucky five who got their bags in Paris, or perhaps their conveyor belt will be working, but for the record, we warned you! :-)

Our trip has been full of adventures, but none nearly as exciting as the adventure our bags have been on. Hopefully next time we’ll get to accompany them.

On a happier note we are SOOOOOOOOOO excited to go home!!! We have been away for a long time (76 days) and can’t wait to see family and be in familiar territory. (Not to mention having some of our stuff again!)

There are some strange adjustments we have had to make. It is totally wierd to me that Shawn can’t speak the language. There have been many times when nobody speaks english except us.

The other adjustment that has been interesting is the driving. We have often seen street signs that are only pictures and we have no idea what they mean. I’ve lost track of how many times we have gone the wrong way on a one way street.

Meals are interesting. We go to a boulangerie each morning for a pastry. Around one or two in the afternoon is when we stop for our lunch of baguette, cheese and fruit. We usually have our dinners at a cafe or at McDonalds. As terrible as that sounds, McD’s is the only fast food restaurant chain in the country side and we haven’t had it or anything like it in months.

One week from today we will be in the air, heading home. I love France and want to come back but I’m so excited about coming home.

And so now, I must go and back, because in typical Kelley fashion (at least the younger generation of Kelleys) we have procrastinated. We are leaving in 30 min and we only have a third of our stuff packed. Don’t worry Mom and Dad, we’ll make it to the airport in plenty of time :)

Thanks again to all who have been supporting us and encouraging us on this journey. Gotta run!

We’ve had a few questions about the food here in Kenya, so I thought I would show you a few pictures. The picture above is of nyama choma being prepared. This meat just happens to be a goat! We have had goat several times and neither of us are too fond of it, although we will eat it if that’s all there is. Kenyans believe that the meat closest to the bone is the sweetest, so often as you eat, you will get a mouthful of bone with your meat. For those of us who are used t cold, boneless, prepackaged meat, this comes as a shock. We have also had ostrich (which is one of our favorites, it is better than chicken!), crocodile, lamb (which was a first for me), beef and chicken. The crocodile was one of the worst things I’ve ever tasted in my life. It’s really rubbery and it tastes really fishy.

The second picture is a plate of chipati sitting outside in the shade. Chipati is kind of like pita bread or tortillas except very different. I don’t know how to describe them but they are really good. We have also had ugali, a dish eaten by the pound by many, made of flour and water. It is a pasty dish that doesn’t really taste like anything. One of my favorite things is fried spinach and cabbage, it’s sooooo good.

All in all, our favorite meal is mexican at Marcia and Dennis Felkner’s house. We have fresh salsa, homemade guacamole, homemade sour cream and chipatis for the tortilla.

Java House is a very western eating establishment. One that has the best icecream and coffee in Kenya! At least according to us. When we are at hotels and resorts we have buffets galore. These usually consist of different salads; carrot salad, onion and tomato salad, and cucumber salad. There is also potatoes, two or three kinds of meat, rice, soup, curried vegetables and cooked veggies. However, we have found desserts to be lacking. Most of them are very British and are not very sweet (no offense to those who love British desserts?).

When we get stateside, the first thing we want to eat is Chili’s, a great restaurant that has the best chicken soft tacos in the world. My mouth is watering as I type!

This morning we came over to the head office of World Vision. After talking with people, I had no idea what I was going to do this week. However, I am now working in the Child Sponsor area. Everytime a sponsor sends their child a gift, letter, etc. someone over here has to open it and document what was sent and make sure that it is appropriate (no guns, rotten food, etc.). That is what I am working on this week. It’s cool to see how many sponsors send stuff to the kids, although I laugh at the impracticality of some of it.

It’s going to be a good week here. I’m excited about it. It will end our trip well!

This is how it all began…

When Shawn booked our flights for Kenya he sat me down just before the final confirmation. He surprised me by telling me that he booked us a week in Paris on the way home. The purpose of this week was to debrief and unwind a bit from our trip in Kenya. Well here we are at the end of our stay in Kenya and we have nothing planned to do for the last week we are supposed to be here. We have accomplished everything we set out to do. We saw the missionaries we came to see and worked with them. We spent our time with World Vision. And we did the three-week travel study. We prayed about it and talked to some friends of ours here that we respect, as well as the parents, and we really don’t feel like we need to stay here any longer.

So, we are flying standby and are ready for a two-week vacation in France! We are really excited to be able to do this. Shawn had been numerous times and even did a three-week exchange program in Paris when he was thirteen. And another reason I’m excited is because I’ll get to put my French to good use. We are renting a car the first week there and will be touring the countryside and southern France. The second week we will be staying with the people Shawn had stayed with for those three weeks, and we will be playing in Paris.

We leave Paris on August 21 and fly to London and then to Rockford, Illinois. We are there from the 21 to the 23, just as a stop over to visit with family and friends and to meet with the missions committee. We are really looking forward to reporting back to the church with all that we have learned and our pictures. On the evening of the 23 we head back to good, old Langley. And even though we have graduated Trinity Western will be seeing a lot of Shawn during the two weeks of orientation before classes. He will be setting up their computers and helping the new yearbook staff get settled. We will be heading of to camp around the 8th of September. We are here on a six-month contract. We are really excited to be heading back to the Island where we first met.

