Living in Light of Eternity. : Blessed. (1st half of Kenya Trip)!

So as I am trying to get back into the swing of things I thought I would attempt to write a blog about our trip to Africa. I am thinking I am going to have to write a few different ones seeing as so much happened in 17 days!


Left to right: Mike , Me, Karissa, Vic

Too start off I will talk about the 1^st week in Kenya. The team I traveled with was: Karissa Young (BBC friend), Mike Poe and Vic Rader (Founders of Encouragement Children’s Center). We had a great team and all of us got a long very well and always

had an awesome time. (see picture to right lol) God definitely had His hand in this entire trip. Karissa and I met Mike in the Philadelphia airport. Which in and of itself was a big risk meeting a man that we did not even know. However, God again took care of us and by the middle of the trip we were calling him our father and he was calling us his daughters. J Well we arrived in London and had a few hour layover waiting for Vic to arrive. Well come to find out his flight was late and he was going to miss the flight to Nairobi so Mike told us that we were just going to go ahead and get on the flight because we had people who were going to meet us in Nairobi that were from the orphanage. So we did just that got on the plane and arrived in Nairobi on May 18 at 9pm. Now let me tell you Nairobi is no walk in the park. It is kind of scary especially at night. We had to stop for gas and we got our first taste of men staring at us because we were muzungus (white people). We definitely felt kind of like celebrity because everyone waved and said Jambo (hello) to us everywhere we went. Well Vic arrived the next morning and we took off to head to Webuye. It was a long trip but really awesome because we got to see all different cities, towns, villages throughout Kenya. The trip was about 8 hours and not on what you call roads here but I would call them more like pathways.

When we arrived at the orphanage the children came out in matching shirts singing to us “we welcome you” it was beautiful and so sweet:) It was a little overwhelming at first but we then got help carrying all of our things inside. It was so cute because the little kids grabbed my backpack and put it on! So we got settled in and then went out and all the children were singing so we went out and sang with them…then they taught us some dance moves! (quite a funny sight) Church was awesome. We worshiped the Lord for 4 hours and it was great! We were in a little building (tin roof, tin walls, tiny windows) with about 150 people and it was quite warm! After the 1^st service we had a break and had about 3 offers of marriage from the men…haha! Long storryyy… lol

My group of kids=)

Well Monday through Friday we did VBS and many other things during the days. Not an ordinary VBS. There were 47 kids and 2 Leaders. INSANITY=) We had no helpers because apparently the workers thought that they could use that time as a break which was totally fine because we enjoyed running the whole thing. Because the children spoke very little English it was hard for us to communicate. So we would have to do A LOT of hand motions (which if you know me and Karissa we already do that) and work on our pronunciations. Never used contractions there! So we would start off doing music which was always a blast! The kids LOVED to sing and dance.!! We then move into our groups with about 24 kids in each group and do story time…again interesting as they had a hard time understanding English. But I believe the Lord helped both of us to clearly present the stories. The kids responded and were so focused on what I was saying it was amazing. Unlike anything of done before. (which there are a lot “I have never done this before” things on this trip). Well the last night (Friday) Karissa and I had brought glow sticks for the kids…well it turned out to be a GREAT success! We danced with the kids for over an hour just dancing and singing and loving on them. It was so cool see. Here is a link of a video clip of the glow sticks:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q_U7xhmBS0&feature=youtu.be

We also spoke at three schools within the 1^st ten days. The first school was awesome. It was named the school of excellence in there area which was mainly for the discipline side of things. There students were so well behaved and we could tell getting a good education. However when you think of a school of excellence you think bathrooms, running water, electricity, nice desks, hard floor and so on. Well erase that picture from your mind. This school did not have any of those things. But yet they were so happy that they were getting an education that they did not even care what kind of buildings and classrooms they had. Well we got a very warm welcome from them. We were able to share our testimonies and a little bit about what America is like. (with a translator) Vic then had the whole school together and spoke to them =) It was awesome.

Now the second school we went to was a little different Pastor Godfrey (manager of the orphanage and pastor of a church in the area) was the only one who went with us this time. Well there were 1800 students in this school!! It was crazyyy! We only spoke to 2 classrooms and same type of building as the 1^st but not very well disciplined. The kids were very rambunctious and wild. We then were told we could go and talk with some of the kids out in the school yard…well it turns out all 1800 kids were in the school yard…we got MAULED! These kids came at us like we were celebrity's. Pushing, shoving, kicking, and grabbing our hair. It was chaotic and we did not have anyone to help calm them down…it was quite the experience but definitely now I know what it feels like to be a celebrity.

The third school was probably the best school to speak too but also the scariest. The way we got there was riding a “bota bota” and they are kind of like motorcycles so that was fun! But the school was in the slums and even worse buildings then the other schools (which at this point I did not think possible). We spoke to almost 400 kids going from classroom to classroom. It was so scary because we could sense some type of evil or something there. We could not figure out why we felt this way but it was intense. Well as we were speaking I just felt so led to share the gospel more in depth then we had in the other schools and I know that God was speaking through me because the things that came out of my mouth I would have never thought I would be able to say so well in front of a group of people. The kids then began asking questions not just about America but about Jesus and God. It was an amazing experience.

Well after we got done speaking one of the teachers introduced us to a little girl who lived in a small slum that was right by the school and the teacher wanted us to go with her. So we did, just me and Karissa. Well as we walked over the children that were standing by the house looked scared to death about something. The little girl took us into her home and we were looking at the room and all of sudden the little girl froze with fear and this man came from the back and was just very scary. He looked very drunk and possibly demon possessed. We had never experienced anything like this before so we just tried to be very kind and eventually after 5 or so minutes (felt like an eternity) we kindly said we were going to leave and he continued to stare and grunt. So we got of the house and felt very nervous but we wanted to walk the little girl back over to the school . Well of course then the storms came and so we were stuck at the school with Pastor Godfrey. We finally got a hold of someone to pick us up so that was nice. God protected us and it was an incredible experience I will not forget.

Well this is only parts of the first week...I will write more later =) But for now remember you are blessed and do not forget that ever.