Friday, July 15, 2011
WEEKLY UPDATE July 16, 2011
We have completed tons of travel this last week. Thursday night, we traveled to Eldoret (2 hours away) to spend the night in preparation for our Zone Conference early the next day. It is so nice to be with the other missionaries and to be recharged with the messages we get in those meetings.
ABERDARE NATIONAL PARK
We left Eldoret about noon to travel to Aberdare National Park on our way to Nairobi. It took us about 6 hours to get that far. It was very chilly, and we just barely made it before the park closed for the day at 6PM. That was important because believe me, there is NOWHERE to stay out there if we hadn’t been able to get into the park where we had reservations.
Aberdare is a very beautiful park. We stayed in the Ark Lodge with 3 other couples, who had traveled up for their P-day on Saturday. It was in this park that the present Queen Elizabeth learned that her father had passed away, and she was the new monarch.
Friday night we had a remarkable experience. The Ark Lodge is built on a hill that overlooks a watering hole and salted ground to lure the animals to come and mill about in front of viewing sites on three levels of the Lodge. We could look out of a cement type bunker on ground level—no glass—just openings with the animals about 15-20 feet from us, then glassed-in observation windows on the top level and an observation deck right over their heads in the middle. There were probably 100 guests there that night.
ELEPHANTS GALORE
It was just something else to see large groups of elephants come and go. At one point several of the guests (including us) counted about 45 elephants down below us, 2-3 water buffalo, and about 2AM the warning buzzer sounded in our room to notify us that 2 black rhinos had appeared. It was fascinating to us. We’ve never seen anything like it in the wild. I’m sure there were other buzzers during the night, but we slept through them. The park hosts a population of over 2,000 elephants.
The next day we traveled with the others to see 5 beautiful waterfalls on our way back to Nairobi. In one area, there were 3 waterfalls in the same place. Of course, Neal hiked to all of them.
FHE in the “NEST”
We had a wonderful Sunday visiting a very small branch in Nairobi. When we started, there weren’t enough men to administer the sacrament. I think it was just us, the branch pres and wife and maybe 5 others as well as the other missionary couple.
The Branch President and wife are from Utah. He works as an engineer scientist in a Soda Plant…Soda, the chemical, not the drink. They live 2 hours away from the Church on the company property. Both he and she have had Malaria this week. This is her 2nd bout in a month. They have married kids but look quite a bit younger than us. (I know it doesn’t take much).
We attended FHE on Monday with the couples. The lesson was based on Stone Soup (and we were served a vegetable soup)---the Lord’s storehouse…everyone contributing whatever talents they have to better the whole.
DOCTOR VISIT
Neal has been sick for awhile and still wasn’t any better after a course of our self-administered Amoxicillan. So, Monday, the doctor in Nairobi gave him some strong stuff and said if he wasn’t better by Friday (today) to come back to be tested for TB. He thinks his cough is some better today—not completely—and he has an ugly red sore on his foot…we wonder if it is another jigger. He is trying to treat it here at home with remedies he sees online. It seems like we just get one thing after another.
VISITOR-TRAINER FROM SOUTH AFRICA
We traveled to Nairobi for CES training. We had the supervisor for all of CES for SE Africa here. He and our Nairobi Supervisor taught us much during the 2-day training, the first training we’ve ever had here specific to our assignment. Both men planned to return with us to Kitale to do a training with our teachers here on Thursday (yesterday).
Our Nairobi boss rolled his car 2 weeks ago, and his wife has been in serious condition in the hospital, so he remained in Nairobi, and only the So African Supervisor came out to Kitale. We’ve had some wonderful training sessions with him. He has clarified many things for us, which is absolutely wonderful!
BORDER CROSSING
Today, we took him to Busia to the Uganda Border so that he could visit the CES workers there. It was a 6 hour round trip to the border, so we are tired tonight. It was quite disconcerting to get to the border crossover. A long line of big trucks parked on the side of the road up to the crossing (Neal estimated about ½ mile of trucks). The closer we got to the crossing, the more congested it became. The road runs through open markets on both sides of the pavement with big drop offs from the tarmac down to the dirt and mud below. Tons of people were walking back and forth hawking things, riding bikes and motorcycles, etc. It was dusty and loud and so many people, just chaotic.
As we approached the crossing, we had to weave in and out off the road and into dirty, muddy cracks in the pavement and paths on the shoulder. Looking up ahead, we thought there was no way we could get through. As we slowed, men approached our windows.
We were so glad we had an African in our car (even though he can’t speak Swahili). The men were trying to get us to pay to let them accompany us through the border. We didn’t understand what they were saying or what they really wanted us to do, but it was obvious they wanted money for whatever service they planned to render. We moved through a gated enclosure to turn around, hoping to meet the Ugandan CES workers to trade off our passenger to them.
Finally, they arrived, and they were so welcome. They, of course, were dressed in suits and looked official, and finally, the men that had been hounding us, backed off, and we turned around and made our way back to the end of the truck line where we waited to take another member back to our area. It was quite an intimidating experience.
SOUTH AFRICAN INSIGHTS AND OBSERVATIONS:
Yesterday, we took our South African visitor to our Inservice training and then to visit a counselor in the branch presidency and his wife and then over to the counselor’s mother’s home so the visitor could get a feel for the wonderful people here.
I think maybe it was the first time the supervisor had ever been in a mud home. He was really shocked at how humbly the people live—to see the bare feet and the hardships these good people experience. Both the counselor and his 19 yr old brother have had Malaria this week. The counselor is 29 yrs old (P.M.) and said he needed help to get home from Church last week because he was so sick he couldn’t walk. We asked if they had been to a doctor. They said they couldn’t afford it, but instead went to the chemist and used medicine they’ve tried before. He said they try 2 different kinds of Malaria pills usually, and then if they don’t work, they are forced to go to the doctor.
Just over and over again, the supervisor expressed surprise and shock at the cultural differences he observed and listened to in comparison to what he is used to in South Africa.
Native wisdom: It was pouring rain, and one of our branch presidents—such a kindly 60ish man, wisely commented: “When it rains, babies just go to sleep”
Sign on billboard: “Don’t point fingers, anybody can get AIDS.
