Monday 11 April 2011

This Afternoon I was Powerless

In Kisumu this afternoon I was powerless.

Moses, Paul James and I

We broke down.

There was nothing for it, we had to get out of the car and push.

It was hot, we were in Nakumatt supermarket car park in the middle of town and we were trying to bump start the little Toyota 110 whose battery had sadly failed us.

We pushed it down the short ramp, out past the shopping mall entrance and down towards the busy back street, lined with wooden shacks hung with t-shirts and shoes, bags and phones and all manner of amazing things. Bicycles, tuk-tuks, cars and motorcycles plied this route for business, it was no place to be stranded and we pushed as hard as we could.

But we had no luck.

Rather than risk the wrath of the van drivers, motorcyclists and tuk-tuk drivers we pushed the car up against a wall to the side of the road.

This, rather unfortunately, turned out to be the wall at the entrance to the Kenya Post depot, into which lorries regularly turned to pick up and deliver their loads.

We were, to be frank, a bit of a nuisance.

Well actually, it was only Paul James and I that were a nuisance, as by this time Moses had put the bonnet up, hit the battery with a pair of heavy pliers a couple of times and then run off to find someone who might help.

A friend of his worked in the Supermarket and the car’s mechanic only worked around the corner, so cries for help were sent out into many directions.

Just the other side of the wall was a kiosk selling fresh meat.

That statement may be the biggest lie on this blog to date, but I can factually guarantee that it was a kiosk and it did sell meat.

We bought a kilo of goat meat from it just yesterday for 300 shillings (£2.50) and then Moses turned it into a stew with groundnuts and chilli. But, as we stood waiting, the smell from the kiosk was less than pleasant in the afternoon sun.

Eventually Moses returned from his sojourn into the depths of Nakumatt with a new battery. It was clear that the old one had no life left at all, despite the encouragement from a passer by to fill it with coca cola – guaranteed, apparently, to get it going again.

Ad so we returned, somewhat later than planned, to the hotel.

It was just as well, as this evening we had planned a wonderful supper.

Moses returned home to change into his finery and to pick up Tatu, his naturally beautiful Tanzanian wife, and then returned, with Paul James, at the customary 45 minutes later than we had agreed.

We jumped in the car and headed to town.

We have been to the Thai restaurant there a number of times before. I always try to go out with Moses, Tatu and Paul James at the end of my trips and we always discuss where to go. There are good Indian restaurants, African, Italian, but the Thai always wins.

Whilst Moses parked the car (some distance from the kerb) we headed inside.

The restaurant is upstairs in a small shopping mall, above the Fly540 offices and next to a foreign exchange. It is unassuming, but welcoming, lit with red lanterns and a warm smile.

We were shown to our table and ordered the mandatory prawn crackers, which appeared a few minutes later with a fiery red chilli sauce, a tamarind dip and onions.

We feasted. We enjoyed chicken and ribs, satay and prawns, shredded pork and pineapple rice – tasty, well cooked and full of flavour.

Moses was curious to know how things were cooked. After his success in the kitchen with the goat and the mushrooms he is looking at oriental cuisine as a logical next step.

In particular he loved the spare ribs and tried to guess the flavours. I told him that good spare ribs are marinated for a long time so that the juices flow into them and slowly flavour the meat before they are cooked on hot flames. He was intrigued.

As we ate chicken wings - sorry, as Tatu ate the chicken wings and the rest of us tucked into the spare ribs – we reflected on the time we have spent together.

Moses shared how easy it had been, how we haven’t rushed about this time, how we have shared and had time to mull over ideas and thoughts, how we have agreed on so many things without it seeming like much effort.

And it has been good.

As we talked we looked back over the ten years of the Trust.

We talked about this wonderful place, about the need to spend time here and get to know it, to get to know the people and to get to an understanding of the culture.

There have been times when we have tried to go too fast, times when we have worked in our own strength and tried to force things to happen and times when we have waited to see and understand the best thing to do.

But we all agreed that, over the last ten years, this place has been marinating us, seeping into our bones, getting under our skin, helping us to understand. And we are much better for the experience.

The flavours coming out are good, this trip has left a wonderful taste.

