squirrel hunting and emotional list of lasts.

hey everyone, this blog only has about maybe a week and a half left cause i am home in less then a week. so just a heads up.

it's been calm here for the most part but i have about 5 days till i leave. we are trying to make the best of it and get a lot of stuff done but its tough to do with the things planned here. bill, my roommate, is the computer teacher for the school, we just got the school hooked up to a network so 2 computers can run off the internet. i know it sounds high tech and totally crazy, but it's a yellow cord that goes to one computer to another, not as crazy. but his computer classes are writing emails to his friends and are in the computer lab from 8 am to 9 pm trying to get everyone to send out at least 3. its good stuff for them to learn, but takes a lot of work to execute. after we leave the computer lab might or might not be open anymore since the only people that know how to work with and fix computers are leaving. but who knows. this place is a graveyard for donated computers.

monday was a fun day, i found out the school had a squirrel problem and they were eating all the seeds that have been planted, crazy right? i also found out that they caught one in a trap right when i was debating finding meat for dinner (lack of meat makes me go crazy). i asked if i killed it, if i could have it, the technician said sure and it was mine. easy to kill and clean, fur comes off like nothing. threw it in a pan with some oil and it tasted amazing. it has the color and texture of chicken, but a way better taste. i loved it. also i got free meat. everyone that tried it liked it too, even the kenyans who thought i was crazy. so now i am checking the trap everyday for a male that is crafty and cocky. i baited it with oranges and still waiting.

early saturday morning i went out with the cook to search for a goat for Madaraka day which is independence day for Kenya. we walked 3 km to a nice ranch that raised them, but they were asking for 5000 and i only wanted to spend 3000. so we walked backed, discussed options such as going to a strange part of Nairobi and visiting a slaughter house. 20 min after i got back, Lucy our team mom called me down to look at one that was 3000, it was small, but i liked it. so now i am the owner of a animal again. this one will last maybe one meal but feed all the kids.

i gave my last 2 sermons here to the kids and am officially done. today is our last sunday here so it will be a strange, sad day. i still teach everyday this week, since i leave late friday. 2 new housemates are coming on wednesday i guess, but who knows if it will happen. no school for Madaraka day, so only 4 days to teach. it will be tough to leave, but i really will be happy to be home. Kidscamp will go on at the end of june, and i am very excited to be going for my 5th year in a row. i have graduation parties to go to and such also, and many things that i am very excited for. my grandpas 90th is what i am excited for the most i think, cause it makes it easy to see the whole family and also see my grandpa.

no real updates other then that. i leave friday night at 2355 and arrive in Zurich at around 0600 then leave zurich at around 1300 then back in the u.s june 4th at around 1635. so yeah.

my toilet runneth over

so much has gone on since i last posted, so thats why i avoided the introduction. lets jump into the awesomeness that has been my last week.

-school started at the school and i am teaching a whole whole lot. I picked up 2 more bible classes and now i am head p.e teacher which is fun too.

-last wednesday, we helped deliver food to a IDP camp near by. IDP stands for internally displaced person, a nicer term then what they really are, refugee. they come from areas that were hit with the violence of the past elections that ruined most of this country. the "camp" was nothing more then an empty field that the people live in and wait for the area they used to live, to get better. for some, homes were burned, families were killed, people were chased. it's tough to see, but the delivery of food makes it somewhat better. there was a camera crew and many local officials who came to see the delivery. it was a great 2 hours.

-last friday i hauled all the materials i brought through Nairobi to drop off with a pastor. the bag was around 50 lbs and awkwardly shaped. i got looked at a lot but i liked it. i called the bag "50 lbs of trust" because missions press trusted me with every once of that bag. i loved being able to haul it.

-came home after a long day of hauling the bag to the news that we were having our last all night prayer meeting here. so the whole night was filled with prayer and mini sermons and mandazies and tea. i went to sleep around 4:30 am.

-at 7:30 am, i woke up to go to Nairobi to help my roommate find a suit. suits are cheap here, like really really cheap. so we went to an area called Eastleigh that is really the suit district of kenya. it's full of refugees who came and made a living here. it's great to see, but they tough to make a deal with.

-made a new friend in a shop in Nairobi.

-sunday i got hit with a very, very nasty fever and the flu. i struggled out of bed and questioned me staying in it the rest of the day. after service, i crashed for 5 hours and then was woken up saying that i had to go to a dinner at a woman who has grown fond of us. i never turn down meals, but this was crazy. if i declined, it was like spitting in the face of the woman who invited us. so i went, ate great kikuyu food, and then struggled back.

