Poinsettia trees at Isaac's farm!
Paw paw tree? Not sure about this one...
Trumpet vines are everywhere!
So are watermelons!
And bananas and avacados! Yummy.
Okay so if you are still reading this, it was only flora, no fauna in this post :-)
Sunday, August 19, 2012
Flora and fauna in Kangundo
Poinsettia trees at Isaac's farm!
Paw paw tree? Not sure about this one...
Trumpet vines are everywhere!
So are watermelons!
And bananas and avacados! Yummy.
Okay so if you are still reading this, it was only flora, no fauna in this post :-)
The road to Eldoret
Four hour drive to Eldoret includes :
Crossing the Equator!
Zebras on the side of the road...
Baboons on the side of the road...
The Great Rift Valley...
Vendors at the look out for the Rift Valley...
Vendors along the side of the road...
Beautiful acacia trees on either side of the road...
Wood stacked ten feet high on a bicycle ...
Produce stands built along the side of the road...
Flock of geese following a farmer...
Beautiful scenery everywhere!
Green maize fields! It is much wetter in this part of Kenya!
Red fence overlooking the Rift...
Hat overlooking Rift valley ;-)
Crossing the Equator!
Zebras on the side of the road...
Baboons on the side of the road...
The Great Rift Valley...
Vendors at the look out for the Rift Valley...
Vendors along the side of the road...
Beautiful acacia trees on either side of the road...
Wood stacked ten feet high on a bicycle ...
Produce stands built along the side of the road...
Flock of geese following a farmer...
Beautiful scenery everywhere!
Green maize fields! It is much wetter in this part of Kenya!
Red fence overlooking the Rift...
Hat overlooking Rift valley ;-)
Teaching at New Dawn
Karen Prigodich asked how the last day of teaching went at New Dawn. I said, "It was three days past the end of their term." Karen replied, " Enough said." Despite the fact they were giving up some of their school holiday time, the lesson went fairly well. Good thing I was reaching art!
This student did a great job "channeling" Miro after the line family lesson. And then we all made more art for cards to sell later.
Erin has been such a great help! We make a good team!
After class I had an amazing talk with Casey. She is the young woman on the left below. This is her second year at New Dawn, and while this picture may not show it, she has an incredible spirit, despite having lost her father at age three and then having witnessed her mother shot and killed right in front of her during the unrest in Eldoret when she was eleven.
This isn't something she usually talks about, so I was incredibly humbled that she opened up to me. She shared with me some poems she has written to help her find healing in her grief and I was able to share with her one of mine. Please pray for Casey, who lives with her aunt, as she continues to deal with the pain in her life. She absolutely loves New Dawn and is so grateful to be there. One of her favorite verses is "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."
It was also great to have Nate, in the middle, who loves to be social, and helped pass out materials each day. Casey's best friend Devin is on the right. She is one of the student leaders and was always checking in to see if I needed anything. They are all amazing young people.
This student did a great job "channeling" Miro after the line family lesson. And then we all made more art for cards to sell later.
Erin has been such a great help! We make a good team!
After class I had an amazing talk with Casey. She is the young woman on the left below. This is her second year at New Dawn, and while this picture may not show it, she has an incredible spirit, despite having lost her father at age three and then having witnessed her mother shot and killed right in front of her during the unrest in Eldoret when she was eleven.
This isn't something she usually talks about, so I was incredibly humbled that she opened up to me. She shared with me some poems she has written to help her find healing in her grief and I was able to share with her one of mine. Please pray for Casey, who lives with her aunt, as she continues to deal with the pain in her life. She absolutely loves New Dawn and is so grateful to be there. One of her favorite verses is "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."
It was also great to have Nate, in the middle, who loves to be social, and helped pass out materials each day. Casey's best friend Devin is on the right. She is one of the student leaders and was always checking in to see if I needed anything. They are all amazing young people.
Road to Haruma
On the way to the New Dawn school, this is typical of what you see in the neighborhood leading up to the Haruma slum. Huge estates walled off from each other.
On the boundary road between the neighborhood above and the Haruma slum. Estates to the left. Shanty sheds to the right.
Woman selling her produce directly across the road from the walled estates.
View of the Haruma slum from the balcony of the new addition of New Dawn. The school is an oasis in the midst of incredible poverty and hopelessness.
Here is Erin greeting the slum children who come out as soon as we park the van.
One of these little girls was carrying her baby brother on her back.
One of the goals of New Dawn is to become fully sustainable. They have a huge Kale garden, three cows, and a large greenhouse for raising tomatoes and peppers. What they don't use to feed the students, they sell.
I got to be friends with Minah the caretaker who was chopping grasses to feed the cows. The assistant cook was wearing an apron that caught my eye...it was an apron from our Art Camp days at church! Miriam had given it to her!