Our evening was over so soon, three hours in an instant. It was lovely to spend time with my Kenyan family.

How good it is, when brothers and sisters dwell together in unity.

Sunday 10 April 2011

Thanksgiving and Prayers

Sunday.

And so to church.

Not just any church though, this is African church. Worship here isn’t the reverential singing of a few songs from hundreds of years ago. It’s a celebration, a party. It’s dancing until you can’t dance any more, it’s repeated harmonic rhythms sung out from the front and repeated by the congregation. It’s jumping and clapping and dancing and singing until you think there is nothing left in you.

And then it is thanksgiving.

Not a prayer from the front, not a formal time, but a mass participation event where everyone in the church raises their voice and gives thanks for all the things God is doing in their lives. They may be the poorest of the poor, they may live in the mud and thatch huts that surround the church and our land, but they manage to give thanks for 10 minutes at least. Everyone talking at once, their own personal prayers lost in the melee of voices and left to the beneficiary of the thanksgiving to sort out.

Then the music starts again. Soft guitar rhythms, “wewe bwana, ni wewe Bwana yangu” and then the joy wells up again, the music gets louder, the voices swell and the church starts to party.

Our church in Kibos is not a grand building. It’s a few mbati sheets (corrugated iron) around a wooden frame, sunk into increasingly fragile ground as the rains cause the sandy soils to shift underneath it. It has stood for almost 7 years now and needs reinforcing with steel posts, but nobody minded.

The music these days is limited to Moses guitar, a donation from well wishers in the UK. We had a keyboard, but last November, when the rains caused a blackout the pastor here, Hezbon, borrowed a generator and plugged the keyboard in. Within an hour it had fried, quite literally.

After an hour or so of praise and worship, thanksgiving and dancing Moses invited me to preach the sermon. It was quite short by Kenyan standards, just about an hour, translated by Moses into Swahili.

My local preacher training at the Methodist Church has had little influence on my preaching here in Kenya. I am often led to tear up my notes and preach from the heart. This morning I shared from Isaiah 35 – The future Glory of Zion

He will come and save you

Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped

Then the lame shall leap like a deer and the tongue of the dumb shall sing

For waters shall break forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert

The parched land shall become a pool

And the ransomed of the Lord shall return ....

And they will come to Zion with singing

With everlasting joy upon their heads

They shall obtain joy and gladness

And sorrow and sighing shall flee away

The worship that followed was wonderful, we prayed God’s kingdom down upon us and his peace upon all we do. I greeted everyone like old friends. I love it here.

I left tired, sweaty and hugely uplifted.

One day, just one day to have English worship like they do here!

This morning we took three new boys into our home at Mamboleo. The space has been made available over the last couple of months as schools have started and three boys that were with us have been resettled at their homes, with parents, grandparents or guardians.

As a result of going through the budgets yesterday we recognised that we were able to support the new intake of boys.

I know for Nicky and I this is a wonderful moment. It’s why the Trust was started in the first place, to help the most desperate off the streets. It’s the reason for the name of this blog.

Paul James and John Odhiambo, our Director and Social Worker respectively have been meeting the boys in town for some time now, taking them to a small cafe for some food and chatting with them, getting to know the reasons they were on the streets, their family background and circumstances.

They recommended them as soon as funds were available and we were delighted to welcome them today.

Brian, Fidel and Silas have been on the streets for 1.5, 2 and 2 years respectively. Their stories are different, but are all equally tragic. The loss of parents, living with elderly grandparents who aren’t able to cope, single parents who drink and beat the children. They left their homes in rural Nyanza for the streets of the largest town here, Kisumu.

On the streets they have found food at various outreach centres, even gone to a different home for a few days, but ran away again because they couldn’t cope with the regime.

I hope we are a different kind of organisation. We have small places with, what feels, to me at least, like family units. Boys treat other boys like brothers, teasing, joking, but ultimately caring for and loving one another.

But not all boys stay. About one in 5 will leave and choose a life on the streets. They struggle with the discipline of waking up each day for school, doing chores and contributing to the running of the house, washing their clothes and doing their homework.

Those who do make it are a joy and a blessing beyond measure.

