Out of Canada, Into Kenya - Shawn's Journal

What have *you* been doing?

I’m sure there are still many of you who aren’t sure exactly what it is that we’re doing in Kenya, especially that we feel we can ask for support for doing it. First of all, I can assure you this isn’t a vacation. It also isn’t all about a class, as only three weeks of our 10 in Kenya were class-related. (side-note: none of the support went toward any of those expenses.) So then, what exactly have we been doing?

The best way to sum it up is “support and report”. Here I’ll explain the “support” part, later I’ll explain “report”. All of the time that we’ve been in Kenya so far (except for the travel study portion) has been spent with missionaries here. We weren’t sure what to expect when we decided to visit missionaries, but we have been greatly enlightened in the last 2 months.

The first family that we stayed with was the Milligans - Bob, Stephanie, Brad, Jon, Julissa, Paul, Kira and Joey. They are serving at Rift Valley Academy, where they’ve been for three years now. They are dorm parents for grade 11 guys (19 of them), since RVA is a boarding school. Bob Milligan also teaches chemistry at RVA. There are approximately 500 students attending RVA from Kindergarten through 12th grade. The curriculum is North American and the school fills a huge need for families desiring to serve in East Africa but still desiring a quality education for their children.

Is it a really a quality education? Well, Brad Milligan just graduated from RVA last month and is currently heading to the States with a scholarship to attend Princeton in the fall. I’d say that’s pretty good quality. Without people like the Milligans to serve as dorm parents, a school like RVA wouldn’t be possible.

While staying with the various missionaries, we have had three specific goals:
1. Help them practically, in whatever way possible.
2. Encourage them in their continuing ministry.
3. Enable them to communicate more effectively with friends and family back in N. America.

While at RVA, we were able to stay with the Milligan’s six kids and act as dorm parents for a weekend while Bob and Stephanie “got away” for a relaxing weekend to themselves. That was the first time in their seven years overseas that they’ve been able to do that. We also took lots (over 1000) photos during our time there. They will be able to share those photos with friends and family when they go back Stateside, helping them to effectively share with others what exactly goes on at RVA. They also mentioned that all their kids except Joey had spent time in the U.S. while they were young so they had formal photos taken while they were growing up. Joey, since he had spent almost his entire life in Africa, hadn’t had any taken. We learned of this after one afternoon in which Joey got to be a model and I took quite a few photos of him.

The other thing I was able to do for Bob, was to create a website for his chemistry classes that will enable the students to access a calendar, notes, announcements and other items that will help them in their classes.

From RVA, we moved on to Nairobi where we’ve been staying with Dennis and Marcia Felkner. They’ve been family friends for a long time and it seems like they’ve blessed us far more than what we’ve been able to do for them. They assure us, however, that we have been an encouragement to them, especially during this time when all three of their kids (ages 17, 18, 19) are in the States. Indeed, they’ve felt like parents (a few times we’ve referred to them as our “African Parents”), so I can understand when they call us their kids.

We’ve been able to take lots of photos of the area where they work. As well, I’ve been working on a website for them that they will use much like we’ve been using our website to communicate with you. They will be able to post updates on it, as well as share photos with their friends, family and supporters. Below is a little teaser of the site. Because of the extent of the site, it won’t be finished before we get back home, but here’s a little view of the design of it. It’s called Felkner Footprints, which is what they’ve called their newsletter for the last 19 or so years since they’ve been on the missions field.

Dennis and Marcia work for Wycliffe Bible Translators, where Dennis works in computer support and publishing. Marcia is one of the branch administrators and also the medical liaison for the group that is here.

This weekend we’re taking Dennis and Marcia away for the weekend as a thank-you and also to allow us to meet a Kenyan family who run an orphanage (Cheppema Children’s Home) near Nakuru. Then we leave on Sunday with Worldvision to head north near Mt. Kenya for a week where we’ll be doing some writing and photojournalism projects for them.

This has been a long entry, but hopefully it helps to clarify what we’ve been doing this summer. So, what have you been doing? I know that there are nearly 100 of you who check this site on a regular basis, so let us know what you’ve been doing - we’d love to hear from you! Either leave a message for us in the comments, or send us an email and let us know!

Posted by slvrfrg at July 22, 2004 05:46 PM