Branch President testifying of blessings of tithing: I don’t worry about my cow being stolen any more. It was a blessing of paying tithing that made it possible for me to buy her. It is a “Mormon cow”. You can’t steal a “Mormon” cow.
Thomas Friedman, newspaper publisher wrote, “The Stone Age didn’t end because we ran out of stones.”
Today we were driving down busy road…lots of people…full-grown man completely naked ran toward us as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening. No one seemed to take much notice…
ABERDARE NATIONAL PARK
We left Eldoret about noon to travel to Aberdare National Park on our way to Nairobi. It took us about 6 hours to get that far. It was very chilly, and we just barely made it before the park closed for the day at 6PM. That was important because believe me, there is NOWHERE to stay out there if we hadn’t been able to get into the park where we had reservations.
Aberdare is a very beautiful park. We stayed in the Ark Lodge with 3 other couples, who had traveled up for their P-day on Saturday. It was in this park that the present Queen Elizabeth learned that her father had passed away, and she was the new monarch.
Friday night we had a remarkable experience. The Ark Lodge is built on a hill that overlooks a watering hole and salted ground to lure the animals to come and mill about in front of viewing sites on three levels of the Lodge. We could look out of a cement type bunker on ground level—no glass—just openings with the animals about 15-20 feet from us, then glassed-in observation windows on the top level and an observation deck right over their heads in the middle. There were probably 100 guests there that night.
ELEPHANTS GALORE
It was just something else to see large groups of elephants come and go. At one point several of the guests (including us) counted about 45 elephants down below us, 2-3 water buffalo, and about 2AM the warning buzzer sounded in our room to notify us that 2 black rhinos had appeared. It was fascinating to us. We’ve never seen anything like it in the wild. I’m sure there were other buzzers during the night, but we slept through them. The park hosts a population of over 2,000 elephants.
The next day we traveled with the others to see 5 beautiful waterfalls on our way back to Nairobi. In one area, there were 3 waterfalls in the same place. Of course, Neal hiked to all of them.
FHE in the “NEST”
We had a wonderful Sunday visiting a very small branch in Nairobi. When we started, there weren’t enough men to administer the sacrament. I think it was just us, the branch pres and wife and maybe 5 others as well as the other missionary couple.
The Branch President and wife are from Utah. He works as an engineer scientist in a Soda Plant…Soda, the chemical, not the drink. They live 2 hours away from the Church on the company property. Both he and she have had Malaria this week. This is her 2nd bout in a month. They have married kids but look quite a bit younger than us. (I know it doesn’t take much).
We attended FHE on Monday with the couples. The lesson was based on Stone Soup (and we were served a vegetable soup)---the Lord’s storehouse…everyone contributing whatever talents they have to better the whole.
DOCTOR VISIT
Neal has been sick for awhile and still wasn’t any better after a course of our self-administered Amoxicillan. So, Monday, the doctor in Nairobi gave him some strong stuff and said if he wasn’t better by Friday (today) to come back to be tested for TB. He thinks his cough is some better today—not completely—and he has an ugly red sore on his foot…we wonder if it is another jigger. He is trying to treat it here at home with remedies he sees online. It seems like we just get one thing after another.
VISITOR-TRAINER FROM SOUTH AFRICA
We traveled to Nairobi for CES training. We had the supervisor for all of CES for SE Africa here. He and our Nairobi Supervisor taught us much during the 2-day training, the first training we’ve ever had here specific to our assignment. Both men planned to return with us to Kitale to do a training with our teachers here on Thursday (yesterday).
Our Nairobi boss rolled his car 2 weeks ago, and his wife has been in serious condition in the hospital, so he remained in Nairobi, and only the So African Supervisor came out to Kitale. We’ve had some wonderful training sessions with him. He has clarified many things for us, which is absolutely wonderful!
BORDER CROSSING
Today, we took him to Busia to the Uganda Border so that he could visit the CES workers there. It was a 6 hour round trip to the border, so we are tired tonight. It was quite disconcerting to get to the border crossover. A long line of big trucks parked on the side of the road up to the crossing (Neal estimated about ½ mile of trucks). The closer we got to the crossing, the more congested it became. The road runs through open markets on both sides of the pavement with big drop offs from the tarmac down to the dirt and mud below. Tons of people were walking back and forth hawking things, riding bikes and motorcycles, etc. It was dusty and loud and so many people, just chaotic.
As we approached the crossing, we had to weave in and out off the road and into dirty, muddy cracks in the pavement and paths on the shoulder. Looking up ahead, we thought there was no way we could get through. As we slowed, men approached our windows.
We were so glad we had an African in our car (even though he can’t speak Swahili). The men were trying to get us to pay to let them accompany us through the border. We didn’t understand what they were saying or what they really wanted us to do, but it was obvious they wanted money for whatever service they planned to render. We moved through a gated enclosure to turn around, hoping to meet the Ugandan CES workers to trade off our passenger to them.
Finally, they arrived, and they were so welcome. They, of course, were dressed in suits and looked official, and finally, the men that had been hounding us, backed off, and we turned around and made our way back to the end of the truck line where we waited to take another member back to our area. It was quite an intimidating experience.
SOUTH AFRICAN INSIGHTS AND OBSERVATIONS:
Yesterday, we took our South African visitor to our Inservice training and then to visit a counselor in the branch presidency and his wife and then over to the counselor’s mother’s home so the visitor could get a feel for the wonderful people here.
I think maybe it was the first time the supervisor had ever been in a mud home. He was really shocked at how humbly the people live—to see the bare feet and the hardships these good people experience. Both the counselor and his 19 yr old brother have had Malaria this week. The counselor is 29 yrs old (P.M.) and said he needed help to get home from Church last week because he was so sick he couldn’t walk. We asked if they had been to a doctor. They said they couldn’t afford it, but instead went to the chemist and used medicine they’ve tried before. He said they try 2 different kinds of Malaria pills usually, and then if they don’t work, they are forced to go to the doctor.
Just over and over again, the supervisor expressed surprise and shock at the cultural differences he observed and listened to in comparison to what he is used to in South Africa.
Native wisdom: It was pouring rain, and one of our branch presidents—such a kindly 60ish man, wisely commented: “When it rains, babies just go to sleep”
Sign on billboard: “Don’t point fingers, anybody can get AIDS.