And they are many. I was lucky enough to talk with a number of them this afternoon as we sat at Kibos. Atenas, Shadrack, Winnie, Evelyn, Dominic, John, Florence, Isaiah, articulate children blessed by the work of people here with funds from generous supporters in the UK and thankful for a second chance in their lives. I just wish it could be for so many more.

It is 10 years this October since Nicky and I first came out. The first boys we took in 2003 are now in secondary schools and the most delightful young men. 28 street boys have gone home and are in school, 34 are in secondary school and looking forward to their KCSE exams, 13 this year will take KCPE and graduate from primary school. 3 have completed secondary school and are looking at colleges and university.

They could never of dreamed of this.

It’s worth giving thanks for.

Our new boys got fresh clothes and a good bath this morning. They have been playing football in front of the house with the other boys this afternoon.

It will be a long road for Brian, Fidel and Silas. My prayer is that they, along with those who have made it so far, will

come to Zion with singing

With everlasting joy upon their heads

They shall obtain joy and gladness

And sorrow and sighing shall flee away

I hope, in another 10 years time, we will be giving thanks, Kenyan style of course, for their emergence from the shadows of the streets into the fullness of maturity. If you have faith, please say a prayer for them.

Saturday 9 April 2011

Budgets & Blessings


I sat with Moses and Paul James today to do budgets.

It doesn’t sound like something to look forward to very much, but it was a really good day.

We sat in the garden at Sunset Hotel and went, one by one, through each of the programs that we support, each of the children that we look after. We talked about the programs, whether they are achieving what we envisioned and hoped for, whether we need to make changes, whether to prune or to invest.

The garden at Sunset is a wonderful place, full of tall, spreading trees and colourful plants, a lovely green lawn leading down to a woodland canopy lining the shores of Lake Victoria.

The beautiful purple jacaranda, the flame trees with their glorious red flowers, the fig trees where the monkeys chase each other with dog like barks and squeals.

The birds are equally beautiful, the superb starlings have a wonderful blue sheen, catching the light of the sun on their backs, the small blue green sunbirds, with their slender downturned bills, perfectly formed for coaxing the sweetest nectar from the willing plant producers.

The scarlet-chested sunbird, flitting from branch to branch looked, for all the world, like its heart had opened and was displayed for all to see. Maybe it just loved the richness and variety of this equatorial garden.

Fish eagles sat, imperious on the tree branches, overlooking the lake and Black Kites circle in the skies above, watching, waiting, soaring on thermals, never flapping, but graceful and skilled in flight.

Next to Sunset, by the lake shore, sits the impala park and a newly opened entrance from the hotel grounds gave glimpses of impala, the male with its long curved horns proudly surveying the harem of which he was king.

And through it all we talked. Each program in turn, Kibos, the boys, all those who look after them, the cooks, the gardeners, the land, the problems with the electricity supply, the monthly reports and inspections from the provincial children’s office. The land we own, our plans for gardening and farming, greenhouses and chickens.

The Mamboleo, the boys there, Paul James, his cook, security issues in the area, schools and resettlement programs

Then farming, our street outreach, Kachok, the rubbish dumps, the slum programs, the resource centre and its paintings, how to make the boys more independent, how to withdraw support slowly so they take responsibility, so we can support the more needy.

We talked of the education program, of agreements with guardians, of problems and expectations on the work of the Trust.

We talked for hours.

Moses battery ran out on his laptop and I took it to charge while we ate a late lunch of chicken and fish under the shade of the fig tree. Then more tea to wash it down, and back to work. We drafted agreements, wrote plans and set budgets.

It was work, but it was not work. We achieved a lot, agreed a lot, debated and confirmed a lot. We didn’t drive anywhere, meet anyone, see anything. We sat and opened our hearts, our thoughts, our plans, like the scarlet chested sunbird looking on from the branches above.

I was reminded of Psalm 133

Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!

It is like the precious oil upon the head,
Coming down upon the beard,
Even Aaron’s beard,
Coming down upon the edge of his robes.

It is like the dew of Hermon
Coming down upon the mountains of Zion;
For there the LORD commanded the blessing—life forever.

Who knew that a day of budgets and forms could be a day of commanded blessing.

