Morning visit to Kakamega High School;Afternoon meeting about fish delivery.

SURPRISE! We thought we were having a meeting with just Minishi Oliver school principal for Kakamega High School about future Rotary Projects this morning.  He wanted us to both speak to all 1300 students. So after a rousing song and prayer we made our speeches (I got a few laughs speaking swahili and saying I was a fast runner for "an old white guy"). I made a video of Tanya speaking, but she wont let me post it.  She did well. We described all the Rotary projects we were working on.

Principal Minishi is eager to do a Rotary project that brings a bakery and fish ponds into the school to raise money (and food) to sponsor poor, but high achievers.  KHS has a very good reputation.

Meeting (at Tour Africa of course with passionfruit juice) with KASFOOC's Matano setting up logistics for next Tuesday's fish and feed delivery.  We start at 630 am on trip to Dominion farms 4 hours away to pick up feed and fish and distribute to 4 Rotary-sponsored fish farmers in the co-op.  Its going to be a long day.

On the fish pond - very hot day

This what i came home to yesterday: Tanya reading to the neighbour's kids. Don't worry , I kicked everyone out right away. "Scram" I barked. ;)

The sticks near my left hand are a compost pen holding cow dung to fertilize pen. Normally it would be removed for seining as it catches everything.

Yesterday, Thursday, was play in the pond day.  It was 33 degrees.  Tanya got pretty woozy, but she manned the camera well. Had a good Rotary meeting, all issues sorted out nicely.  Big weight off our shoulders.  We REALLY pushed to finish the 8 springs while we were here.  As a consolation prize I do get to focus on fish ponds Rotary District Community Grant, which has been great.

 Today was 7 hours of paper work at the Golf Hotel.  That's Grace from RC Kakamega, we completed the first draft of our online Global Grant report, then met with treasurer Pillai and sorted out the finances. RCK has 501,000Ksh ($6000 CDN) to get 8 more springs built. We met with all 3 fundis (contractors) and got final, official, receipts.  I gave them Certificates of Appreciation that they can use for future client wooing.

Great news.  We are 45 min into a lightening rain storm.  Yahoo. Longest so far has been 15 minutes. Two of our ponds can really use the water- as can the whole area.  Our protected springs are receiving extra use as unprotected springs dry up.  This is the very driest time of year.

fistfulls of tadpoles- unfortunately we didnt take a pic of our first seine where we caught lots of frogs and tadpoles. I was teaching seining techniques and ridding pond of tadpoles- fish due next tuesday

This is Carolyne's pond (widowed mother of 5). That rock to the right is going to be tricky come harvest time. Its huge.

WAAAY easier to seine a fish pond than a fish pen on a 100'x100' steel ocean pen with tides and wind waves- WAAYY

Seining for tadpoles & malaria tests for TnT

Esther A's newly expanded fish pond.  The structure in the corner is where cow dung is placed to fertilize the water, to create algae for tilapia fingerlings to feed on.

The pond above is 1 of 4 sponsored by the Rotary District Community Grant. Its empty except for tadpoles.  Fingerlings coming net Tuesday.

Tomorrow I will teach beneficiaries some fish seining techniques practicing on the tadpoles.  I will be a little rusty but I want them to know how to move and use their seine net around for fish sampling and harvesting purposes- plus we want to get rid of these tadpoles which are munching on the good algae. Also the dipnet pictured above is one of ten purchased through the Rotary grant.Its going to be a muddy day.


Things are looking good on the Protected Spring side of things.  The RC Kakamega had a board meeting last night.  They are not going to let us build the 8 springs we wanted.  They want to select and build 8 of their choice.  That's OK, a little disappointing, but I have alot of paperwork, accounting and fish pond work to do.  We are ahead of schedule on the springs will get built.  Tanya and I want to get our Rotary reports 90% done before we return as life will be very busy back home, and everything is fresh on our minds. 

I spent a couple hours today at Golf Hotel this afternoon getting press release and report for Comox Valley Road Runners donation to Kip Keino underpriveleged athletes in Eldoret.  The motivation is back.