Branch President testifying of blessings of tithing: I don’t worry about my cow being stolen any more. It was a blessing of paying tithing that made it possible for me to buy her. It is a “Mormon cow”. You can’t steal a “Mormon” cow.
Thomas Friedman, newspaper publisher wrote, “The Stone Age didn’t end because we ran out of stones.”
Today we were driving down busy road…lots of people…full-grown man completely naked ran toward us as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening. No one seemed to take much notice…
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Victor's 3 generations
Victor is one of our most exciting prospective missionaries. He has been a member for a year and is pretty amazing in his knowledge of the gospel and his excitement to serve. He lives with his grandfather (the man that was slashed in an attempted robbery 2 weeks ago). Grandfather is polygamous. A couple of the wives no longer live with him, but the two women pictured below are 2 of his wives. One is in her 60s and the other (with her hand by her face) is in her 40s. These two women work the fields together--hand plowing, planting, weeding and harvesting.
Some forgotten additions
I forgot to mention that the sister told us that after giving birth, her neighbor sisters gave her a rest from hauling water for a short time.
July 5, 2011
PICTURES BELOW: Just some explanation. In the earlier text, I talked about being up in the bush in the middle of some maize fields and finding two babies all alone—one 3 years old and the other a newborn. After we passed them in shock, and being told by the branch president they were okay and to leave them alone, Neal was able to get a picture later. When he passed again, the 3 year old had picked up the crying baby and was trying to rock it back and form and whimpering “Mamma Mamma . It was pretty traumatic for us. Anyway, he got a picture of them. If you blow it up by clicking on it, you will be able to see them. It broke our hearts.
Then you will see pictures of Paul and Eunice. They were so excited to buy their new home only to have the roof crash in with the first rainstorm. So, he has just built a new one.
July 5, 2011
I just want to get all of this down before the weekend and I forget it all. We’ve had quite a day. We went with a branch president out to visit some of his less-active members. We had such a wonderful day with him and with these wonderful people. He is such a humble, kind man.
CHILDREN ALONE:
So, we had another shocking experience with little kids today. We drove to meet a family that has been quite upset and hostile for several years. We have been to their home twice before. They live off the road, back in a narrow dirt lane almost completely covered over with high maize plants. You keep driving as the maize gets closer and closer over the car and then finally opens out at the back of the fields. Today, we got out of the car with the branch president, but the house looked deserted and all the doors were padlocked. Then around the corner came a little 3 year-old and a one year old with almost nothing on. The one year old looked like she really had a bad cold, bad nose. The President knew the older child vaguely, but the child didn’t recognize him.
There wasn’t an adult anywhere. President questioned the 3 year old, who told him they had all gone to town. It was just shocking to us because they are so remote. I asked, “What would happen if they were hurt?” He said, “They would have to go cry to a neighbor, but this family is on the outs with their neighbors. They are embroiled in a lawsuit. The member bought this land from a 2nd party. The original owner still owned the land, but the 2nd party took money from the member, and now the original owner is trying to kick them off the land. So, the little kids couldn’t go to the neighbors if they got hurt anyway! Those words the other Branch President had said to us rang in our ears…”Little kids are economic liabilities”. This president said that is not generally the feeling people have about their children. Many are loved and wanted….it is very sad. He also said, “The mother in the other case…in the maize field was probably plowing in the maize and couldn’t afford a caretaker, so she brought her children with her to work and had to leave them on the edge of the field.”
We ran into a hedge of Mauricious stone…a plant used for hedges to keep the animals from the maize. It has some nasty thorns on it.
Most interesting life story—a woman’s experience
We went to visit Josephine. She comes miles walking to Church and is quite active. Her husband is also a member but inactive. She understands more English than she can speak, but our accents are very difficult for most Kenyans to understand. They can understand British English much better. She struggled to understand us. She lives in quite a nice mud and cow dung home. It has much smoother walls and appears more sturdy than most of the people’s homes here. The missionaries built her home in 2005. A mud and cow dung home will last 50 years the Branch Pres said.
Her home, like most here, was very dark. She decorated it in calendars of a Catholic Jesus and political people. Many people have pictures of Obama hanging in their homes. I was impressed that she had strung several yards of lace on the walls to cover the mud. One swatch was very beautiful lace…with human figures and ducks on it. It was tattered and dirty, but very beautiful.
We began to ask her about her life. Sometimes she answered us directly, and other times, the Branch Pres translated. It was so interesting. She gets up before it is light each morning to walk 1 hour 1 way to the spring to get water. She carries 20 liters on her head plus 5 liters in her hand. Then she walks 1 hour back, drops the water and returns for a 2nd trip. She does this every morning and tries to get back before it gets too light. Then she cooks (outside on a mud stove), cleans, gardens, and all the other things women do here. She said “the old lady”..same age as Neal…born 1942…”can only lug 10 liters…5 in each arm any more.”
Courting-Marriage
I asked how she met her husband. She lived in one village and he in another. She said he worked for an NGO (non-government organization) that was planting seedlings in her area. She worked as a guide to the land that he was looking at. Her brother had orange trees and her future husband came to inspect them. They talked a bit, and then he went to her parents to talk about moving in with her. They told him to go away and come back later. He went to his relatives and talked with them and together, they all went back to talk to them about the cost. It was to be 3 cows and some money. It was paid in small amounts. I asked her if she loved him then. She, like other Kenyans, giggled and laughed…they are so shocked when you use the word love or refer to it in anyway. She said, yes, she loved him and that that love grew because they have five children! Then she giggled again. It was so cute.
She said that she had all of her children at home. We looked around the small room completely filled with wooden rough furniture. There isn’t any room to even walk to get between the coffee tables (this rough furniture with very little overstuffing) and asked her where she could birth a child there. She said, “Oh you can have a baby wherever it comes” Then she gestured outside in the dirt by the door. Neal asked her where they all sleep (she has 3 kids still at home). She said they eat at night, and then the kids go next door where grandma lives and sleep with her.
We asked who delivered her babies, and she said her neighbor did with gloves and a sterilized razor. The Branch President explained to all of us that it is now against the law to have the babies at home because if the midwife is HIV positive, and she has a wound, she can transmit the disease to the mother. Josephine was not aware of that law.
