Thursday, July 8th -- Time Flies When You're Having Fun

Today Julia and I finally completed the student biographies that include a background history, explanation of their hopes and dreams, and their picture. We received terrific news today! One of the boys in Class One, Emmanuel, will be traveling to Nairobi on Monday with Sister Mary. Emmanuel was born without either of his hands and without one of his feet. His other foot has some trouble too. Emmanuel is also cross-eyed. Despite these physical challenges, he is full of energy, manages to carry out almost every activity just fine, and is the friendliest child at the school. Mentally, he is completely fine. His eyes have been straining as he tries to see the blackboard. Sister Mary knows an eye doctor who has offered to give Emmanuel an eye exam for free to see if he can be a candidate for eye surgery or eye glasses. He thinks that both Julia and I are nuns! When I asked him a few days ago where he would travel to if he could go anywhere in the world, he responded saying Nairobi. He is THRILLED that his dream come true is happening. The generous work of this eye doctor may change Emmanuel's life. I gathered the extra band-aids, medicines, and a few of my PC t-shirts to give to the students at the school. Anything spare that we brought, we're going to leave with them.

We received a debriefing on the Post Election Violence that struck Kenya in 2008 from some of the Sisters and Brothers who were in Kenya then. So many lives changed from that point on. Kenyan tribalism is a huge, huge problem. The rivalries and pride for each tribe have been going on for many years. The tribes who were targeted had their houses, schools, and churches burnt down. Entire communities were lit on fire and people who forced to abandon the homes they built and lost their life savings. Five months after the violence ceased, the government told everyone it was safe to go back to their homes. The government was mistaken and the violence continued. An example of the hate crimes that happened is that doors and iron sheeted roofs were stolen off of the houses of neighboring tribes. The tribe who stole it would put the roof and door that they stole from their neighbor before burning the house down. When the people returned to see if anything was left on their property months later, the found their houses in ashes with their roof and door (even with its number intact) on their neighbors house. So many Kenyans were killed, leaving many children orphaned. People were left to die in the white tents that the government provided because of the lack of health care. So many atrocities occurred that really affected the students at OLG.

Julia and I went to the convent to teach the sisters how to make chappati and pass along our new-found culinary knowledge. I bought a special chappati pan to bring home! It weighs about 10 lbs so I am going to have a heavy carry on! Wycliff, the 7th grade by who is suffering with aplastic anemia, is doing poorly and is in a lot of pain. Sister Mary and Father Martin are going to drive to his grandmother's house where he is to see him tomorrow. He may stay with his grandmother or come back to be by his friends and stay at St. Consolatta's Hospital. Please keep him in your prayers.

After chappati making, we went to the dining hall for dance practice. The older girls taught Julia and me their traditional dances. We will be liturgical dancers with them at mass on Saturday. Everyone had been doing their homework at desks in the dining hall. Everyone took a break, half the group sang and the other half taught us the dances. We were all laughing hysterically the entire time. They have been practicing all week to make the mass on Saturday special for the last full day that I will be here. Sister Mary came in to take pictures of us learning and brought the extra chappati we made for the students. They were ecstatic! Two of the eskari walked us back. Today was a jam packed day that flew by. We finally arrived at the compound at 9:00 pm to eat a quick dinner. We met Mark Anthony who is a novice in Nairobi. He highly suggested that we try to visit the Obama's town before leaving.

Father Martin graciously thanked me right before I went to bed for coming this summer to help at OLG. He explained to me that the children have such a hard time with trusting people who love them freely. They are used to people saying they love them just because they have an ulterior motive and want something from them. He said that he hopes Julia and me are the first of many volunteers from Providence College.