Malaria
So we were feeling a bit logey and we have lots of mosquito bites and neither of us took vaccines or malaria meds.  We are at a cafe today and our waitress who we vaguely knew so i started a little chat- she turns out to be a 4th year med student who has been in Houston the last 10 years!  Long and amazing story.  She is back home in Kakamega working at her parents cafe for 6 months, taking a break.  Anyway, that amazing tale aside, we tell her our malaria concerns and she , after tea, walks us down to a clinic and for $2 each we get our blood tested.  We were found to be clean, no parasites in our blood.

Has anybody seen my motivation?

We seemed to have misplaced our motivation.  We arrived back in Kakamega on Thursday for a bonus 2 1/2 weeks to wrap up our projects.  On the agenda is:  Final 8 springs, Delivery of fingerlings and feed for fish farmers, Put together and distribute manual for Asset Based Community Development Facilitators, and print photos to leave behind for our friends and members of the community who were kind enough to let us snap.  We've met hurdles at every step and so far on day 4, we haven't really accomplished a thing.

I did sleep last night after a short rain shower freshened the air, though I woke up this morning to Terry clapping at fat mosquitoes trapped inside our net.  He said they were easy to catch because they were full of blood.  And I am covered in bites.  Damn it.

We have both been napping every afternoon, weird, and Terry has headed out for his morning run... which for the past three days has turned into a morning walk after he shuffles along for the first 5 or 10 minutes.  Also weird.

My camera is on day two in the shop, fingers crossed I haven't lost all my pictures since February 21st :o(

The Kakamega Rotary Club is stalling on the springs.  :o(

Two of the fish ponds are still filling up with water... pole, pole -- slowly, slowly.  And the Chairman of KASFOOC is sending us texts that sounds like he's mad at us, but we can't make any sense of them.  :o(

I haven't opened the document to work on the manual.  TODAY!  I am determined.  :o(

And yesterday Fredrick called to meet me in the morning.  He told me he has sold a bed, a three person chair, and a stool.  Good news!  And then he told me that he went home on Saturday to find his house completely empty, except for a bed, one chair, and his clothes.  Josephine and the children are gone.  :o(

What are we doing here.    

On another note... the sun is shining, birds are singing, there is music in the streets.  We had enough water this morning to make tea and have a sponge bath.  Life is just o.k.  :o)

Free Range Chickens

I am sitting on our little porch in our new compound watching the 20 or so resident chickens do their thing.  They are much more beautiful (and funny) than one might imagine.  They have been good for no less than an hours entertainment so far.  Unfortunately I have no pictures to post as they are trapped in my camera which has been infected by a nasty virus since late February.  I will be quite heartbroken if my pictures are lost.  Fingers crossed that our Kakamega IT guy can retrieve them.

It is odd being back after a week in Mombasa.  I got a cold while we were there which challenged my ability to sleep the last two nights due to lack of oxygen when I lied down.  We've had three nights in our little ground level apartment here... and so far no sleeping.  Breathing is better, but no airflow, stifling hot, and a stupid mosquito net that drapes over our faces and never quite closes, trapping mosquitoes and air.  There is also a little bug zapper here, so I spend hours each night swatting mosquitoes and flies, chasing the small sense of satisfaction that comes with the pop and zap accompanied by the unpleasant smokey smell of triumph.  Sigh.  What lengths I will go to for the illusion that I have things under control.    

So, Mombasa was just ... delightful.  We were hosted by a lovely, spunky Rotarian, Leah Bryant, and her 10 year old daughter Tatyana.  We met Leah at the PETS conference in Nairobi a few weeks ago and she invited us to come... so we did.  Pictures will say so much more than I will be able to here, but I'll give it a go.  She lives in a big bright pinky-orange house that was build in the 50's.  Leah is a practicing Buddhist and has a lovely alter with mediation cushions, candles, artwork, and bowls. She and her daughter chant every morning and every evening.  I asked Tatyana if her mind feels calm after she chants and she confessed with a smile, "I mostly do it for my mom."

