It's Sunday, the day of rest here in Africa. We spent the past few days at Priscilla's house across the road from her orphanage. We were at the orphanage school most of yesterday. I taught a math class and a music class. The classes are quite crowded, hot, quite dusty, but the kids seems to accept that and learn the best they can. The children are so respectful, they stand when I enter the room, and even stand to answer a question when I ask. I had to get them to chill and have a fun time in the class. They laughed quite hard when I tried to use my Swahili to tell them which page in the textbook to turn to, and of course they proceeded to give me a lesson in Swahili. Not sure who's getting the most out of these classes.
The music class they crammed in about 3 different grades, so there were 4 people sitting at a desk/bench made for 1 or 2, but they didn't seem to mind. I taught them the doe-ree-mi's and then Sound of Music's 'Doe a deer...' - that was so cute, them singing this song. I let them off for a break after an hour, and went to the 'teacher's room' where the teachers seemed to be just as intrigued with Scott and I as the kids. About 15 minutes later I heard in the distance this Sound of Music song. So I go back to the class and that's how they were calling me to come back, they all congregated back into the class and started singing that song to get me back. Man, that was something. I did a simple coin trick with the kids, making a coin disappear and pulling it out of one of the kids' ear. Well, that went over much bigger than I anticipated. The classroom jammed with kids wanting to see this 'magic' and wanting me to pull a coin out of their ear, belly-laughing when I did. They wanted me to put the coin thru the blackboard, so I did. Then they all ran outside to the other side of the wall to find the coin, and when they couldn't find it, they accused the other class of taking it, until they finally found it under my shoe. Very cute kids. We gave them 2 soccer balls Scott brought - of course this had to be a 20-minute ceremony with the whole school in attendance. All this happens on the grass/mud field as the only indoors they have are the crammed classrooms. Then for the rest of the day everyone played with the balls, even the teachers. I could never have imagined the happiness 2 soccer balls could have brought to these people, it's quite amazing. Scott and I played soccer for an hour or so with the kids - some of them really have quite the soccer skills. They seem to use a crumpled piece of plastic garbage tied in a ball, as their soccer ball, which is quite small, and I wonder if they're used to messing around with such a small ball, that when they get to a real ball, they can be that much more accurate. But they were kicking the ball flipping, out of the air, with very accurate shots. Was quite fun.
I spent some time looking at their facility and trekking down to the water spring where the kids go to get water and wash their clothes. The school's plan is to pipe this water up to the school from the spring so they can have safe drinking water at the school. They have already laid the pipe and they have the required reservoirs, they just need an electric pump and some digging and plumpbing work done. Part of the goal of this trip was to find our next water project. I think we've found it.
Judy, Priscilla's daughter-in-law who lives with them, took me on a tour of their sugar cane fields. That was quite something, long fields of high purple sugar cane as far as you can see. She pulled out a stalk so Scott and I could try it, very sweet, I can see why the kids here love it.
Today we took a motorcycle early from Priscilla's to Majango where we caught a Matatu into Kisumu where we are right now at an Internet cafe. The muddy road on the way to Majengo was a bit crazy on a motorcycle. We get 1/2 way to Majengo, the road gets real slippery, and the driver reaches for his helmet and puts it on. Yeah, thanks, instills alot of confidence in his driving ability. How about a ride where the passenger gets to wear the helmet? In the Matatu, We were stopped by a policeman looking for a bribe from the Matatu driver to pass, which is standard - the driver needs to pay them to pass, inconspicuously of course so the police don't get in trouble. The Matatu loves having us white people with them, as police seem afraid of us and our cameras that can prove their corruption so they generally let the Matatu's we are in pass. The Matatu's are all quite used, the insides are generally the steel frame, and if we're lucky, some padding on the roof for when you bang your head when they speed over the potholes. Reminded me of the taxi driver's car in Nakuru when we were looking at the animals last week. Did I mention that days ago? I was in the back while he was touring us thru the game park. We came upon a family of baboons who surrounded the car. We were fine to watch them from the car, I opened the back window and get a better look, as they were a safe distance from the car. Then the driver throws a samosa out his window! We're like 'Dude, stop feeding them! Don't do that on our account!' So a huge baboon comes to take the samosa, and of course wants more. So he sits outside MY open window behind the driver's seat in the back, wanting more. He's like 2 feet from me, staring me down thru my open window. So I go to close the window, but of course the window can't be closed - I believe it's a feature in these taxi's - so the driver's reaching back helping me to pry the bloody window shut while the baboon edges closer and closer, watching this frenzy. Sure, we can laugh about it now...
We are to meet our friend in nearby Bondo, a friend we met in Kakamega, who will show us around and take us back to the orphanage. We probably won't get to the Internet until Tuesday in Nairobi. We have our flights booked from Kisumu to Nairobi Tuesday morning, where we'll spend a few days before I fly back to Canada and Scott heads east to Mombasa. Time is getting short, but I know the next few days will seem like weeks, as the past days have seemed. We will be teaching again tomorrow - fun stuff. I was finally able to figure out the telecommunications here in Kenya and was able to get to a phone to make a call to Ute and the kids to wish them luck in their Jiu Jitsu grading yesterday. It was so good to hear their voices - it seems like I haven't talked to them in months! Very nice to hear their voices.
Till Tuesday...
This is a photo of Priscilla, the wonderful woman who is putting us up, who runs the orphanage and school.
