................Team Kenya 2009

Safari Time!

2009-07-07T08:44:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, we are all safe and healthy. We have had a great time here in Kitale, now it is time to have some fun and see some wild animals!!! We are off to our safari now!!!

We will see you all once we are back in Canada.

We land in Toronto on Friday afternoon.

See you all soon,
Paul

Free Day

2009-07-07T00:58:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody! Well, yesterday was our last full day in Kitale before we leave today (everyone was tired and we never got around to blogging yesterday night). Well, yesterday was the Eldoret Shopping day, after a 1:20h van ride we arrived in Eldoret and visited Robert’s store where we bought all of our souvenirs and assorted crafts. With everyone crowded into a very tiny store we were scanning the shelves of figurines and other bowls, spoons and drums. Later, after we all left shopping we headed out for lunch in Eldoret, right after ordering our food and receiving our drinks, the power goes out (again). We ate our food and left in the dark. The van ride back was just as bumpy as the ride there, with old speed bumps and pot holes tossing us around every which way. One thing people over 6’ have learned is that we should always duck; the van roof is not overly padded and never fun to hit. Anyway, after we returned back to TI there was not much to do, with everyone taking a few last pictures and charging ipods and the day came to a close quite fast. Dinner was tacos with homemade guacamole, salsa and tortillas. After filling our stomachs we just sat around playing the guitar and talking until Meredith gave us a short message and the team talked about how this experience in Kenya has changed our life. Well, that’s all folks, sorry there are no pictures of town, there are no cameras allowed in town.

See everyone soon

-Sam

2 Days In One Post!

2009-07-05T11:49:00.000-07:00

Heyo! It’s Chrisy Hurn blogging at you! I hope that you all in Canada are having a nice time doing what you do. Ok, so! Yesterday morning we all woke up and did our usual morning routine. Then we hopped on the Matatu to go to HBF. It was pretty fun as usual. When we got there my team had to finish up painting our room, so Justine and Sam took that project on. I however along with everyone else snuggled (and tickled of course) all the orphaned kids at HBF. It was fantastic if I do say so myself. Those children are the cutest little things one can ever see. Unlike Canadian children they accept you right away with open arms. If they are playing a game of football (soccer) and fall on the ground or scrape their knee they don’t start to cry but they get back up and keep playing. We are not supposed to have favorites, but honestly its hard not to. The little girl I fell absolutely in love with (Rubi), would sit on my lap and snuggle in, but not just sit there but she would use all he little force to push herself closer and tighter into my arms. Another girl (I forget her name) Laura and I fell in love with. She was beautiful and had a sweet voice, we hung out with her pretty much the whole time. Laura and I were heartbroken when we found out she is HIV positive. She even fell asleep in my arms. Unfortunately Saturday was our last day at HBF, so we had to say goodbye. Another girl that I loved to tickle (and she liked to bounce around on my lap) gave me a huge hug, and she wouldn’t let go, the last thing she said to me was, “please don’t go”. Saying goodbye to these beautiful children was painful to all of us. When we loaded back into the Matatu, almost all the girls were in tears. It was hard to think about how these beautiful children who embraced us with open arms and who we fell in love with may never see us again. We got back home and went straight to the market to get some yummy ice cream. When we finally got back home to the compound we were completely beat tired. I wanted to sleep but I had to help cook dinner. We had grilled cheese sandwiches and some really yummy noodles. After my team finished washing the dishes we all gathered together for a talk. A talk about manliness and womanliness. For some of us this was a very touchy subject. WE then ate a beautifully decorated 4th of July cake (made by Meredith, it tasted even better than it looked). Then we all went to bed.

OK SO! TODAY we all woke up, however it was not our usual morning routine. The guys, and Laurie, woke up at 7 to slaughter the two goats we would be eating for dinner. The boys took a video of it but it was too painful for me to cry because the goat was crying. Then we all ate breakfast and some of us decided to go to Kenyan church. We went to Lighthouse Baptist church with Mark and Derek. We were greeted with hello’s, handshakes, hugs and kisses. The worship was sweet cause everyone was super into it and dancing around (haha my kind of church!). Those Kenyans know where it’s at. Then the pastor gave a message, but it was kinda hard to understand. After church we all walked home and prepared for the guests that came over tonight. The guys then proceeded to slaughter a bunny, it was so cute. We did a little house cleaning, some people played volleyball, some took naps, I played guitar. When people started to arrive we fired up the barbeque and cooked the bunny and goats. I tried some bunny but I didn’t really like the taste. I thought the goat at first tasted a bit like fish, but then it got a little better. Everyone (as in the guests) brought side dishes that were delicious. I have never seen so many mazungu’s in my life. Then we all gathered around the campfire (while other TK members worked tirelessly in the kitchen washing dishes) and sang worship songs together. It was a pretty stellar night. And now, here I am. I am a little tired now so I am going to go to bed now. GOODNIGHTTT!

