I have been thinking about how to end this blog.   First, I want to thank all those who supported me in this mission trip financially, with your prayers and good wishes, with textbooks, materials, technology lessons (JJ) , ideas and encouragement. I want to thank my daughter Jenny, for creating this blog and then taking my daily emails to her and putting them into this blog. This blog became very important to me, as I wrote my e-mail at the end of every day.  Not only was it a means to share with all of you  the events of the day,  but I also hoped to also give you a glimpse into the culture and people of  Kenya while keeping the focus on the purpose of the trip, which was to assist Kupenda with their mission of helping children with disablities. It also became a way for me to sort through all  the emotions that I was feeling during this time and provided me with a perfect vehicle through which to chronicle this amazing journey.

For those of you who know me well ( and for those of you who don’t) this trip represented everything that I was afraid of.  I had never been out of the country alone, heck I had never really been anywhere without someone I knew. I was afraid of bugs, spiders, most animals and of not fitting in or keeping up with a group that was significantly younger than I was and being so far away from my children. Most of all I was afraid that the workshops and my attempts to assist the teachers would be a flop and that I would not be succesful in helping  them. The one thing I was not afraid of was  the children. I loved them before I even met them and once I got to meet them I loved them even more.  That love for them and the desire to help was greater than all the fears.  So I faced all my fears and I am happy and proud to say…..” I did it”  I will never look at life  in the same way again. That’s not to say that I now love bugs, but I am not afraid of them anymore and I know that my trusty spray bottle of Listerine will do the trick.

I also want to thank our team leaders Andy and Kate Bauer. This mission trip was very well organized. The schedule kept our focus on the special needs  children with a wide variety of activities that gave us so many experiences. We also got to go out into the villages, go shopping in the marketplace and on an amazing safari. I trusted them 100% with our safety and wellbeing.

Finally, what are the next steps? Many of you have expressed an interest in helping with this cause and certainly the need is enormous and there are many ways to helpBut as Andy said, yes the need is great but things are so much better than they were 3 years ago, and with our help they will continue to move in a positive direction. The people in this area of Kenya are becoming aware that children with disabilities ” can have a good life” I have seen first hand that YES, we can make a diffence in the lives of these children. There are no laws to protect them so they depend on us. I will be communicating with Cindy Bauer ( the head of Kupenda) about ways that people can help if they are interested. If anyone would like to help in some way please let me know through this blog or my home or school e-mail.

  Check back on Thursday because we will be adding some pictures to this blog.

 So for the last time I say to all of you, “Kwaheri”

Love, Fran

The Tsavo National Park is now a semi desert because they have not had much rain in two years. Tough for both animals and vegetation. We went driving about for about an hour and saw similar animals to saturday. Our driver said we were lucky to see both a cheetah and lion up close. then we had breakfast and drove the hour and a half through the rest of the park and boarded a bus to head to Mombasa and the first leg of our journey home. Mombasa is the second largest city in kenya and the biggest seaport in Africa. The airport………………..slow…………….. long lines, computers were out, had to go through customs, ect but we made our plane. Little Kenya Airlines. Quick flight to Nairobi. We had a a 6 hour delay so we piled into two Mutatos and went into the city for dinner. I am heading out and have lots to share so more on the time in nairobi and the journey home  tomorrow.

Whenwe went to the camp restaurant for a fabulous dinner there were 4 giselles nibbling grass on my front lawnI can actually see the roof of my tent move from the pitter patter of little monkeys. I don’t get concerned because I know they can,t get in. Lol.      At 4:00 today we went out in the tsavo ( I spelled it wrong before) national park in the Range Rovers.  The tour guy said we hit the jackpot because we saw a cheetah less than 20 feet from our car. He was resting under a tree. We also saw lions but from a distance you had to use binoculars. Besides what we saw earlier, we saw ostriches, 3 kinds of giselles, antelope, and some deer type animals. There are so many different types of birds sometimes in irredescent colors. I can hear the roar of the elephant as I write this. I am pretty tired and we need to be on the rover at 6am to go out again.so I will say good night. Love Fran PS I am taking lots of pictures

We went out on these very very small bumpy roads right into the park. As we drove along we saw groups of giraffes, antelopes, giselles, elephants, and zebras. As we were driving a group of wart hogs were running and we rode right beside them. After about 2 hours we got to our camp called Satou Camp. Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined this place!!  It is like a 5 star tent.  There was a huge tent with a double bed, full bathroom in a a little tent that connects with a toilet and real sink. Everything sits on cemented stone . There is an open porch with chairs and a table.