These round black plastic structures in the foreground are pod container gardens that grow vegetables out the sides and can sustain a family of eight. We watched several being built around the grounds of New Dawn. This garden project was begun last year through Kizimani.
The new addition is incredible. It is three stories high ( that is three used shipping containers high) which now house a faculty space, all school meeting space, library, biology lab, chem and physics lab, computer lab, and a media room where Hans held his Bible teaching seminars with the faculty (complete with white board!) our first few days there the students were busily getting ready for the dedication ceremony for the annex, so in the midst of my teaching art, there was a beehive of activity: moving furniture, putting books on the library shelves, carpenters using skill saws right outside my classroom, electricians finishing wiring, painters painting, etc.
Science lab above, computer lab below awaiting computers to be installed.
Library books all put away.
Media room all set up for Hans and his teaching!
Hans also had the opportunity to represent Kizimani at the dedication ceremony for the addition and he even gave an address. It was an incredible experience and truly the highlight of the trip for him.
On the boundary road between the neighborhood above and the Haruma slum. Estates to the left. Shanty sheds to the right.
Woman selling her produce directly across the road from the walled estates.
View of the Haruma slum from the balcony of the new addition of New Dawn. The school is an oasis in the midst of incredible poverty and hopelessness.
Here is Erin greeting the slum children who come out as soon as we park the van.
One of these little girls was carrying her baby brother on her back.
One of the goals of New Dawn is to become fully sustainable. They have a huge Kale garden, three cows, and a large greenhouse for raising tomatoes and peppers. What they don't use to feed the students, they sell.
I got to be friends with Minah the caretaker who was chopping grasses to feed the cows. The assistant cook was wearing an apron that caught my eye...it was an apron from our Art Camp days at church! Miriam had given it to her!
These round black plastic structures in the foreground are pod container gardens that grow vegetables out the sides and can sustain a family of eight. We watched several being built around the grounds of New Dawn. This garden project was begun last year through Kizimani.
The new addition is incredible. It is three stories high ( that is three used shipping containers high) which now house a faculty space, all school meeting space, library, biology lab, chem and physics lab, computer lab, and a media room where Hans held his Bible teaching seminars with the faculty (complete with white board!) our first few days there the students were busily getting ready for the dedication ceremony for the annex, so in the midst of my teaching art, there was a beehive of activity: moving furniture, putting books on the library shelves, carpenters using skill saws right outside my classroom, electricians finishing wiring, painters painting, etc.
Science lab above, computer lab below awaiting computers to be installed.
Library books all put away.
Media room all set up for Hans and his teaching!
Hans also had the opportunity to represent Kizimani at the dedication ceremony for the addition and he even gave an address. It was an incredible experience and truly the highlight of the trip for him.
Friday, August 17, 2012
Firsts
Marabou storks
Crossing 4 lanes of oncoming traffic
Nairobi traffic jams
Matatu taxi van rides
Warthogs
Acacia trees
Sacred Ibis
Zebras on the side of the road
Great Rift Valley
Kenyan hospitality
Kenyan church
Pineapple Fanta soda
63 students in one classroom
63 students all well behaved
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Crossing 4 lanes of oncoming traffic
Nairobi traffic jams
Matatu taxi van rides
Warthogs
Acacia trees
Sacred Ibis
Zebras on the side of the road
Great Rift Valley
Kenyan hospitality
Kenyan church
Pineapple Fanta soda
63 students in one classroom
63 students all well behaved
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Thursday, August 16, 2012
Chickens, cows, and goats. Oh my!
Sheep too. They are everywhere once you leave the heart of Nairobi. Along the sides of the road, crossing the roads, wandering about, sometimes tethered, sometimes loose. The cows are frequently brahmas and along with donkeys are the beasts of burden, yoked to carts of wood. The chickens and roosters are of the leghorn variety.
Can you guess what happened here while we were at lunch?
We even ran across a familiar Thanksgiving friend...
In Kangundo at Isaac's farm we arrived early enough in the morning to hear the roosters crowing throughout the surrounding homes and villages. Erin and I walked to the viewpoint of Isaac's land. The vista was stunning and the distant crowing simply enhanced the peace we felt.
On Sunday we attended Isaac's church.
Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Can you guess what happened here while we were at lunch?
We even ran across a familiar Thanksgiving friend...
In Kangundo at Isaac's farm we arrived early enough in the morning to hear the roosters crowing throughout the surrounding homes and villages. Erin and I walked to the viewpoint of Isaac's land. The vista was stunning and the distant crowing simply enhanced the peace we felt.
On Sunday we attended Isaac's church.
Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Painting in Kangundo
Kenya Rule #2: Make do with what you got.