Friday 8 April 2011

Perhaps we need a different anthem


It was a long drive today.

Moses and I went up to Kitale, to meet with Vincent and Rose. Vincent heads up our farming activity, running the farm that produces the maize that we use almost everyday in the staple food of this part of Kenya, ugali.

Ugali, for the uninitiated is a kind of maize stodge. It is essentially a blend of maize flour and water, cooked into a dough like porridge, formed into a large heap and piled onto a plate. It is traditionally eaten by taking a small piece from the pile, kneading it for a moment or two in your hand and then using it to scoop up sauce, gravy, chicken, fish, vegetables or whatever else is available. It is starchy, filling and inexpensive.

Kitale has been called the bread basket of Kenya. It is a green and fertile land to the north of Kisumu in Rift Valley province. It sits at around 7,000ft and consequently is cool and rainy. Perfect for agriculture.

I wasn’t looking forward to the trip. The last time I went, with David Lee, we travelled for more than four hours to get there on awful pot-holed roads. I am glad to say that, soon after our visit (though not because of!) the government embarked on an improvement program and the road is now a positive billiard table all the way to Webuye. It has cut two hours off the journey and made the town much more accessible.

We arrived at 12:30 to be greeted by Vincent and Rose and their beautiful children, Princess, Precious, Prosper and Perfect (2 girls and two, gorgeous, 6 month old twin boys).

Vincent, for reasons best known to himself, is an Arsenal supporter. He loves them as if he were brought up within a stones throw of the Emirates. I had stopped off on my way here to buy him a new Arsenal shirt. It hurt me to do so I have to admit, but I knew it would make him happy. That’s commitment!

Vincent was delighted and promptly put it on. He then waxed lyrical for ten minutes about “beautiful football” and how “we just lack goals”. Well, that’s the point of football as far as I can tell.

Anyway, he was happy.

So we moved on to talk of farming. We have big plans for our farm in Kitale and Vincent, as a teacher of Agriculture, is key to helping us realise them. But we aren’t quite ready to start this year, so we talked about farming the 10 acres we have farmed for the last few years.

Maize prices have rocketed and are currently 50% higher than two or three years ago. This puts a huge strain on our food budget for our work in Kisumu, so we have been growing our own for 7 or 8 years now. If things go well this year we will harvest more than 200 bags on November, enough for our work and a healthy profit to enable us to farm again next year.

Before we travelled back to Kisumu Rose prepared a wonderful meal of chapatti, Okra, Green Grams and Beef (and of course ugali for Vincent and Moses!). It was a feast and washed down with English tea (black with a little milk, compared with the Kenyan way of very milky and at least 3 teaspoons of sugar) - Rose has known me long enough to know I prefer it the English way!

As we ate, the TV screen broadcast images of Kenyan leaders live at their pre-trial hearing at the International Criminal Court in the Hague (six leaders are charged in connection with the post election violence in early 2008).

The court proceedings were formal and official, but I was amazed to see the number of politicians who had travelled from Kenya to the Hague to offer support to those suspected of inciting serious violence. Nothing to do with the trial, which is only a pre-trial to decide if there is a case to answer, the politicians had, nonetheless, travelled all the way to the Netherlands to appear on TV showing support.

As the news channels broadcast pictures of them stood outside the court, singing the Kenyan national anthem in support of their indicted colleagues inside I couldn’t help but reflect.

The cost of a flight to Amsterdam and a hotel in the Hague for 4 or 5 nights is the equivalent of our farming 10 acres to support over 75 children in orphanages, rehabilitation and home resettlement programs.

Maybe, just maybe, we should be singing a different kind of anthem. One for the hungry children, widows and orphans of this beautiful, fertile, rich land.

As I got back to Kisumu it was raining. At last the rains we have hoped for had come. Better than any man’s, perhaps we have God’s blessing on our work.

Thursday 7 April 2011

I study because I like to know things


This is Samuel. He hasn't had the greatest start in life, but I was lucky enough to spend half an hour or so talking with him this morning.

He is the most delightful young man.

He is in the first term at Rang'ala Boys secondary school. And he loves it.