Last time I wrote we were in Nanyuki. The next day we headed even furthur north to the DolDol district. Here we made some great friends and saw much of the country side. This area is primarily Masai. We visited a Masai Manyatta (house) and met many Masai people. We rode for hours on roads that are little more than trails through the brush in spots. This area is very dry and the Masai people live by grazing cattle.

Our main purpose in visiting this area was to hand out mosquito nets to the sponsered children (through World Vision) and to do the children’s annual progress reports. We had a lot of fun meeting the children and interacting with them, even though we could not understand one another. Once again it was amazing seeing World Vision’s partnership with the community. It is so exciting to see such a huge organization doing missions work well and effectively.

We were so blessed this past week by our hosts, the World Vision staff, in Nanyuki and on the field. They took such good care of us. They were also good friends and we had many occasions of fun and laughter. We are praying that the Lord will bless them as they continue their work in this region and that as they phase out of these two districts that all would go smoothly.

For my birthday Shawn, the Felkners and some of my friends from TWU took me to Ethipian food restaurant for dinner. We then had cake and ice cream…it was a good day. I have to admit that I missed my family and friends!

On Friday the Felkners, shawn and I left to go up to Nakuru. We spent all day at Cheppema Children’s Home. This day was by far a highlight for us. This home was initiated by a Kenyan family. It is so exciting to see nationals taking care of their own people rather than people from England, Canada and the US doing all the work. When the local people run projects like this, they are sustainable.

In two weeks time they will be getting a water line into the home itself. This is so exciting since it will revolutionize the way these people live. I thought that it only meant that laundry and showering would be easier. It means so much more. As they say here: water means life. Once they have the water close (right now it is a two km walk) they will be able to irrigate fields which means they can grow cash crops in order to make money to pay for food. Food is their biggest need right now.

We are presently in Nanyuki. This is a town just east of Mount Kenya. We are currently travelling with World Vision. They are showing us all the work that they care doing in this sector. So far we have visited farmers who have water to irrigate their fields, thanks to the help of W.V. We even helped one man harvest peas, which is a cash crop that will be shipped overseas. Without the water, people can only grow maize. We visited a dispensary (a clinic) where a new maternity wing is being built.

Today we hiked on Mount Kenya in order to reach a pipeline that is being layed in order to bring water to communities who don’t have any. People from these communities walk up to 8 km to reach the pipeline. Many of them are carrying long pipe sections on their back. They have been working on this line for four years and will probably be done by February. We hiked up to the intake and saw the whole line. It is amazing seeing a hundred or more people working together for this project. The community digs the trenches and lays the pipe by hand. Some times these trenches go as deep as 12-15 feet.

I hope and pray that this finds you all well. Our time in Kenya is rapidly coming to a close and I want to thank you all for your prayers and emails.

Mombasa was beautiful. We had spent the last week of the travel study on the coast of the Indian Ocean. Unfortunately Shawn and I came home early cause we were sick. It was really neat getting to see another part of Kenya. I found it to be really different in some ways but also the same rest the rest of the country. Many more people on the coast dress traditionally. Mombasa also seemed to be a little more laid back that Nairobi. However, you can really tell how focused on tourism this area is. I’ve heard Mombasa referred to as Europe’s Hawaii. The one thing that seems to be the same across the country is people trying to sell us things. There were people on the beach selling their wares at inflated prices for tourists.

The travel study was an amazing experience. We learned so much about Kenya and were really challenged to think about development and international aid in Kenya. We also focused on the issue of AIDS as well as orphans. My heart was broken repeatedly as we visited children’s homes and discussed what we could do to help. I know that many of my ideas were challenged and I am still trying to come to terms with some new ideas I have been presented with.

Tomorrow we drive from Kisumu to Nairobi (this is an estimated 4-5 hour drive. The drive here however, took almost 10 hours). The evening we get back to Nairobi we board an overnight train to Mombasa on the coast. We arrive in the morning the next day and are there for five or six nights. I’m really excited about this leg of the trip.

This portion of the trip is and has been a lot of fun. This has definitely been a time to play for us. Although, Our hearts have been broken for the people and certain circumstances we have seen. We have been learning so much about the people and country we are visiting.

The travel study ends on the 16th and so we will head back to Marcia and Dennis Felners for about 10 days. We will be working on their website and at Wycliff. I might get the opportunity to visit a fe more childrens homes. On July 26 Shawn and I are heading up to Don Dol. This is a two on the “northern frontier”. I put that in quotations because it isn’t really even half way across the country land wise but people wise it’s in the middle of nowhere. We are there for a week. We are not yet sure what we will be doing.

After that we are heading back down to Karen (a nice area in Nairobi) and we will be staying at the world vision guesthouse while Shawn teaches the communications department more about photography. We will be here until the 6th of August. After that we will go back to Felkners until we can figure out what else to do.