-the title of this blog was taken from the words i mouthed while trying to fix our toilet. the floor has been looking like hurricane katrina washed through since last week. i still laugh every time i see the water.

so yeah, there is my last week. i only have 16 days left till i leave, which makes me sad that my time is up, and that i have to return to the normal life that America holds for me. i will cry when i leave, and will always miss these kids. i am in the process of trying to find a final feast for the kids to have. it's between 50 pounds of pig, or one goat. tough choice. but i want to leave them with something good.

love you all. 

what TIA has taught me

I think my favorite and most frequently used term used since coming here is TIA or time in Africa. It got really popular from the movie Blood diamond, but here it’s an every day thing. You might use the term in reference to what we call “African time”, which is when you’re supposed to start at one time, but several hours past the original time, you have yet to start. Like on Sunday, I went to a church and they had a car to pick us up, it was supposed to pick us up at 8 am, but did not get there until 9 am. We went to a crusade right after the service that was supposed to start at 3 pm, but started at 5, we were supposed to be back before 6, but we did not make it home till after 10 pm that night. TIA. But it can also be used for when something goes wrong. Today as I washed my very dirty clothes, a thunder head filled the sky and poured rain non stop, again TIA, but it was not over, as the rain poured, my clothes line broke, dropping all my clothes. TIA. So this happens quite a bit, and sometimes it sucks. Like when the internet won’t work on a computer it always worked on or when your matatu breaks down when you’re trying to make it home before dark. Kenya teaches you a lot about life but even more about your faith. You can’t put your reliance in anything but God. You can’t plan for anything either, video chat dates get interrupted by the annoyance of no power, dinners get pushed back because the kitchen is not cleared of people, and the lesson you want to teach a class gets pushed back due to classes flooding with water. But that’s life. And to be honest it makes the good moments better. Its one thing that I kinda enjoy about Kenya is the unpredictability. I like setting times and dates, but it takes the surprise out of the moment. Here its fun to have the element of surprise and being unsure of what will happen in that day.

Kenya teaches other things though that makes life harder at first but grow accustomed to as time goes on. Washing your clothes takes time and energy and is nothing like it is at home. At home, you toss in the clothes in the washing machine, put in the soap and crank the knob. Here it requires 2 buckets and a bar of soap and a lot of water and of course a clothes line. Most of the time as your clothes dries on the line, they will fall off and land in the dirt, and you must wash again. This would be annoying to most, but it teaches you patience and to work hard for the simple things. Showering used to require a bucket and cold water and a wash cloth. Bathing was a chore, and cold water sucked during cold nights and cleaning yourself was a lengthy issue. But I learned again that these simple tasks take more energy to most people around the world. I get to experience what it would be like to be someone who lives their life doing these things. It enhances the life I lived back home. I kick myself now for mocking the food served at camps, because now I wish for that food. There is always that person that comes back from a mission’s trip and says “it really makes you thankful for what you have”, though it’s a cliché, it’s true. Everything that we have is a luxury, eating steak for dinner is not needed, but it’s wanted over eating ugali and beans. Showering in a nice heated shower is a luxury, when your option is pouring water over yourself with an empty sprite bottle with somewhat unclean water. It’s one of those things that everyone must do at least once in their life. I know I have changed because of it. And I realize that I have become the person I make fun of that comes off a 2 week mission’s trip and says their life is changed forever. I used to look at those people as wannabe missionaries and philanthropist who only want the fame, but not the work. I was that person for a while, after I came back the first time, I thought of how cool and good it was that I went, but now as I sit here waiting for the power to kick off at any moment, I realize how small my contribution is to the world. when I think of other missionaries who devote their lives to one country or area, and work everyday to make it a little bit better, I can only realize that I devoted not my life to Kenya, but 4 months. I’m not saying that this trip is nothing, because doing work for FMP and teaching the kids is hard work. But it’s not me alone doing the work. I am a very small fish in a big pond when it comes to FMP, and I am one of many teachers and volunteers and missionaries who have devoted time to helping these kids. I think the transformation that is really taking place happens more to me then the world. That alone makes the trip worth it. My faith, personality, breaking point, and ability to love and understand people has changed, which I think is the greatest thing I could ever learn. So in short, I love Kenya not because of the food, or the buildings and living conditions, but for the way God can work through a land and people that have little material wealth, but can love and need love.

p.s Bin Laden being dead is not as good as it sounds when your over seas in a place that was once attacked by friends of Bin Laden.