You Don't Choose Where You Are Born

Sarah writes about Friday, Sept. 3 -

While the title for Friday is about birth, the day was all about endings. Even though we still have more than a week to go in the trip, Friday was the last day we'd be spending at Kimuri School, and the team was not eager to say goodbye to those we'd met there. We had only the morning to finish our work before we would gather with Church of the Torch leaders for tea, so we were up for an early start.

Last day drawings

Upon arrival, the children were in the dining hall for Scout Day. The Boy Scouts have an international division for Kenya, and teachers Evanson and Grace had on their scout leader uniforms and were reviewing the Scout Oath and Creed. After they finished, Gretchen, Kathy, and Joyce then pulled out a map of the world and showed the children where Kenya and Rochester are. The children were interested in seeing how far we'd come, and Evanson was thrilled to get the map for use in the classroom. Because the singing was so popular on previous days, the group then went outside for more rounds of singing games and a giant circle of Hokey Pokey that was a huge hit.

Our last pane of glass is installed

Back on Wednesday, while Mary and I were finishing window washing, we discovered another classroom had a window with no panes of glass. From a distance, at first it just looked like someone had done a remarkable job of cleaning, but on closer inspection, it was clear that there was nothing there. On Thursday Tina and Brad had measured the frames, so on Friday morning they worked with Dick and Chuck to install five of the remaining panes. Brad and Rich traveled again to Kikuyu make the final purchase of glass for the church to finish the remaining windows, and they also purchased paint for the church to repaint the school doors and columns.

While others were busy with the children and glass panes, Mary and I again worked with several students cleaning classrooms.

Driving in popped nails

Happily, there wasn't much to be done because Ruth had had the students clean most of the remaining classrooms on Thursday while our team was on a touring day, visiting the elephant orphanage in Nairobi National Park and supporting Amani ya Juu, meaning "peace from above," a cooperative of displaced and marginalized women who create fair trade textiles for sale.

All too soon it was time for tea, so the team gathered with Grace, some of the church elders, the Presbytery moderator, and all of the children for a brief ceremony and tea. A man named Joseph, one of the elders, started things by saying, "You don't choose where you are born." Looking around at our team, who were fortunate to be born in the US into a situation where we could have the means to make this trip, and the children, who had so little, it was especially poignant. There is, of course, much to be said for hard work, but all the hard work in the world might not make enough of a difference to overcome such a huge discrepancy at the start. The small sacrifices we had made for this trip were a tiny token, but it was clearly appreciated by the children, school and church.

"When will you be back?"

As we started to leave we were surrounded by the children for hugs and some teary goodbyes and we wondered what would happen on Monday when school resumed without us. We left a school that was brighter, literally, with sunlight flooding the clean classrooms and newly repaired desks, a teacher who had worked for the past year without pay, but who was bolstered by a financial contribution and the knowledge that someone does recognize the work she does, and a supporting church that seemed energized to help continue the work we had started at the school.

We didn't choose where we were born. But maybe we did a little to make the gulf between the children and ourselves a tiny bit smaller.

Kimuri School students and teachers; Church of the Torch Leaders; and us

Brief Tour of the Kimuri School

This short video will give you an idea of what the Kimuri School is like. You can see all the videos at YouTube.

Videos from Kenya!

You can now see videos from Kenya on YouTube. Check it out!

Wednesday at the Kimuri School

Rich writes about Wednesday Sept. 1 -

Mary and Sarah organized a group of older students from the school to clean the classroom windows and rooms. The school has two wings with a total of six rooms, and the rooms have a narrow band of windows near the ceiling that are not very bright at the best of times.

Scrubbing the blackboard, walls, and windows

The windows were coated with red dirt, which the children scrubbed away with brushes and rags. Each room's blackboard was throughly cleaned and washed; debris and dirt were swept out of the rooms. When they finished, the rooms were much brighter, making it easier to see both books and writing.