I have to admit that the thought of being for that long is exhausting. Shawn and I are both doing well. We’ve both been sick but are good now. The medicine that I was on to get rid of the parasite made my skin overly sensitive to the sun so I’m a little fried right now even though I was wearing sunscreen. This is my first burn so I shouldn’t complain and it’s only really bad in the tops of my shoulders.

Sorry mom and dad about the repetitiveness of this post for you !!!

We also went on our first safari! We drove through the Nairobi game park on Saturday morning and saw many things. We saw Zebras and giraffs and many other things. For lunch we went to Mamba (swahili for crocodile) restaurant for lunch. We ate outside at one big table under a tent and had an amazing lunch. the restaurant also cut us an awesome deal. We went into their crocodile and ostrich farms for free. It was an unexpected but really cool stop.

Tommorow we are heading out to Masai Mara for a few days on a safari. It should be relaxing. This is one of the touristy highlights of our time in the travel study.

The only drawback of the change in locations is that we do not have constant internet access. I know that this will greatly disturbe Shawn! :) However, this means that we will not be posting as regularily as usual…sorry mom and dad!!!

Thanks for your continued prayers. Please pray for the team as a whole while we are on this three week travel study. Pray for health and safety as we will be eating new things and traveling in Kenyan style…by bad roads and long train roads!

There were tables and tables filled with Kenyan women hand crafting each individual bead. There weren’t even assembly lines. It was amazing to see the women forming and painting the hundreds of thousands of beads this place manufactures.

Kazuri Beads was started by a British family and was meant to provide good work for Kenyan people. Today, there are more than a hundred families living totally self-sustained through their work at the shop. These people working there are now able to provide for their families without begging on the street or asking for aid from an orginization that cannot sustain them for life.

The second place we went is similar in that it is a store and factory only this place deals with fabrics. This place is called Amani Ya Juu. This store is actually living quarters, factory, store and small restaurant that is run solely by refugee women. The women mostly come from the surrounding countries such as Uganda, Ethiopia and Somalia. These woman are safe and are self sufficient. Also, their work is amazing. They die their own fabrics and use them for many different projects. They quilt quite a bit, which I loved.

It was great to see some different approaches to aid in this country. Both of these places are helping people to become experienced in a trade and self-sufficient. It was also really cool to be able to buy some gifts at places like these where you know the proceeds will be going to benefit people honestly.

Before I continue I have to explain something: this is held every Friday. This is very much a “touristy” thing to do. I think we saw just as many white people there as non. However, this is not the kind of market that you would find anywhere in North America. Everything was hand made. Hand carved, hand sewn, hand dyed, and hand beaded. Therefore, even though this is definitely a draw for tourists, it is authentic. You bargain and are implored to stop by the sellers.

It is here, at the market, that I found out how completely gullible I am and how terrible I am at bargaining. I realize in hindsight that I ask too many yes/no questions. I could have asked a seller if a certain piece was made of soapstone and his answer would have been yes, even if it clearly wasn’t. I would ask, did you make this? Yes they would reply…every time. I also realize that I showed way to much interest in things and did not know how to say no. When you show interest they know that you’re a goner and that they have made their profit.

On top of my gullibleness (that isn’t even a word is it? Well, it is now) the market was on the roof. This limited the space and also made it very warm. The aisles between the vendors were probably only a few feet wide. So there are vendors trying to entice you to stop and look and buy. Then there are the white people gawking (I am generalizing - some bargained very well and even spoke Swahili…). Then there was me. Looking for all the world like I had money to burn and a need to buy one of everything I saw. Needless to say, if it weren’t for Shawn and Marcia, I would have had a hard time leaving. And that would have been only partly due to my resisitance, the vendors would have taken care of the rest.

Tonight, we were walking through a portion of downtown Nairobi and two little girls came and followed us begging, I mean literally begging rather than asking, for shillings and food. It broke my heart. Not because of their individual need but because of the pattern of society that causes them to do this. People can often make more money begging than they can working, especially the crippled, the mothers with their babies and the kids. The parents had trained these two girls to go out and make a living for them. A common reasoning among the missionaries we have met is, not to give the beggars money because it only reinforces their reasoning in continuing to beg rather than working for their wages.

However, my being a gullible and naïve person, it breaks my heart each time I see someone begging. However, I do realize that my money can be put to much better use through organizations that are working with and helping nationals to become self sufficient. And so when I buy souvenirs, I am trying to buy from places where the proceeds go to paying decent wages for Kenyans who are doing honest work. This is a hard thing to come to terms with: how can I best help that will make the most lasting impact.

A few days ago Shawn took me out onto the dirt road heading down into the valley and taught me how to ride the piki. It only took me a few tries to get it into first gear and then I was off. It’s a little scary learning out here because you are learning on a hill and the road isn’t exactly flat and even. My biggest problem was kickstarting it. It took all of my strength to start it. A few times Shawn would take pity on me and kick start it for me. Hopefully we’ll get to ride them more today. I’ll get Shawn to put up some more pictures later if he has time. Otherwise we’re hoping to put up a lot of our pics once we are in Nairobi!