My apologies for taking so long to post again. Things got busy over last weekend and with heading to Namanga on Sunday. The internet also became a little more contentious and then I headed home on Tuesday. Layovers were short and did not avail time to write. Once home, I had to get in gear and catch up on a few things. So here I am!
On Saturday, the 14th, we headed back up to the Kiriko Special School to finish things up. It had rained more overnight and the ground was in good condition to set out some plants. The Magruder family, my hosts in Nairobi, brought some supplies up for the school. They are helping with the construction of a boys dormitory at the school. They also got their hands dirty and helped set out some plants.
We had lunch at the school and then said our goodbyes and headed back to Nairobi. I was treated to an Ethiopian dinner with the Magruders. Yum! I got things repacked that evening because I had a 7am departure Sunday morning for Namanga.
Wilson, my driver, was at the door a little before 7 on Sunday. The Toyota Landcruiser above was my chariot for the next three days. We headed out for Namanga in the cool Nairobi morning. Traffic was the lightest I have ever seen it. We arrived in Namanga in about two and a half hours. We met Pastor Simon at his house and then went to Namanga Baptist Church for services. Below is Pastor Simon preaching.
We had lunch and then spent some time getting a few things prepared for our trip to Meto on Monday. Meto/Empukani is a Massai village that Robert Dickinson and I visited in February with With Open Eyes. I was glad to have also have a little time to rest that evening. The pace of the trip was beginning to catch up to me!
I have been trying since April of 2016 to get an electric fence in place to help keep monkeys out of several garden areas. I wanted to see how it would work. We sent parts to South Sudan for this, but with refugees relocating, it did not get installed. I bought another set for Namanga last October. It finally made it there a couple months ago. I was so excited to see that Pastor Simon had installed it! And it works! I was hoping to get to see it in action, but the garden didn’t have any monkey attacks while I was there.
Early on Monday, we set out for Meto. We had a 2 hour cross country drive to get there. Pastor Timothy Moilo had a Mobile Messenger Bible training class going on this week. It has been incredibly dry in this area for a long, long time. The first picture below is the schoolyard in February of this year. The second is the same schoolyard on Monday. There is just nothing growing.
This little goat was trying to find some green leaves on this acacia bush. There wasn’t much there. So sad.
I was able to get some time with the Mobile Messengers before lunch to do some training on conservation agriculture and show them the videos on the drip irrigation system. It helps having the videos in a language that the folks can understand! No interpretation needed! Below, Pastor Timothy is helping interpret my conservation agriculture presentation.
Nicholas, the trainer doing the Bible teaching is from northern Kenya and has worked with conservation agriculture before. He was very excited to learn about what we are doing with the irrigation. It may be a connection for another area for EDEN.
The garden area and a large part of the compound had been fenced since we were there in February. The garden had also been tilled and they were in the process of putting in beds.
The engineer from the irrigation company was to be in Meto on Tuesday. I measured everything off and made sure all of the parts were there. We needed to get a few more items to connect the tank to the water supply line. Meto has a deep well that they use for water. We wrapped things up and headed back to Namanga to catch the hardware store before it closed.
We ran into some complications in getting the engineer to Namanga and in getting all the necessary items. None of the pipes seem to be standard sizes and everything has to custom fit. With election protests still a possibility and me having to get to the other side of Nairobi to get packed up to come home, I was not able to return to Meto on Tuesday. Pastor Simon took the engineer and a plumber up to get the system installed.
The guys still have to complete the beds in the foreground in the picture above. The smaller tank on the right is the new one for the irrigation system. This is a full half acre that will serve the community well. EDEN is also supplying transplants for them to plant. Those should get put in the ground this next week.
Wilson and I headed for Nairobi and made it to the Magruder’s house in the early afternoon. It was good to be able to shower and pack with a little time to spare. I even got to see Stephen Dinkins again as we were picking the kids up from school.
As always, there is a lot to process and a lot of opportunity. Stay tuned to see how you can help with some future projects! Thanks for reading!
EDEN in Africa 