Work begun Monday by Brad, Chuck, Dick, and Tina to replace 25 broken window panes continued on Wednesday. Replacing the panes has been a challenge, with each window frame custom made to fit the opening in the wall. For this reason each individual pane opening has to be measured, then the list of measurements taken to a glass store in the town of Kikuyu, and a unique piece of glass cut. Once the panes are brought back to the school worksite, they have to be sorted to find their unique location, and as you can imagine this process is quite lengthy. The original broken glass and old glazing putty was removed last Friday; old putty tends to be brittle and hard, requiring the use of chisels and scrapers to remove it.

Scraping putty off

A pane of glass is inserted into the opening and glazed using a black, sticky putty; at the end of the day removing it from your hands requires scrapers and brushes. Once the process to install a pane was refined the pace of installation increased greatly, and 24 of the 25 broken panes were completed by the end of the day.

Using borrowed tools, several school desks were rehabilitated. Many of the desk joints had loosened, and over time the nail heads had popped up. First the exposed nails were pounded in, then the joints were strengthened using deck screws. One desk was beyond repair, so it was partially dismantled and the parts used to replace missing and broken pieces of other desks.

Eleanor, Kathy, Kendra, and Gretchen write -
Our Wednesday morning began with worshiping with the staff at the Kikuyu Hospital Chapel. The Swahili/English service was inspirational. As we arrived at the school we heard the children singing as they waited for us.

Flannel board stories

We divided the children into three groups by age. Gretchen and Kathy's group told Bible stories with the aid of a flannel board. A craft followed using scissors, crayons, and construction paper which they really enjoyed. (They have never had a chance to use these materials before.) Group two was lead by Eleanor and Joyce outside.

The children love Football

They did more singing, games and finger plays. Imagine ... Eleanor (aka Grandmother to the kids) leading the children in the 'Hokey Pokey." Kendra promoted herself from Coach Kendra to Colonel Kendra as she gave orders for the children to march in pairs of two to "We Are Soldiers in the Army" The children were then instructed by their Commander-In-Chief to divide into two groups for relay races, soccer("Football") and other games.

The children are excited to see us each day and greet us with broad smiles and great enthusiam.

You can see a lot more pictures online.

Colorado

Note: The internet service to Kikuyu Hospital and University was not working from Monday afternoon until Wednesday evening.

Sarah writes about Monday, Aug. 30 -
Red dirt is found throughout the world: in Colorado, the very name of which means "red earth"; in parts of India, as I discovered last year; and as I knew academically, but now know as a concrete fact, in Kenya.

Kimuri School.

Laterite, the name of that iron-rich dirt that covers the Great Rift Valley and everything around it, is prized for the richness it provides the soil, helping to make Kenya an exporter of flowers, and it gives fish tanks the nutrients needed to keep natural plants, as opposed to those of the plastic variety, thriving.
After a weekend that lived up to the "voluntourism" catch-phrase of this vacation, with shopping for more shoes for the students at Kimuri School, souvenir shopping at an outdoor bazaar, and community building with the church secretary and her family, today the team experienced that red earth in many ways in and around the school.
In the morning, the group split up, with Eleanor, Kathy, Joyce, Gretchen, and Rich working indoors with groups of children for drawing, coloring, a story, singing games such as "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" and "Hokey Pokey," and a dental hygiene lesson.

Children drawing their pictures.

Kendra, Mary, and I played active games outdoors, including soccer, wonderball, relay and running games, and Fruit Basket Upset, plus a hand-washing lesson.

Each pane had to be individually measured and cut.

The 38 broken windows were being replaced by Brad, Chuck, Dick, and Tina, with help from some of the local men. In the afternoon, Rich and I started cleaning one of the classrooms.

Getting ready to play fruit basket upset.

We sat in red dirt for some of the games. Red dirt covered the soccer ball. Rich and I swept up piles of red dirt from the classrooms. The buildings are frequently built of bricks made from the red dirt. Even the window repairers had to clean the red dirt out before re-glazing the windows.