As I sit on the porch about 5 feet from me are these little white monkeys with black faces walking around. A male baboon and a female baboon are chasing each other( actually I think the male was chasing the female) about 3 feet from my porch. That made me a little nervous and I almost went back in my tent but the ranger scared him away. As I look out from my porch are 50 elephants under the trees about a football field away ( or less). There are babies and big ones, red ones from the clay and black ones from the dirt. Every so often you hear them roar.  A monkey is now sitting on the far end of my porch, just sitting. I have the tent under neath the monkey tree. Lol I am not afraid cause if I yell they are more afraid of me. I am right in the middle of a discovery channel movie. I can hardlly believe my eyes. We are off on another safari- more later. Kwaheri!

Then a special lunch was prepared for us and the teachers, house mothers, cooks, administators and the “school committee” all attended. The school committee coinsists of one parent from each class to represent the school. After we ate the “master of ceremonies” ( every event has a program and a master of ceremonies) lol began the program. Everyone introduced themselves and then the school committee chair, the director of Kupenda, each member of the board of Kupenda, the representative from the government, and the principal of Gede special needs school each gave a speech.

Each of them formally thanked us for coming to help these last 2 weeks. The chairwoman who has a son who has no fingers but is very bright said” when my son was born I thought no one woud love him except me, because of the Gede school my child has hope that He will have a good life” They asked us to please tell our friends that they loved them and not to forget about them. This took about. 2 hours. .

The kenyan people LOVE the formal ceremony. They also sang a song for us and a talented me mber of our team playedcthe guitar and sang a song. . Then we went to see the children and we gave each child a little bottle of coca cola or fanta. The kids just loved it and wanted their picture taken with them drinking their soda.  We said our goodgyes to the children and teachers. Lots of tears, hugs and more pictures.

Something the principal, Madame Karo, said at the goodbye luncheon summed up my feelings exactly–she said ” and Jesus said whatsoever you do to the least of my brothers, is that which you do unto me. ” Kwaheri everyone! ( Good night)

We visited the classes and showed the children the switch toys, which they loved. Because all the teachers want to use the switch toys , the director of Kupenda decided we would leave them in his office and teachers from all the schools could sign them out for week. The same with all the textbooks I brought. I had given a teacher at the workshop a book on developing behavior plans and I saw it on the headmaster’s desk. He took it from the teacher because he deals with behavior from all the classes. He showed me how he was reading and summarizing each chapter. These teachers are thirsting for more knowledge with little resources. Then I went back to Gede to do crafts with some of the children. Tomorrow is our last day with the children as we leave for the Safari on Saturday.

In this blog I willl describe the bathroom facilities since I had to use the one at Gede for the first time. The other people from our team refer to the as “squatty pottys” lol it is basically a basin in the ground. And that is a step up from what most Kenyans have. I took a picture of it. We are lucky in our houses we have a toilet albeit a very very primitive one. Our shower is the corner of the bathroom that has been sectioned off with two pieces of wood. There is a head of the shower and a hole in the floor for the water to drain out. We do have some hot water. No shower curtains ect. This shower is considered a luxury in Kenya. Most of them wash themselves from a basin. One of my team members took their shower with this huge cockroach bug running around ( I have had to also deal with this bug until Emma caught it last night and threw it out the window. ) Huray for that although I spray the bugs with my trusty listerine and it really does keep them away. I should do a commercial for that stuff when I get back. Lol kwaheri everyone. Love Fran