He never believed he would go. Four years ago his marks at primary school were poor. You need at least 250 out of 500 to get a secondary school and he was getting marks in the 100's. But Samuel found a place to settle in our home at Mamboleo on a hillside on the outskirts of Kisumu.

He also found inspiriation in a another pupil who befriended him at his primary school.
His friend, a girl in the same class, encouraged him to achieve more. She was scoring around 300 and looking forward to secondary school.

Through sheer hard work Samuel studied and studied. His marks improved each year until, by class 8 and his KCPE exams he managed the remarkable score of 280.

He was overjoyed.

Still he didn't get a letter calling him to secondary school, so Moses and Paul James set about finding him one. We already have 2 boys in Rang'ala, Shadrack and Atenas, both in Form 2 and both loving it, so Moses and Paul James went up there to see what they could do.

After much pleading they agreed to take Samuel, knowing what good students Shadrack and Atenas had proved to be.

Samuel started in the middle of February, 3 weeks after everyone else, but his attitude is the most refreshing I have come across in all of our children.

Other boys there ask him what mark he got in KCPE, he simply says that it isn't about the past, but the present and he only lives in the present. He says that they only passed their exams by cramming, but he studies because he likes to know. He is sure he will overtake them

Despite missing 3 weeks of the first term he has scored above average in the end of term exams. He reckons he will be in the top 10 before he reaches form 3.

You know, I think he just might

Wednesday 6 April 2011

Bio Sand Water Filters

I knew Moses was serious about this trip. Last night he left me saying that he would pick me up this morning at 8:00am. In Kenyan time, 8:00am means anywhere between 9:30 and 11:00 depending on how slow breakfast was and what else proved to be more interesting in between

But this morning Moses showed up at 5 minutes before 8 o’clock.

I also knew that this was a serious trip, because he showed up in the land rover, not the little Toyota for running about town.

“Are there going to be some rough roads today?” I enquired naively. His reply was non-committal, which I took to be a firm yes. Kenyans say so much without words.

Moses, it turned out, was good friends with a man, Sebastian, who was now a bishop somewhere in the middle of nowhere. He used to be in Kisumu, running a thriving church, but his wife, also a pastor, had begun a church in their rural home and this too was doing remarkably well. They took the decision to move away from Kisumu and found a new pastor for their city centre church.

Whilst in Kisumu Moses and Sebastian had forged a friendship, based partly on their mutual calling, but also on their love of engineering and technology. Back in the rural home Sebastian, never one to sit still, had heard about an organisation called Connect Africa and begun to work with them.

Connect Africa are based in Kampala, Uganda. Their Director is an energetic and passionate Canadian man called Trevor. Trevor travels the world on behalf of Connect Africa, looking for technology and innovation to bring back.

But he doesn’t import things, he instead finds local technicians, engineers and scientists to make African versions from local materials.

And so it was with the Bio Sand Water Filter.

In essence, it’s a small concrete case filled with sand (the type is important) and gravel. You pour in water and good “living organisms which grow in the bio layer” (see, I did pay attention) filter out the things that could kill you or make you sick. When you are ready, you pour in more water and you get the clean, processed water out of a spout conveniently located at jerry can height

It was developed by the Universityof Calgary, Alberta and made by 12 local men from rural kenyan villages, from local materials

We travelled the bumpy dusty roads of Nyanza province to a homestead in the rural area where Trevor, Gilbert, his chief technician and the rest of the team had set up a demonstration area.Mighty impressive it was too.

From there we travelled with Trevor and the team as Connect Africa donated filter units, manufactured by local people in Busia, to schools and community groups around the region. At each place we were warmly received and the filter units accepted with joy.

We talked about possible applications for the units in the slums of Kisumu where we work. Places where clean water is next to impossible to find and sickness takes away too many lives.

Trevor and his team donated a unit to us and promised to come and see us again, to talk about a possible partnership. We could be enabled to make units ourselves, for slum support, home repatriation and rural reintegration programs.

Whatever comes of it, I have enjoyed a day with people passionate about making life better for ordinary African people.

Africa may well be better, connected.

Tuesday 5 April 2011

Encounters with Chameleons


This afternoon in Kibos we went for a walk, to look around and pray over the acre or so plot that we are roughly farming.