Our high hopes for painting the classroom and dorm room for the special needs students were radically adjusted as we discovered our time and adequate supplies were severely limited. The first day, our task was to sweep down the crumbling cement walls and then the floor. We used local "brooms" made of branches from some bush tied together at one end. We soon realized there was no way to completely make the walls free from dust. In Kenya, after you sweep the walls, you then "wash" the walls. We were given two metal bowls with some water. But then all we had were our paint brushes with which to wash the walls.
All this really accomplished was spreading a thin layer of mud all over the walls. By that time it was time for lunch, which was just as well since we now needed to wait for the walls to dry before attempting to paint, which we still weren't sure how we were going to accomplish in the first place, since all we had were a variety of colors of enamel paint and several six inch wide brushes. No turpentine, no stir sticks, no paint pans, no rollers, no blue tape, no tarps.
What we did have was plenty of opinions from the local officials about how to paint, which colors to use, etc. By the time we had negotiated some semblance of a plan, it was time to go back to Nairobi for the night.
After dinner a few of us went to the local Nakumatt (think Fred Meyer) in search of more paint supplies. It seems hardly anyone uses rollers to paint, so no rollers, no paint pans, no blue tape, no stir sticks, no tarps. What we could find in the paint department was turpentine, and plastic sheeting remnants, and some metal serving trays from the houseware department to substitute for paint pans. With these in hand and the blue painters tape I happened to bring in my luggage, (what teacher doesn't travel with blue tape?) we headed out the next day. In the meantime, Washira our head driver, praise the Lord, had also gone by a larger Nakumatt and found us three rollers and paint pans. We were feeling pretty good at this point.
The reason for the turpentine, in case you were wondering, was not for cleaning the brushes when we were done, but actually for thinning the paint, which the local official insisted we were supposed to do. The paint already looked kind of thin in the first place, but we certainly didn't want to cause any more waves, so we thinned the first batch of the white paint. Our paint crew got started painting while I went to meet with the teacher. When I came back more than an hour later it looked to me like the walls had barely been touched. Gingerly I asked how it was going. The look on Dawn's face said it all. The walls were so porous, and the paint so thin, it soaked completely in..leaving the walls looking not much different than before. Oy.
From then on, we thinned paint with just a capful of thinner just in case someone was watching. The bottom 30 inches was to be blue and that went on much better. But again, by the time we had everything sort of figured out it was time to go back, and we would not be returning. The dorm would have to wait.
Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Our high hopes for painting the classroom and dorm room for the special needs students were radically adjusted as we discovered our time and adequate supplies were severely limited. The first day, our task was to sweep down the crumbling cement walls and then the floor. We used local "brooms" made of branches from some bush tied together at one end. We soon realized there was no way to completely make the walls free from dust. In Kenya, after you sweep the walls, you then "wash" the walls. We were given two metal bowls with some water. But then all we had were our paint brushes with which to wash the walls.
All this really accomplished was spreading a thin layer of mud all over the walls. By that time it was time for lunch, which was just as well since we now needed to wait for the walls to dry before attempting to paint, which we still weren't sure how we were going to accomplish in the first place, since all we had were a variety of colors of enamel paint and several six inch wide brushes. No turpentine, no stir sticks, no paint pans, no rollers, no blue tape, no tarps.
What we did have was plenty of opinions from the local officials about how to paint, which colors to use, etc. By the time we had negotiated some semblance of a plan, it was time to go back to Nairobi for the night.
After dinner a few of us went to the local Nakumatt (think Fred Meyer) in search of more paint supplies. It seems hardly anyone uses rollers to paint, so no rollers, no paint pans, no blue tape, no stir sticks, no tarps. What we could find in the paint department was turpentine, and plastic sheeting remnants, and some metal serving trays from the houseware department to substitute for paint pans. With these in hand and the blue painters tape I happened to bring in my luggage, (what teacher doesn't travel with blue tape?) we headed out the next day. In the meantime, Washira our head driver, praise the Lord, had also gone by a larger Nakumatt and found us three rollers and paint pans. We were feeling pretty good at this point.
The reason for the turpentine, in case you were wondering, was not for cleaning the brushes when we were done, but actually for thinning the paint, which the local official insisted we were supposed to do. The paint already looked kind of thin in the first place, but we certainly didn't want to cause any more waves, so we thinned the first batch of the white paint. Our paint crew got started painting while I went to meet with the teacher. When I came back more than an hour later it looked to me like the walls had barely been touched. Gingerly I asked how it was going. The look on Dawn's face said it all. The walls were so porous, and the paint so thin, it soaked completely in..leaving the walls looking not much different than before. Oy.
From then on, we thinned paint with just a capful of thinner just in case someone was watching. The bottom 30 inches was to be blue and that went on much better. But again, by the time we had everything sort of figured out it was time to go back, and we would not be returning. The dorm would have to wait.
Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
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