I thought I would share a little aboiut the food tonight. We have some nice men who prepare our meals. In the morning fresh mangos, papaya and pineapple with toast and scrambled eggs. I usually have toast and kenyan coffee. I brought my own hazlenut creamers ( they travel well) the coffee is great! For lunch we make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.   My most memorable supper was baracuda, baked., standing upright complete with eyes and teeth and a potato in its mouth. I took its picture but only ate the potato. Lol Other nights we had shrimp stew ( yummy ) calamari stew ( not for this girl) lots of rice and beans and fried chicken. Chickens are everywhere; school, streets, stores in and out of houses . I cankt bring myself to eat it. We also had what they called “Italian night” spaghetti with a spicy hamburger tomatoi sauce. Very tasty. If there is dessert its a tiny banana which is very sweet. The kenyans themseves eat a lot of “ugali” which is smashed corn mixed with water, looks like grits only they let it harden intoi alump and pull off pieces.. They eat this with beans or stew I have not trird this yet but I willl probably have to at the next group dinner. .                      Kwaheri ( good night )

I brought a little boom box and some music cds that jenny burnt from our preschool teachers. The CP classesloved it and we did the macarena and taught them the YMCA song and then we did a Congo line to the locomotion song. Imagine children with one leg or no legs or different types of CP doing a Congo line. What a beautiful sight!  The deaf classes are leveled like a public school although if you are say 15 and just starting school you go to Kindergarten. Many od the deaf students are very bright and will go to secondary deaf school. In one deaf class we had a dance party They love to dance! No music, profoundly deaf they danced up a storm one at atime. They watch michael Jackson and imitate him to a T. They were terrific!  I worked a lot with the teachers showing them how to manage many children ( 10 to 20) on many diifferent levels with no resources. They use rocks and bottle caps for counting. Very little paper or chalk although our group brought over quite a bit. Nice day IIm pooped. We get there about 8 and help until 4.  As I am writing this there is asmall gecko walking on the ceiling. Luckily I am in the mosquito netting. Also I sleep with my spray bottle of listerine. Kills bugs on contact and freshens your breath. LOL nite

Megan a girl on the team, the director, Andy the team leader and I went to two homes.  It was way off the beaten path. We parked the van, and walked thru the corn fields, by the chickens and goats and many other mud huts. I am getting very good at walking many miles with a heavy backpack.  We visited a little boy 12 years old who was born normal. A few years ago he got encephalitis and became very ill. The muscles in his legs atrophied and they are no use to him. He also has a lttle hydrocephalus and is very suceptible to eye and ear infections. BUT he is cognitively just fine. I gave him a package of peanut butter crackers and once I opened it he was able to get his crackers  and eat it perfectly. He is smart enough to go to regular school but he needs a wheelchair and money for school fees and special food because he was malnourished from the infection.

His name is Jimmy. I knew that God had sent me to that particular house for a reason and I decided that I would sponsor him to go to school and get him a wheelchair in Jimmy’s memory. I took lots of pictures of him that I’ll show u when I get back. When I left him they told him that now he could go to school, he smiled and nodded his head wisely.  There are many ways to help these children. If you are interested let  me know when I get back and Ill tell u how.  Love u all. Fran

The entire shopping is done on the bartering system. Everything is handmade and made out of beads cow horns, wood, soapstone,coconuts, ect. Their money is schillings and its about 75 schillings to the dollar. It is an amazing experience. You walk from little shack to little shack and they come up to you and beg you to come into their store. We were prepped for this so we were fine. I did really well with this. Its difficult because you are constantly trying to convert the schiilings to dollars. They start really high and then they say let’s negotiate. LOL they are so very poor that they need your business. If you pretend to walk out you get your price. If we go back, I’m going to write down the money exchange so we can negotiate a fair price. I’m feeling like I did too well and I want to pay a fair price for my crafts. Tomorrow up at six to work in. The schools for the day. I will be working in the cerebral palsy classes. There are 3 of them. So I will sign off now toi go to sleep. It is 11:30, earliest night this week. LOL. Love, Fran