February
15, 2011 - TMSC,
Kenya
This
was our first wake up in our new home. We actually like it a lot out here. It
is SO dark bc of the mud that it’s built with. Last night was so incredibly
cold, though! Since we live on only $1 per day, we can’t afford blankets for our beds.
All that we have are the clothes on our backs and our lasso (piece of fabric). I hardly slept bc
it was so cold. I had my legs curled up, my arms in my shirt and even my face
in my shirt part of the time. *
Note- in my journal I had scribbled out the word shirt 2 times…my brain was so
foggy that I couldn’t even spell correctly! * It was a really long, really cold
night. When I woke up I realized that it was my cousin Lisa’s birthday! Happy
Birthday, Muz!!
After
getting up we went to have our breakfast of 2 cups of tea, w/out sugar. It was so
nice to have something hot to warm up my body! We decided to do laundry early
so that it would be dry earlier in the day. As we were washing, w/ our bar of
body soap, Hesbon 1 (there are 2 Hesbons) told us that he needed our help fetching water. Amanda and
I had already agreed that we didn’t need to get any water this morning bc we
had some left from yesterday. But here they live as a community. Everyone helps
everyone else. So off we went to the spring…
Fetching
Water and Playing Donkey-
Hesbon
decided not to take the donkey to the spring, but he did take the cart. We had
about 10, 20 liter jugs to fill and bring back. The cold water of the spring
felt so good on my aching feet. It was, if only for a minute, a great relief.
It was so hard carrying the water up that steep hill today. I had muscles
aching that I forgot even existed. All that I wanted to do was stop, but I
couldn’t. There was an important task to be completed that wasn’t just about
me. When we got all of the jugs to the top, it was time to load them. Hesbon stood
in the cart, being careful to load the jugs in the right places. It was our job
to hand them to him…talk about an upper body workout! Before we took off,
Hesbon informed us of our role in this adventure…”you are to be the
brakes”….Say what?? Our job was to stay behind the cart and slow it down when
it sped up too fast. Now remember, we’re still barefoot on this rocky, pain
filled road! We pressed on trying not to complain but it didn’t last long.
We were literally being pulled by the cart..almost to the point of a slow jog.
What normally takes about 10 minutes took us about 5 :/ We finished “braking”
down the slight slope that is our road and then pushed it up into the yard of
the school. As we were unloading, the cart flipped backwards and water came
rushing out of the remaining jugs! It turns out that Amanda had removed a jug
at the front of the cart and all of the weight shifted to the back. Physics,
and common sense, tells you to hold down the front of the cart before removing
those jugs…but hunger has a way of clouding your brain. Common sense goes
straight out the window! When everything was unloaded, Hesbon crushed our
spirits…we had to go back and fetch more water! We had gotten enough for the
school, but we needed to go back to get more for the orphanage. So, we began
the painful journey back to the spring. It took some serious prayer for me to
carry the water back up that hill. I had no strength on my own at that point.
Prayer is powerful. I made it back up that hill with 80 liters of water. Thank you,
Lord, for giving me strength! Then began the dreaded job of being the brakes.
*Oh, I forgot to mention that I played the donkey on the second trip to the
spring! I pulled the cart to give Hesbon a break :) * Painful step after
painful step we pressed on. We finally saw relief in the form of about 10 young
boys running to our rescue…what a beautiful sight it was!!
Sweet
Irene
After
arriving back at the orphanage, the boys took all of the water to the back. One of
those jugs was for me and Amanda, so as soon as we caught up, we went to get
it. That’s when we found Irene. She has been suffering with the chicken pox for
a few days, but they have gotten really bad. She now has open wounds where her
boils have popped. She was obviously in a lot of pain and couldn’t stop her
endless flow of tears. Irene is normally a little ball of smiles and joy. But
today, the chicken pox were winning. We decided that she needed medical attention.
Although it wasn’t in our budget for the challenge, we knew that she was more
important. We got her dressed and the 3 of us headed to Kakamega. *We took a
time out from the challenge to focus on her. We took the car to town* We took
her to a wonderful doctor that we had been to before. As Amanda sat with Irene,
I went to get her a treat from the Nakumat to take her mind off of her pain.
Talk about temptation! Even though we came to town, drove the car, and had to
use our phone to call the doctor, we still carried on with the rest of the
challenge. So walking in to the Nakumat, where I could buy anything before, I
now could buy nothing. I would never say that I am thankful for Irene’s
chicken pox but I am and will forever be thankful for the lesson that I
learned because of it. Usually when I walk through Kakamega I don’t think about
the other people’s circumstances. That changed today. Walking through the
grocery store and not being able to buy anything for myself was a challenge in
itself. It made me think about these people who are surrounded by everything
and can afford nothing. It also made me think of the parents who must sacrifice
so much if their child is sick. Some just have to watch their child suffer
because they can’t afford to do anything. God is really teaching me more than I
expected to learn through all of this. It is my prayer that He continues
showing me these things that need to be brought to light. *It turns out that
Irene has a viral infection, a bacterial infection, and a fungal infection.
Good news - she’ll be ok!!*
Lunch
and Mango Search
When
we got back to TMSC we made sure that Irene’s caretakers knew how to properly
treat her. Then it was lunchtime! Although I knew that it was only going to be ugali,
I was so excited because I was hungry! It was so good to be able to chew again.
Built into our daily budget we have 10ksh each to spend on anything. Yesterday
we didn’t spend it, so today we had 20ksh each to spend! We decided that we
needed something with some flavor, so we opted for a mango. We went for a walk
in search of mangos and found ourselves at the corner. *This is short for Kakoyi
Corner…a matatu stage* We came upon a shop that sold sugar in small quantities!
Since we had money from yesterday, we pooled it and bought ¼ kilo of sugar for
20ksh! Praise the Lord we can have sugar in our tea!! This was a cool find
because we never knew that there were places that sold things like this. We
went on in search of mangos. We had to cross the HOT asphalt road but we
found some! The best part…they were 5ksh each! We both bought 2 for our
remaining 10ksh :) We’ll have 1 with our tea tonight and 1
tomorrow. The walk back from the corner was excruciating. Our feet were so
tender from walking so much today. *The mango search was about 1.5 miles RT*
The plan when we got back was to cut up the mangos, but we were sidetracked by
a game of volleyball that the kids were playing. Amanda got right in there and
played while I watched. It was really fun and took our minds off of our hungry
bellies. To keep ourselves busy after the game, we came to sew button holes onto the kid’s new uniforms. It’s amazing how keeping your hands busy can help keep
your mind off of the rumbles in your stomach. Tonight’s dinner was so good! We
had tea with sugar and a mango! Dang it was good :) I ate the ENTIRE mango…I
even learned a lesson by it. I am SO wasteful. At home, we say “there are
starving kids in Africa” when we leave food on our plates…it’s true. As a
society, we are so wasteful. Before this, I would have never picked up the
remaining pieces of a mango to suck them dry. When I was finished tonight,
there was only a seed and the skin left. It was so good. We did our nightly
video blog and debriefed our day. Soon after, it was devo time with the girls
and then off to bed. I also ran out of kerosene for my lantern, tonight :/ I guess I know where my money is going tomorrow!
Day 2 Complete
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