She said she had her boys circumcised down at the river when they were 15 years old. Again, she said they had to bring their own knives so they knew they were sterile. She was aghast when we told her we circumcise at a few days old. She questioned how we could explain to a child that young the rules of sexual conduct.
She also confirmed that once circumcised, the boys went to live with other friends (boys) and not in the home of their mother.
She said she came from a home of 4 boys and 5 girls. Three of her brothers died: 2 of amoeba-waterborne diseases and one from a lorrie accident.
NEXT we visited a counselor in the branch presidency. Although they live very humbly, they insisted on giving us some bananas, which we gave to the Branch President. They live in a large mud home with a tin roof. It just poured while we were there…rains every day about 3PM. Some of the rain came down on us while we talked. It was very dark and we could hardly see each other. They have just had a run of Malaria in their home as well. It was nice to visit with them. He has just built some “African chairs” very comfortable, made with tree limbs and slabs of wood.
It was still pouring rain when we left. We made our way through the maze of muddy roads to finally emerge onto the tarmac, but we could hardly see through the rain to make our way home. On the way, the President mentioned that the Primary President had come to Church Sunday with a large bandage on her face. She has 4 tiny children. Her husband has been active, but is now inactive. He is a motorcycle driver for a living and is gone a lot. She had gone to the market to get some food for the children (they haven’t much and are often hungry). He returned home unexpectedly to find the kids hungry and crying. He beat her quite badly because she had left them without food. She went to the Chief and he made the husband take her to the hospital where she was treated. But, she has gone back. She really has little recourse. Her parents live far away and they were starving when we went to see them last week. We asked the President what are her options? He had no answers. It is so hard.
MALARIA
He and his wife are in their 60s. We have written about them before. He pumps her on his bike to church over really rough roads. It takes them over 2 hours by bike, 4 hours walking. He is really a saint in the true measure of the word. She is sick again right now. She has Malaria again and is diabetic. They often have Malaria, and so I asked him how often they have it. He said he has been good for about a month and a half. He said they usually have it (one or the other of them) about 6 months of the year. He said also that it is very expensive to get the medicine and the test to be sure you have Malaria. It costs 90 ksh for the medicine That is about $1, but a lot to them.
He described different kinds of Malaria they get: dizzy, weak (“if not puking”) he said. Some kinds make you “puke” a lot. Fever, diarrhea, chills…”it just makes you want to sit in the sun because you are so cold”
VOCAB: a picky picky is a motorcycle, a boda boda is a bike
VISITING
We went first to visit John 33 an Elder, and Elizabeth 28 and their 4 children. John’s younger brother, Alfred was there (23). John has been really active in the past and served in Br. Presidency as a Counselor. He turned down a good job because he had to work on Sundays. Then he got a job as a matatu driver, and hasn’t been to church since. We met with them in their humble home.
They were very gracious and kind and welcoming to us. Elizabeth speaks very little English. They are a handsome couple. I don’t know why but the house was teeming with flies…they were all over us for the entire time we were there. They live up on the crest of a beautiful green hill that overlooks an entire panorama of a valley.
John bore a strong testimony and promised to come to Church. He has just stopped his job. We didn’t find out why. They live and he works on a 4 acre plot of ground belonging to his cousin, who lives in Maryland. She has a large garden. Gardens are the women’s work. We were very impressed with them. They live very, very far from the Church.
So, it has been such a full day. We typed two patriarchal blessings this morning, prepared them with pictures for the people. Then we worked on CES reports and submitted pictures of our prospective missionaries to the office secretary, who is kind enough to duplicate them for the young men. The rest of the day we spent cleaning, washing, and packing for next week.
Then you will see pictures of Paul and Eunice. They were so excited to buy their new home only to have the roof crash in with the first rainstorm. So, he has just built a new one.
July 5, 2011
I just want to get all of this down before the weekend and I forget it all. We’ve had quite a day. We went with a branch president out to visit some of his less-active members. We had such a wonderful day with him and with these wonderful people. He is such a humble, kind man.
CHILDREN ALONE:
So, we had another shocking experience with little kids today. We drove to meet a family that has been quite upset and hostile for several years. We have been to their home twice before. They live off the road, back in a narrow dirt lane almost completely covered over with high maize plants. You keep driving as the maize gets closer and closer over the car and then finally opens out at the back of the fields. Today, we got out of the car with the branch president, but the house looked deserted and all the doors were padlocked. Then around the corner came a little 3 year-old and a one year old with almost nothing on. The one year old looked like she really had a bad cold, bad nose. The President knew the older child vaguely, but the child didn’t recognize him.
There wasn’t an adult anywhere. President questioned the 3 year old, who told him they had all gone to town. It was just shocking to us because they are so remote. I asked, “What would happen if they were hurt?” He said, “They would have to go cry to a neighbor, but this family is on the outs with their neighbors. They are embroiled in a lawsuit. The member bought this land from a 2nd party. The original owner still owned the land, but the 2nd party took money from the member, and now the original owner is trying to kick them off the land. So, the little kids couldn’t go to the neighbors if they got hurt anyway! Those words the other Branch President had said to us rang in our ears…”Little kids are economic liabilities”. This president said that is not generally the feeling people have about their children. Many are loved and wanted….it is very sad. He also said, “The mother in the other case…in the maize field was probably plowing in the maize and couldn’t afford a caretaker, so she brought her children with her to work and had to leave them on the edge of the field.”
We ran into a hedge of Mauricious stone…a plant used for hedges to keep the animals from the maize. It has some nasty thorns on it.
Most interesting life story—a woman’s experience
We went to visit Josephine. She comes miles walking to Church and is quite active. Her husband is also a member but inactive. She understands more English than she can speak, but our accents are very difficult for most Kenyans to understand. They can understand British English much better. She struggled to understand us. She lives in quite a nice mud and cow dung home. It has much smoother walls and appears more sturdy than most of the people’s homes here. The missionaries built her home in 2005. A mud and cow dung home will last 50 years the Branch Pres said.
Her home, like most here, was very dark. She decorated it in calendars of a Catholic Jesus and political people. Many people have pictures of Obama hanging in their homes. I was impressed that she had strung several yards of lace on the walls to cover the mud. One swatch was very beautiful lace…with human figures and ducks on it. It was tattered and dirty, but very beautiful.
