Good morning from Nairobi! We continue to be quite busy - but we are having fun, and learning lots! Friday morning we visiting a project that has some involvement with Rachael's church in Edmonton. She will tell you all about it!
Well, we traveled far out beyond Nairobi, into Masai land to an area called Ngong. It is a beautiful part of the world with many acacia trees and stunning mountains (not as big as the rockies though!!!). It is the area where the gentleman from the book Out of Africa (in the movie- Robert Redford's character) is believed to have crashed his plane. He is said to be buried there. Anyway, we visited a very interesting project where they are trying to help orphans, kids from the slums and the Masai children to get education and health care. They have a primary school, secondary school, health clinic and quite a progressive farming program. The farm is meant to help teach the children the skills needed for farming and animal rearing. I (Rachael) found this area particularly fascinating. They have a biogas program set up where they use cow manure to produce methane gas to run the food burners to cook for the children. Imagine, "poop" from four cows generating enough energy to cook half the food for the kids!!! The ultimate form of recycling. It was a gas, man!!! The project was quite ingenious. It is amazing what you can do with so little. The resourcefulness of the Kenyan people always impresses me.
In the afternoon, we had a board meeting with the Board of Tumaini. Here is Carolyn to tell you all about it.
Well, we should have known we were in trouble when the meeting started 1 hour late! And it went on for 4 hours!!! We received a report of happenings over the past year, most of it pretty exciting. The music group from Tumaini came first in a regional competition, then 9th out of 25 schools at a provincial level! Not bad for the first time participating! A low of the report would be the struggle to make ends meet due to the rapidly rising food costs in Kenya. We received an update on the building construction - the exterior of the building is due to be finished in the fall of 2011, with the inside completion by the new year. For sure, my faith in Johnstone, our board chair, the rest of the board and staff of the school continues to increase. They sure work hard!
More later!!! Today we hit the market - SHOPPING!!!!
Below is a picture of Paola, with a student sponsored by her go
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