We had breakfast every morning on the veranda in the warm, muggy, Mombasa air, served by Janet, Leah's Luhya nanny.  Having "workers" is something that would definitely take some getting used to.  It was strange hearing, "Janet, get me my (fill in the blank)... NOW," many times a day.  Leah lived in New York for 22 years and has definitely carried some of the get-er-done attitude home.  She is much like Terry -- staccato pace.  When she returned to Kenya after so many years in the states, her mom warned her about her soft attitude toward workers -- Leah was saying "slavery is over."  But, over the years she has come to set clear, strong boundaries, otherwise she would be helping long lost family members from all of her workers (as she did for years), while less and less work was being performed at home.  It is a different world.  We have learned, as with many things here, to hold our judgements because there is no way we understand all the layers of complexity here.  Nothing is as it seems at first glance.

Leah's driver, Ali, gave us a good peek.  It is so wonderful to have a driver at the ready, never having to worry about traffic, or parking...  but the tricky part is that Ali is a devout Muslim and a very heavy sleeper.  On more than one occasion when we returned to the car we would find Ali sound asleep and it would take much knocking on the car widow to wake him, or he would be gone... car locked, no where to be found.  Muslims pray 5 times a day and there are mosques on nearly every corner, so Ali would often slip away to pray.

Leah has 5 dogs, 2 cats, 2 parrots, one big tortoise, lots of little tortoises, hedgehogs, pea hens... I think that's it.  Her big tortoise was run over by a truck a few years ago.  His shell was cracked and is held together with wire twist ties.  She has to shellac his shell and bring him in in the rain since his shell has been compromised.

Our week in Mombasa included much lounging on the beach, eating delicious seafood, drinking cappuccinos, watching movies in a big luxurious theatre, riding camels on the beach, buying lots of curios, site seeing, visiting Rotarians, sipping sodas under the stars on a boat on the creek.  Total decadence.  We were quite surprised how easy it was to switch from $3 a day on lunch for two to $30-$50 for a meal.  Yikes.  We didn't even skip a beat. 


 

Met ODOH KEEF boy

Tanya, Antony and Alinda- this is ODOH 3rd year of sponsoring Antony. He is the top of his 300 boy class academically with a hobby of running

Tanya, Alinda, and I took a 1 hour taxi ride out to the boarding school of One Drope of Hope's kid, Antony, 17yrs old, Form 3.  This what all those weekend craft fairs Julie and Tanya went to to sell jewellry paid for.  Amazing to hear about a day in his life at school:

Their days are scheduled from 430am to 1130pm

We are having trouble with RC Kakamega- they want to proceed slowly to complete the remaining springs.  We want to complete before we leave- that was the deal.  They have a board meeting Tuesday that has bene delayed for 2 weeks.

Fish ponds are filling, fingerling delivery due next Tuesday.

We are not enjoying our new apartment. No water, lousy mosquito net, unscreened windows means we cannot open them so the nites are a sauna. Not getting much sleep.

Last day in Mombasa

Today is the last day of a 6 day holiday on the Kenya coast.  Its been relaxing and refreshing- like being in Puerto Vallarta in a way. Its hot! Palm trees, beautiful ocean.

Yesterday we toured the old town. A 400 year old fort was great, Fort Jesus.  Then we attended the Rotary Club of Bahari Mombasa and felt really welcomed.  They have the highest attendance rate in 4 countries quite regularly.  31 members, 96% were present that day. Waterfront meeting room next to Fort Jesus. This club is happening and we want to partner with them.  They have several ongoing matching grants and sponsor 40 kids through school from primary to university.  They did a huge adotpt a village project and are looking to build and supply a high school- a group out of UK will finance the building, the land is free, got will pay teachers.

Then we did errands with Rtn Leah- that was neat, bombing arund with her and her driver.  Then we went to a Rotary meeting at night where a new group is being chartered in Mtwapa .  It was great to talk to non Rotarians about to form a new club.  We sat around chatting under a starry sky on a boat moored in a river- very peaceful.  All of them are do-gooders already, looking forward to getting Rotary back up to help their community on a larger scale.

Tomorrow we head back to Kakamega, arriving at our new apartment- our previous digs got rented out.  We will hit the Kakamega Rotary Meeting tomorrow night and see if the new spring locations are selected.  The fish ponds are ready for stocking.

Sorry no pictures. I gave my camera away (and GPS, memory stick, computer, phone) and Tanya's has a virus, so once back in Kakamega we'll clean her camera and I'll get mine back so stay tuned.

Hi ho hi ho, back to work we go.