We began to ask her about her life. Sometimes she answered us directly, and other times, the Branch Pres translated. It was so interesting. She gets up before it is light each morning to walk 1 hour 1 way to the spring to get water. She carries 20 liters on her head plus 5 liters in her hand. Then she walks 1 hour back, drops the water and returns for a 2nd trip. She does this every morning and tries to get back before it gets too light. Then she cooks (outside on a mud stove), cleans, gardens, and all the other things women do here. She said “the old lady”..same age as Neal…born 1942…”can only lug 10 liters…5 in each arm any more.”
Courting-Marriage
I asked how she met her husband. She lived in one village and he in another. She said he worked for an NGO (non-government organization) that was planting seedlings in her area. She worked as a guide to the land that he was looking at. Her brother had orange trees and her future husband came to inspect them. They talked a bit, and then he went to her parents to talk about moving in with her. They told him to go away and come back later. He went to his relatives and talked with them and together, they all went back to talk to them about the cost. It was to be 3 cows and some money. It was paid in small amounts. I asked her if she loved him then. She, like other Kenyans, giggled and laughed…they are so shocked when you use the word love or refer to it in anyway. She said, yes, she loved him and that that love grew because they have five children! Then she giggled again. It was so cute.
She said that she had all of her children at home. We looked around the small room completely filled with wooden rough furniture. There isn’t any room to even walk to get between the coffee tables (this rough furniture with very little overstuffing) and asked her where she could birth a child there. She said, “Oh you can have a baby wherever it comes” Then she gestured outside in the dirt by the door. Neal asked her where they all sleep (she has 3 kids still at home). She said they eat at night, and then the kids go next door where grandma lives and sleep with her.
We asked who delivered her babies, and she said her neighbor did with gloves and a sterilized razor. The Branch President explained to all of us that it is now against the law to have the babies at home because if the midwife is HIV positive, and she has a wound, she can transmit the disease to the mother. Josephine was not aware of that law.
She said she had her boys circumcised down at the river when they were 15 years old. Again, she said they had to bring their own knives so they knew they were sterile. She was aghast when we told her we circumcise at a few days old. She questioned how we could explain to a child that young the rules of sexual conduct.
She also confirmed that once circumcised, the boys went to live with other friends (boys) and not in the home of their mother.
She said she came from a home of 4 boys and 5 girls. Three of her brothers died: 2 of amoeba-waterborne diseases and one from a lorrie accident.
NEXT we visited a counselor in the branch presidency. Although they live very humbly, they insisted on giving us some bananas, which we gave to the Branch President. They live in a large mud home with a tin roof. It just poured while we were there…rains every day about 3PM. Some of the rain came down on us while we talked. It was very dark and we could hardly see each other. They have just had a run of Malaria in their home as well. It was nice to visit with them. He has just built some “African chairs” very comfortable, made with tree limbs and slabs of wood.
It was still pouring rain when we left. We made our way through the maze of muddy roads to finally emerge onto the tarmac, but we could hardly see through the rain to make our way home. On the way, the President mentioned that the Primary President had come to Church Sunday with a large bandage on her face. She has 4 tiny children. Her husband has been active, but is now inactive. He is a motorcycle driver for a living and is gone a lot. She had gone to the market to get some food for the children (they haven’t much and are often hungry). He returned home unexpectedly to find the kids hungry and crying. He beat her quite badly because she had left them without food. She went to the Chief and he made the husband take her to the hospital where she was treated. But, she has gone back. She really has little recourse. Her parents live far away and they were starving when we went to see them last week. We asked the President what are her options? He had no answers. It is so hard.
MALARIA
He and his wife are in their 60s. We have written about them before. He pumps her on his bike to church over really rough roads. It takes them over 2 hours by bike, 4 hours walking. He is really a saint in the true measure of the word. She is sick again right now. She has Malaria again and is diabetic. They often have Malaria, and so I asked him how often they have it. He said he has been good for about a month and a half. He said they usually have it (one or the other of them) about 6 months of the year. He said also that it is very expensive to get the medicine and the test to be sure you have Malaria. It costs 90 ksh for the medicine That is about $1, but a lot to them.
He described different kinds of Malaria they get: dizzy, weak (“if not puking”) he said. Some kinds make you “puke” a lot. Fever, diarrhea, chills…”it just makes you want to sit in the sun because you are so cold”
VOCAB: a picky picky is a motorcycle, a boda boda is a bike
VISITING
We went first to visit John 33 an Elder, and Elizabeth 28 and their 4 children. John’s younger brother, Alfred was there (23). John has been really active in the past and served in Br. Presidency as a Counselor. He turned down a good job because he had to work on Sundays. Then he got a job as a matatu driver, and hasn’t been to church since. We met with them in their humble home.
They were very gracious and kind and welcoming to us. Elizabeth speaks very little English. They are a handsome couple. I don’t know why but the house was teeming with flies…they were all over us for the entire time we were there. They live up on the crest of a beautiful green hill that overlooks an entire panorama of a valley.
John bore a strong testimony and promised to come to Church. He has just stopped his job. We didn’t find out why. They live and he works on a 4 acre plot of ground belonging to his cousin, who lives in Maryland. She has a large garden. Gardens are the women’s work. We were very impressed with them. They live very, very far from the Church.
So, it has been such a full day. We typed two patriarchal blessings this morning, prepared them with pictures for the people. Then we worked on CES reports and submitted pictures of our prospective missionaries to the office secretary, who is kind enough to duplicate them for the young men. The rest of the day we spent cleaning, washing, and packing for next week.
Monday, July 4, 2011
July 4, 2011 Weekly Update
Fast and Testimony Meeting in rural Kenya
I sat in Church yesterday morning and thought, “What a unique experience this is.” We meet in a very primitive rough building with unfinished walls and cracked cement floors. There is no glass in the windows, although every place of entry has bars to prevent theft. There are no curtains or other adornments, but the saints are trying hard to conduct the meeting in the way prescribed by the Handbook. Only a couple of the people in the room have been members more than 3-4 years.