By day's end, the color tinged my shoes and pants and the children's new shoes. After sweeping the walls and floors of the class room, Rich and I had dirt streaks making tracks on our faces. Tracks of Kenya.

After just one work day, I was tired, but already deeply invested in this trip. When I leave in two weeks, the laterite may wash off, but I hope to carry red earth of Kenya with me forever.

You can see more pictures from Monday by clicking here.

Uniforms and Shoes

Kendra writes about Friday, August 27 -

What a Mighty God We Serve! Greetings from Team Kenya 2010. We awoke this morning to a cold, wet winter morning here in Kikuyu, Kenya. This, however , did not deter us from the events of the day.

A child's shoes.

As we drove to the Kimuri school this morning to meet the children, we saw several of them walking to school in their brand new uniforms: The girls in brown sweaters and brown-and-white checkered dresses, and the boys in brown sweaters, checkered shirts, and brown shorts. However, their shoes were in stark contrast to their beautiful, new garments, with many of the children walking to school in the damp, cold weather, through the mud, in shoes with holes in them, open- backed Crocs, or ill-fitting shoes. The team had met on Thursday evening, after giving out the uniforms, and decided to purchase new shoes for the children.

Upon arriving at the school, the children were instructed by both the headmaster, Evanson, and a teacher, Ruth, to sit on the benches. We seated were in the front of the room, facing the children, as Grace, church secretary and all-around supporter of the school, spoke to them about how “smart” they looked in their new uniforms.

Ruth and Tina fitting new shoes.

Grace then proceeded to inform the group that there was one more surprise for the children: They would all be receiving a brand-new pair of shoes. At this, the children broke out into applause and cheering, followed by their singing the following:
What a mighty God we serve
What a mighty God we serve
Angels bow before thee
Heaven and Earth adore thee
What a mighty God we serve

Evanson then led the children in singing other songs and expressed tremendous gratitude for the new uniforms and the shoes for the children.
The team then presented Ruth and Evanson with new books, paper, crayons, and other much-needed school supplies. The “school supply” which appeared to be the most favorite, however, was as supply of soccer balls.

After the presentation, the children were divided into groups to play games, hear a story, or do a craft. Gretchen and Kathy used cutouts on a felt board to tell the story of Noah’s Ark, they then pulled out crayons, paper, and small animal stickers so that the children could draw. Once again, we were amazed to learn that many of the children had never seen or used crayons before, but the pictures they created were quite beautiful.

Frisbee and soccer were part of the afternoon activities.

Mary and Kendra (aka Coach Mary and Coach Kendra) took another group outside to engage in the World Cup of Relay Races. Each team fervently cheered on its teammates, sometimes calling to the other team “We’re #1! We’re #1! We’re #1!” Coach Mary and Coach Kendra’s teams were usurped by a third, late-arriving team, which took home the gold medal for the World Cup by winning the final relay that involved quickly passing a ball backwards overhead to another person until it reached the end of the line, when the last person to receive the ball would run down the field and back to begin again.

While the children played, Brad, Dick, and Chuck (who some of us affectionately refer to as “Charlie”) assessed the repairs that needed to be completed on some of the school buildings. Many windows were broken, and the cinder block rooms needed to be cleaned.

Early that afternoon, we took a break for lunch, and provided a small amount of money to provide tea and bread for the children. We felt this was necessary because many of the children were homeless and few had any type of mid-day meal. After lunch, some of us returned to the school, while Mary and the men went to the store to purchase supplies to repair the school windows. During the afternoon, some of the kids divided into groups and played soccer, with Kendra playing goalie for one team and Tina designated as “referee.” In the end, Kendra’s team won 2 to 1.

At the end of the day, Evanson again expressed his gratitude for our investment into the lives of the children over the last two days. He informed us that we were the only group who had ever come and actually spent time playing with the children and doing crafts. A bittersweet surprise was learning that the shoes that we purchased for the children may be the only new pair of shoes they will ever have. It is for this reason that we stand in agreement with the children and say: What A Mighty God We Serve.

See more pictures at Picasa