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.