We just worked to reactivate the branch president and his wife 3 months ago. He’s been a member maybe a year. His counselors have been members less time. A sixteen year old girl was sustained as the YW President (a shocker to us), and a new R.S. President was called, who has been inactive for awhile.
The room was filled to the brim! We were thrilled. I looked out the windows to see piles of mud and weeds all around us. Two cows and two staked goats grazed right outside my window. A woman walked by within touching distance with a huge load of wood on her head and a toddler dragging along behind her tugging at her skirts.
Several kids walked under my window chewing on sugar cane….the African candy. It is a woody stalk they pull apart with their teeth and chew to extract its sweetness. They can’t afford sweets (candy) like we use, so their teeth are really quite beautiful for the most part. A boy rode by on his bike loaded with an enormous bag of grain tied on each side and one on the back.
We had a hard time hearing the testimony meeting because of thundering drumming combined with chants in Swahili for a religious group next door. At the same time we were drowned out with the loud beating of the drum, two competing ministers fought for converts across the street and on our side of the street screaming into their microphones at a high rapid pitch as if their volume would somehow endorse their message.
We had a lovely meeting however, with no lapses in time between speakers. The members jumped up one at a time to make sure they would be able to bear their testimonies before the close of the meeting.
Baby Blessing
A new baby was blessed, 1½ months old. The mamma looked so young, I had thought earlier she was either in Primary or YW until she began to nurse the baby. I found out she was 18 years old. The father has 5 children from a former marriage. He is 52 years old. They have been married 2 years, and this is her second baby (the first one died). He told me he met her by going to her parents and offering to pay a dowry of 6 cows and some money when she was 16. She is a pretty girl, very shy. I tried to befriend her, but she speaks no English. She looked frightened when I tried to approach her.
I looked around our small congregation. Many sat with muddy bare feet, almost all with ragged, worn clothing, stained and hanging on their thin bodies like shrouds. That was true regardless of age or gender.
Almost all the little girls wore tattered, fancy, dirt-stained dresses unzipped in the back. I don’t understand that style, but almost all girls and many…maybe even most women wear clothing that is unzipped in the back…Some have torn or broken zippers, but many just don’t zip them up. I’ve wondered if it is because it is cooler—but it really isn’t that hot here. I don’t know. Maybe it is too hard to reach.
Little kids were falling asleep on their hard little plastic chairs, seemingly oblivious to the discomfort. We have a Muzungu (white American) elder in this branch now. He played his mouth organ to accompany the sacrament songs (the ones he knew). It was surprising, but really very nice after all. Hey, whatever works.
After church we had many people come to us with requests. We refer almost all of them to the branch president. The car is a problem because they all would like us to take them home and we are not supposed to do that. Neal was feeling so sick. We really debated about going to Church at all, but he really wanted to attend this branch presidency meeting (their first). So, we had planned to leave after Sacrament, forgetting that Sacrament was last in this branch. Then they had no Primary leader, so little 11 year old girls were conducting Primary. No YW leaders turned up, so I taught YW and went to R.S. where the new president was conducting for the first time. YW was conducted during SS. Things run a little differently here.
Sometimes we continue to be shocked:
The other day we were trekking up a steep hill on a narrow path with tall (12 feet Neal says) maize on either side of us. We were following 3 members of the branch presidency. As we came out into a little clearing on a very muddy patch of path, the men veered off into the corn, and we noticed a little girl sitting spread legged on the edge of the corn with her legs and bare feet extending into the mud, flat in front of her. We were shocked (the men ahead of us were completely oblivious to the little girl). Our surprise arose out of the idea of this little girl (about 3 years old) sitting all by herself out in this path.
We conferred together asking each other, “Where is the mother? Should we do something? What if someone takes her?” We agreed we should confer with the branch president up ahead. As we walked past her, we looked back and were further shocked to see a brand new baby lying in the dirt a little further back in the corn.
I ran up to the branch president and mentioned the children. He just shrugged his shoulders and said, “Oh her mamma is working in the maize. It is okay. Don’t worry.” I said, “Oh, in the states, we would never do that. They might be kidnapped.” He laughed at me. “They are economic liabilities here! There are so many of them and no food.”
Neal had to go back to the car maybe 15 minutes later to get some copies of the Book of Mormon. He said when he passed them, the little three year old was whimpering, “Mamma, mamma, mamma.” It just broke our hearts. Economic liabilities….so sad!
The Branch President told us there were 50 orphans in the school his child attends. He was relaying that there are just so many kids alone and hungry.
NEW INSIGHT and PROFOUND WISDOM:
We were working with another branch presidency this week in a different area. This area has had the Church in its midst longer than any other where we work (in the 5 branches). There have been many leaders who have lost their memberships here. Many former members and their families harbor resentments and bitter feelings that have never been resolved. We have worked in this area many times with the former branch presidency. The new branch presidency wanted to go down there to see if we could help to soften some of the feelings. We went back to places we had been several times before. We visited one sister who was so angry whom we had missed before on previous visits. We could not understand her words, but boy could we understand her feelings. After we finished visiting for the day, we felt so badly for them and for their feelings of blame and anger.
We mentioned to the branch president that the experience pretty well mirrored the experiences we had had in this area in the past. Then he said, “My father was a farmer. He gave me advice when I was young and working in the shamba. He said, “ Don’t start working on the shamba (farm) where there are many weeds. You will tire yourself out so much that you won’t be able to have the energy to work in the more productive part of the field. Additionally, you will allow more weeds to move from the dense area into the good and productive area by spending your time where it is so hard. It doesn’t mean that you don’t care about the hard area, or that you neglect it, but it does mean that you measure your energy and work where it will be most fertile and produce the best yield.”
NEW RELIEF SOCIETY PRESIDENT
As we have mentioned before, we have all new branch presidencies. Most of these men are really new in the Church. We are trying to do training (when they will let us) each week by going over the Handbook and trying to help them with forms, etc. One of their biggest obstacles is they have no calendars of any kind, no paper or pencils of any kind, etc.
We talked to this branch president (mentioned in the last paragraph) about the importance of having every person have a Church calling. We talked with him about how important it is to pray about callings.
We were surprised last week to hear in sacrament meeting the name of a lady as Relief Society President that we did not know. We asked the members sitting around us who she was. None of them knew her either.