There was me, Moses, Tatu, Paul James, Kennedy, who has been working over the land and planting maize and John and Dominic, two of the boys from Kibos who broke up from school this morning for Easter
(pictured at Kibos this afternoon)

We crossed the dusty red road, rutted from the tractors that run up and down with their full loads of sugar cane bulging from iron cages pulled behind them.

As we walked down an older man was burning wood close to the road side, filling the air with smoke as he turned branches into charcoal for the cooking fires.

Close by his wife gathered the smaller branches into bundles to sell for firewood. They would well for up to 100 shillings per bundle at the market (about 80p) – enough to put a small meal on the table.

By the side of the road Tatu suddenly stopped and stared. I had walked by before I noticed, but turned round to look. There, crawling out of the grass, getting away from the fire, was a chameleon, bright green against the red road.

It struck me that, if this chameleon was any good, it would have been red by now, but, vivid against the dusty track it wandered forth and began to cross.

Fearing for its safety amongst the motorbikes, cars and tractors that plied this route Moses dashed over and, as his wife recoiled in horror, bent down and picked the chameleon up.

The little lizard spat and tried to bite, not realising that he was only meant well, that he would soon be put in a lovely patch of greenery, away from the dangers of the road.

As I shared in fellowship at the Kachok rubbish dump this evening it struck me what a metaphor the chameleon provided.

The boys we look after often find it hard to change their colours quickly. The life they have known is one of hardship and struggle, one with no discipline, where no social skills are required, they are in a grass that is slowly burning around them, and they don’t know how to get away.

Some of them take the quickest route, straight into busy roads.

For them, the vehicles often get them. Their four wheel drives, tractors and motorbikes are glue, drink or drugs. Death may be slower, but it’s just as inevitable.

And then there are those who are picked up and turned around. They may kick or bite a little in the early days, but they soon find themselves in patches of green. I sat with one such boy this afternoon in Kibos. He had found it hard to settle, but now felt at home. The other boys are like his brothers and Moses and Tatu his mum and dad.

The colours of his street life have gone and he is studying for his KCPE exams, with hope for his future and security at home.

Its better in a safe place than wandering the streets, whether you’re a small green chameleon, or a child without a home.

Friday 1 April 2011

Big dreams and small footsteps

It's that time again.

I am preparing for another trip to Kisumu. I feel a mixture of anticipation and excitement at seeing old friends again and sadness that I will be away from home for a couple of weeks.

It's always good to see Moses and I am really looking forward to meeting up with him. 2011 has been a hard year for him. We always struggle in January and February.

We have so many children who need an education, whose hopes for the future rest on getting through primary and hopefully secondary school.

But the fees are crippling. I don't know how ordinary Kenyans manage.

It costs about £350 to put a child into secondary school, and then you have to buy uniforms and books and shoes and all sorts of things on top.

We have more than 30 children in secondary school this year, children we believe are the Isaiah Trust's family. In return for support, love and care we expect the children to work hard and make the most of the opportunity they have. For some this is easy, but others struggle with the discipline required to study and with sitting in classes with children much younger.

There isn't an easy answer, I guess if there was then many of the problems that have beset the continent, let alone just this country that I have grown to love, would be solved by better men than I.

It's just that, when we are trying so hard to get our children into schools and to give them the best that we can give, the schools don't seem to want to help.

They have become really petty in checking all the equipment is correct. One child was sent home from secondary school where they had reported because they didn't have the correct tupperware plate, another may have been missing a jumper. Not a reason, I don't believe, to deny them classes at the start of the school year. Not when we are running around trying to get lots of different children into lots of different schools.

How is a country going to get out of poverty when it sends its children home from school for stupid reasons.

I have felt really sorry for Moses and Paul James. Normal parents have 2 or 3 children to sort out, but every January they have nearly 100. I don't know where we would be without their faithfulness and their love for the children.

So I am going to spend 10 days in Kisumu. I plan to visit schools and meet with some of the headteachers, encourage the children to do well in their exams. This is the fruit of the hard work that Moses puts in.

As for the children, I will carry good wishes from England, encourage them in the studies and try to give them a picture of hope for their futures.

Big dreams start from small footsteps