HBF Part 2

2009-07-03T10:54:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody :)

Day Six of being in Kenya.
It wasn’t to much different then yesterday we woke up, well the guys did around 6am, and then we ate breakfast. And 7am came around and the girls were still sound asleep, so we decided to chuck rocks and there tin roof. After breakfast, we had our daily Devo’s and our main topic was on humbling yourself.
9:30 came and we left for the HBF in a van and we all crammed in there again, when we got there we had another warm welcoming from the kids :) and we began to get our paint on. The one girls room was being painted yellow, and the other colour was not in stock so they could only paint 2/4 walls. The sitting room was painted grey two walls one gray, and another two walls another shade of grey, it look really awesome, and the guys room was painted a dark blue, and a green, which also looked very classy. Half way through the painting we took a break to spend time with some of the kids, and to give us a break from the building up of paint fumes.
For lunch we had Beans, and Cabbage. It was fairly good. We quickly finished up lunch and spent some more time loving the kids, and receiving so much love from them. The van came and picked us up, and we went back to the compound.
When we got back, I helped cut the veggies for dinner. Than we played a sweet game of volleyball. We ate dinner, and now its update the blog time. That pretty much sums up our day and I hope your all doing great.

Jordan White
On behalf of Team Kenya

HBF - Part 1

2009-07-02T11:05:00.000-07:00

Hey it’s Justine! I’m writing the blog today because I had the first “story of the day.” So last night, after previously waking up due to the impossible to find mosquito in our room (including Tegan and myself), at around 4:30a.m. my shoulder felt like it was being tickled… Half asleep I rubbed it but the feeling didn’t go away, thus I reached into my shirt to scratch my shoulder and, low and behold, there was a crunchy, long, and ugly “flying snake” in my shirt! I was so disturbed by this mystery bug (for I didn’t know what it was at the time) that I couldn’t sleep there. So Tegan and I got dressed for the day (shaking my clothes out beforehand, of course) and went to sleep in the main building. I had to kill two mosquitos in the sitting room before falling asleep around 5:30. I still shudder thinking about it!
Anyhow, this morning we talked about all of the things we have vs. what Kenyan’s have. It was pointed out in numerous ways that we have turned luxuries into necessities and still aren’t satisfied with our lives and what we have. That example is only one of the many topics covered, and it turned into an emotional morning. Once quiet time with the Lord was over and our matatu (a bus-like vehicle, only smaller) arrived, all 20 of us riled in for a squishy 4-to-a-bench ride. There was a separation between some of the seats so Jordan and I had to sit on a plank of wood across the gaps. We were pulled over by the cops because we had too many people, so our driver had to bribe them to let us continue. We reached the HBF (Hope Bright Future) orphanage/school with our painting equipment and got to work priming the boy’s room, girl’s room, and the sitting room. The high walls made it hard to reach the top without ladders, so Laura sat on Tegans shoulders to reach as their solution. A story you at home in Canada might find funny: Ernie was taught by either Mark or Derek how to say “I am Canadian” in Swahili! They had him scream it as loud as he could during painting while the kids were outside playing and they killed themselves laughing! He still is unaware at this moment that what he actually said was “I’m a fart!” Once we were finished we went outside and played tag and mimicking games (like Simon Says) with the children. We had them saying Bethany’s popular phrase: “OH MY CHARLIE!” which Mark let us in on at lunch that “Charlie” happened to mean boyfriend in Swahili. So… we had all of the children chanting “OH MY BOYFRIEND!” which all of us found hilarious afterwards. I absolutely loved how all you had to do was smile at a child and they would smile immediately and latch themselves to you.
Before lunch, the highest class performed with songs and poetry for us and each of the teachers individually welcomed us and encouraged us to “feel at Canada” (at home). We then gave them gifts of school supplies while the children clapped for every item taken out of the bags. Everyone enjoyed the lunch of rice, peas and potatoes (yes mom, I ate potatoes). Then, we all took advantage of the last 20 minutes we had with the children, which was followed by a painful goodbye. Overall it was an amazing and humbling day, and THANK GOODNESS we’re going back tomorrow!
Miss you all,
On behalf of Kenya Team!

Canada Day!

2009-07-01T10:46:00.000-07:00

SUP CANADIANS!

BOYS DAY

Yo happy Canada day YALL, hope u enjoyed fireworks. It stinks cause if we lit fireworks here we would get arrested. LOL. K so anyways our day started normally and stuff, then the boys stayed and played volleyball, while the girls went to the Neema house. I sweated. Lots L. Afterwards we went to work on the chicken coop so that our chickens won’t be homeless. Sawing was TORTURE, I got blisters and they hurt. A lot. There were a lot of miscalculations and problems, but we got it done! After that we played croquet, I lost because I hit the ball like 50,000 feet away. Soon lunch came around and we had leftover spaghetti with sauce and samosas. SO GOOD. Yah so after lunch we went to kill some chickens. Not to be too graphic, but we decapitated them and plucked their feathers off and had chicken stew for dinner! People like Laura were FREAKED out by the dancing headless chickens. It’s a good thing the girls made it back in time to see the last 2 chickens. Chicken stew was GREAT, and we had this pan fried dough thing which was SO GOOD. I ate 3 of those and 2 bowls of soup; I was VERY full. After dinner we just sat around with the American interns J. OH BY THE WAY, we celebrated Canada day with a Canadian flag and a Canadian flagged cake. J