We finally discovered that we did know this sweet woman. We’ve mentioned her and her family in this journal before. They live way, way out in the bush on the top of a long hill. They have 4-5 children. Her husband is the branch clerk. They are really quite new converts less than a year. He rides his bike to church over really rocky and muddy roads. It takes him about an hour-hour and a half to ride to Church one way. To bring their family to Church for one Sunday would cost them $28 American. There is no way…no way in the world they can afford that. They, like almost everyone here, are hungry right now.
Her name is Carol. We were so impressed with their family when we visited them. She has a sweet testimony, but doesn’t speak hardly any English at all. Our R.S. meetings are all in English.
We didn’t get around yet in the 3 weeks we’ve been training in this branch to talk to the branch presidency about what callings entail in detail. I don’t think the branch president has a clue what a R.S. President does.
Carol has never been to a Relief Society meeting. She can’t afford to visit members because she lives so far away from the branch and the other women.
We are trying to visit each branch for a month. We needed to be in a branch far from where Carol will serve this week. We worried about what her first day would be like conducting R.S. We asked the Branch President and young missionaries to visit R.S. to support her. It was a hard experience they reported. I don’t know how we can help her, but that is high on MY priority list for the next month.
Dancing Road We took the entire branch presidency (minus the clerk) out to visit the Clerk and his wife, Carol. As we bumped along---it is a TERRIBLE road---the branch president laughed and said, “We call this the “dancing road” because you swish and sway and go up and down!
One of our Institute Teachers had to leave a branch council meeting (3 hours on a Friday morning) to go visit his sister in the hospital, who has suffered from cancer. She had her ear removed because the cancer had spread there. I had never heard of that before.
Learning curve: Still a third branch president approached us one morning as we were getting ready to go visiting with him. He said, “Is it okay for children to pay tithing before they are eight years old?” We were a little surprised at his question. We assured him that it indeed was. We assume so much, and never think to talk about things that we take for granted. Many of these brethren are so humble.
A Sunday School teacher remarked in class, “Now we have hunger. This is not a time to curse God. It is a time to rely on Him and pray fervently to Him for help.”
TEACHING EXPERIENCE:
We went to visit the 2nd Counselor in a branch presidency. Almost none of the men in these branch presidencies have wives in the Church. Our congregations are mostly men because women stay mostly at home and work on the shamba or the women do not speak English. Anyway, we went to visit him at home. When we arrived, his wife had her sister and a neighbor woman (also married to a leader in the branch) in her home. They had a ton of questions. We opened with prayer, and that resolved a big issue for them. We opened with addressing Heavenly Father and ended in the name of Jesus Christ. They didn’t think we believed in either. We accidentally observed that we didn’t worship Joseph Smith. They questioned if we used the Bible. That was when Neal went to the car to get the books. They were really neat ladies, spoke English well, and had so many questions. We hope they will feel the need to come to Church We gave their names to the missionaries.
I sat in Church yesterday morning and thought, “What a unique experience this is.” We meet in a very primitive rough building with unfinished walls and cracked cement floors. There is no glass in the windows, although every place of entry has bars to prevent theft. There are no curtains or other adornments, but the saints are trying hard to conduct the meeting in the way prescribed by the Handbook. Only a couple of the people in the room have been members more than 3-4 years.
We just worked to reactivate the branch president and his wife 3 months ago. He’s been a member maybe a year. His counselors have been members less time. A sixteen year old girl was sustained as the YW President (a shocker to us), and a new R.S. President was called, who has been inactive for awhile.
The room was filled to the brim! We were thrilled. I looked out the windows to see piles of mud and weeds all around us. Two cows and two staked goats grazed right outside my window. A woman walked by within touching distance with a huge load of wood on her head and a toddler dragging along behind her tugging at her skirts.
Several kids walked under my window chewing on sugar cane….the African candy. It is a woody stalk they pull apart with their teeth and chew to extract its sweetness. They can’t afford sweets (candy) like we use, so their teeth are really quite beautiful for the most part. A boy rode by on his bike loaded with an enormous bag of grain tied on each side and one on the back.
We had a hard time hearing the testimony meeting because of thundering drumming combined with chants in Swahili for a religious group next door. At the same time we were drowned out with the loud beating of the drum, two competing ministers fought for converts across the street and on our side of the street screaming into their microphones at a high rapid pitch as if their volume would somehow endorse their message.
We had a lovely meeting however, with no lapses in time between speakers. The members jumped up one at a time to make sure they would be able to bear their testimonies before the close of the meeting.
Baby Blessing
A new baby was blessed, 1½ months old. The mamma looked so young, I had thought earlier she was either in Primary or YW until she began to nurse the baby. I found out she was 18 years old. The father has 5 children from a former marriage. He is 52 years old. They have been married 2 years, and this is her second baby (the first one died). He told me he met her by going to her parents and offering to pay a dowry of 6 cows and some money when she was 16. She is a pretty girl, very shy. I tried to befriend her, but she speaks no English. She looked frightened when I tried to approach her.
I looked around our small congregation. Many sat with muddy bare feet, almost all with ragged, worn clothing, stained and hanging on their thin bodies like shrouds. That was true regardless of age or gender.
Almost all the little girls wore tattered, fancy, dirt-stained dresses unzipped in the back. I don’t understand that style, but almost all girls and many…maybe even most women wear clothing that is unzipped in the back…Some have torn or broken zippers, but many just don’t zip them up. I’ve wondered if it is because it is cooler—but it really isn’t that hot here. I don’t know. Maybe it is too hard to reach.
Little kids were falling asleep on their hard little plastic chairs, seemingly oblivious to the discomfort. We have a Muzungu (white American) elder in this branch now. He played his mouth organ to accompany the sacrament songs (the ones he knew). It was surprising, but really very nice after all. Hey, whatever works.
After church we had many people come to us with requests. We refer almost all of them to the branch president. The car is a problem because they all would like us to take them home and we are not supposed to do that. Neal was feeling so sick. We really debated about going to Church at all, but he really wanted to attend this branch presidency meeting (their first). So, we had planned to leave after Sacrament, forgetting that Sacrament was last in this branch. Then they had no Primary leader, so little 11 year old girls were conducting Primary. No YW leaders turned up, so I taught YW and went to R.S. where the new president was conducting for the first time. YW was conducted during SS. Things run a little differently here.