Have FUN IN CANADA,

ERNIE CHOW :D

The Girls Day

Hey its Laura. Soo Ernie pretty much summed the day up except for when the girls went to the Neema house. We left early in the morning, which was very tough for us because are alarm clock didn’t go off! Yaa so I skipped breakfast and headed in the room for worship and devos. It was really good! K so then we arrived at the Neema house by a crazy taxi driver. There are 6 girls at the Neema house. They had been taken in because they had all been abused by men in some way or another. They were sooo sweet. We played volleyball with them and another game like monkey in the middle only you are supposed to whip the ball at the person in the middle. It seemed to me like I was always that person in the middle…. So after that we had lunch and I found a grasshopper in my HUGE meal. I felt sick, but sucked it up. They gave us such a huge meal! It was so hard to finish. I could tell that everyone was feeling the same way. The meal was really good though which helped, we had rice and beans. Finally it was the end of the day and we found ourselves on are way home. When we came back we were in for a huge surprise, 2 DEAD chickens were being held up by the guys! It was the scariest thing I had ever seen. (don’t worry we got pictures) J hahaa. I really stretched myself today. I was eventually able to watch the last 2 chickens flap around on the floor.. yaaah. It was difficult to watch. Well overall it was a good day! HAPPY CANADA DAY!

LAURA SIMMONDS

Day 4

2009-06-30T10:56:00.000-07:00

HEY EVERYBODY!!!!!!!

Day two of being in Kenya. We started our morning at 6:00 am with showers and getting ready for the day. About half way through Jordan’s and Sam’s shower the power went out and they were forced to finish their shower’s with cold water. After making breakfast of bread, banana’s, coffee, green oranges, mango, tea and toast for those fortunate enough to be making breakfast as the power came back on, we gathered for devotions. Once we spent some quality time with God, it was time to hit the streets of Kenya. We walked for an hour, avoiding pooh patties, mud puddles, cars, bikes and other people. As we walked through the market, people were staring and greeting us with what English they knew. We walked past a school and the children came running to the fence and began asking the group “How are you?” in unison almost like a song. When we finally arrived at our destination for the day, Neema Kenya Care Center, we were greeted with cheers and open arms as the children ran out of their class rooms to greet us. We split into three groups and told a bible study to the children. After the story we did crafts and played with the kids. Before we departed, the children sang us several songs and recited a few poems.

We continued our journey through town to a restaurant for lunch. Some people were adventurous and tried some interesting stews and other African foods. Others were not so adventurous and stuck to the traditional Swiss Chalet style Kenyan chicken and chips (otherwise known as French fries). We then went to a supermarket and did some simple shopping where some people had some ice cream. As we were walking home the clouds threatened to rain but held off until we made it back to the compound. We enjoyed some free time, some people played guitars, others played volley ball and some just relaxed. We had a delicious beef stew dinner and some fellowship time. After another full day we are all ready to hit the sack and rest up for another day of adventure.

Daniel Klauke
On behalf of Team Kenya

2009-06-29T11:23:00.000-07:00

Hey guys =)

WE’RE HERE !!!

Everything has gone smoothly and there has been no problems. The second plane from London to Nairobi was 8.5 hours long, and for 8 hours of it we had no entertainment due to the system overheating!!! The food wasn’t that bad either! When we finally got to the airport in Nairobi, some of us girls didn’t need to pay our VISA entry fee because “beautiful girls don’t pay”! We then were greeted by a very excited Sean, Meredith, and Daniel; we exchanged our money and went to our hotel.

To curve jet lag we forced ourselves to stay awake for the entire day today including the 8 hour crazy bus ride. The roads were extremely bumpy, worse than we’ve ever been on. On the ride we saw many awesome things: Zebras, baboons, volcanoes, and some crazy looking trees. We piled 4 people in the back seat of every taxi, and were off to the T.I compound. The house and property is amazing, and we’re now all settled in. Everyone is exhausted from the journey and are all anticipating a goodnights sleep in our new home for the next 12 days.

Talk to you all soon,

Alaya
On behalf of Team Kenya

Off to the Airport!

2009-06-27T10:12:00.000-07:00

Here we go!

We are leaving for the airport. We will be traveling to London, than to Nairobi!

Thank you for all your support.

We will post when we reach Kitale on Monday.

Remember we are 7 hours ahead!

On our way,

Team Kenya

Come Along for the Trip

2009-06-17T11:36:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! Welcome to the official Team Kenya blog. We want to invite you to be apart of our trip.

Every couple of day (when we can get a connection) we will update you on what we have been doing. Maybe we can put up a few pics too!

You can also leave us a message in the comment box, so we can hear from you!

We leave Saturday June 27th and return on Friday July 10th.

On our way,
Team Kenya