Sometimes we continue to be shocked:
The other day we were trekking up a steep hill on a narrow path with tall (12 feet Neal says) maize on either side of us. We were following 3 members of the branch presidency. As we came out into a little clearing on a very muddy patch of path, the men veered off into the corn, and we noticed a little girl sitting spread legged on the edge of the corn with her legs and bare feet extending into the mud, flat in front of her. We were shocked (the men ahead of us were completely oblivious to the little girl). Our surprise arose out of the idea of this little girl (about 3 years old) sitting all by herself out in this path.
We conferred together asking each other, “Where is the mother? Should we do something? What if someone takes her?” We agreed we should confer with the branch president up ahead. As we walked past her, we looked back and were further shocked to see a brand new baby lying in the dirt a little further back in the corn.
I ran up to the branch president and mentioned the children. He just shrugged his shoulders and said, “Oh her mamma is working in the maize. It is okay. Don’t worry.” I said, “Oh, in the states, we would never do that. They might be kidnapped.” He laughed at me. “They are economic liabilities here! There are so many of them and no food.”
Neal had to go back to the car maybe 15 minutes later to get some copies of the Book of Mormon. He said when he passed them, the little three year old was whimpering, “Mamma, mamma, mamma.” It just broke our hearts. Economic liabilities….so sad!
The Branch President told us there were 50 orphans in the school his child attends. He was relaying that there are just so many kids alone and hungry.
NEW INSIGHT and PROFOUND WISDOM:
We were working with another branch presidency this week in a different area. This area has had the Church in its midst longer than any other where we work (in the 5 branches). There have been many leaders who have lost their memberships here. Many former members and their families harbor resentments and bitter feelings that have never been resolved. We have worked in this area many times with the former branch presidency. The new branch presidency wanted to go down there to see if we could help to soften some of the feelings. We went back to places we had been several times before. We visited one sister who was so angry whom we had missed before on previous visits. We could not understand her words, but boy could we understand her feelings. After we finished visiting for the day, we felt so badly for them and for their feelings of blame and anger.
We mentioned to the branch president that the experience pretty well mirrored the experiences we had had in this area in the past. Then he said, “My father was a farmer. He gave me advice when I was young and working in the shamba. He said, “ Don’t start working on the shamba (farm) where there are many weeds. You will tire yourself out so much that you won’t be able to have the energy to work in the more productive part of the field. Additionally, you will allow more weeds to move from the dense area into the good and productive area by spending your time where it is so hard. It doesn’t mean that you don’t care about the hard area, or that you neglect it, but it does mean that you measure your energy and work where it will be most fertile and produce the best yield.”
NEW RELIEF SOCIETY PRESIDENT
As we have mentioned before, we have all new branch presidencies. Most of these men are really new in the Church. We are trying to do training (when they will let us) each week by going over the Handbook and trying to help them with forms, etc. One of their biggest obstacles is they have no calendars of any kind, no paper or pencils of any kind, etc.
We talked to this branch president (mentioned in the last paragraph) about the importance of having every person have a Church calling. We talked with him about how important it is to pray about callings.
We were surprised last week to hear in sacrament meeting the name of a lady as Relief Society President that we did not know. We asked the members sitting around us who she was. None of them knew her either.
We finally discovered that we did know this sweet woman. We’ve mentioned her and her family in this journal before. They live way, way out in the bush on the top of a long hill. They have 4-5 children. Her husband is the branch clerk. They are really quite new converts less than a year. He rides his bike to church over really rocky and muddy roads. It takes him about an hour-hour and a half to ride to Church one way. To bring their family to Church for one Sunday would cost them $28 American. There is no way…no way in the world they can afford that. They, like almost everyone here, are hungry right now.
Her name is Carol. We were so impressed with their family when we visited them. She has a sweet testimony, but doesn’t speak hardly any English at all. Our R.S. meetings are all in English.
We didn’t get around yet in the 3 weeks we’ve been training in this branch to talk to the branch presidency about what callings entail in detail. I don’t think the branch president has a clue what a R.S. President does.
Carol has never been to a Relief Society meeting. She can’t afford to visit members because she lives so far away from the branch and the other women.
We are trying to visit each branch for a month. We needed to be in a branch far from where Carol will serve this week. We worried about what her first day would be like conducting R.S. We asked the Branch President and young missionaries to visit R.S. to support her. It was a hard experience they reported. I don’t know how we can help her, but that is high on MY priority list for the next month.
Dancing Road We took the entire branch presidency (minus the clerk) out to visit the Clerk and his wife, Carol. As we bumped along---it is a TERRIBLE road---the branch president laughed and said, “We call this the “dancing road” because you swish and sway and go up and down!
One of our Institute Teachers had to leave a branch council meeting (3 hours on a Friday morning) to go visit his sister in the hospital, who has suffered from cancer. She had her ear removed because the cancer had spread there. I had never heard of that before.
Learning curve: Still a third branch president approached us one morning as we were getting ready to go visiting with him. He said, “Is it okay for children to pay tithing before they are eight years old?” We were a little surprised at his question. We assured him that it indeed was. We assume so much, and never think to talk about things that we take for granted. Many of these brethren are so humble.
A Sunday School teacher remarked in class, “Now we have hunger. This is not a time to curse God. It is a time to rely on Him and pray fervently to Him for help.”
TEACHING EXPERIENCE:
We went to visit the 2nd Counselor in a branch presidency. Almost none of the men in these branch presidencies have wives in the Church. Our congregations are mostly men because women stay mostly at home and work on the shamba or the women do not speak English. Anyway, we went to visit him at home. When we arrived, his wife had her sister and a neighbor woman (also married to a leader in the branch) in her home. They had a ton of questions. We opened with prayer, and that resolved a big issue for them. We opened with addressing Heavenly Father and ended in the name of Jesus Christ. They didn’t think we believed in either. We accidentally observed that we didn’t worship Joseph Smith. They questioned if we used the Bible. That was when Neal went to the car to get the books. They were really neat ladies, spoke English well, and had so many questions. We hope they will feel the need to come to Church We gave their names to the missionaries.
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