It appears that everywhere I go death follows. After I retired the murder rate in Essex
appeared to have dropped, or perhaps the
deaths are not news anymore. I seem to
have the same affect in Kenya as the conference I was due to lead had to be
cancelled as one of the leading elders died (although the death was natural and
not suspicious).
AIC Kaboswa was our destination on
Sunday morning. We were informed it was a 9am start and we would be finished by
11am, which was good as we were leaving Kericho today. We were early at the
rendezvous point and waited, Peter turned up slightly late and then said we
were going to an old lady's house to pray for her as she was ill, so obviously
not a 9am start. It had been raining so the roads in the village were slightly
muddy and so were we as the final ¼ mile was not suitable for the car, so we
walked. We met with the family and prayed for the old lady, who was very pleased to see us. It was then a muddy
walk back and onto the church. By now the children had seen Linda and were
following her, a new tribe.
Although we had been told church
started at 9am ( it was nearer 09.45 by now) the message didn't seem to have
filtered out to the congregation, as there were not many there. However, there
were loads of children, courtesy of Linda. We started anyway and one of my
students called Dorothy was leading the service and did any excellent job, must
have been my teaching! Wilson Kipsang had won the Tokyo marathon that morning
(runs slightly faster than me) and so I was able to link that into a sermon on
running, based on Hebrews 12 verses 1-3. As the main bulk of the congregation
was children, I tailored my sermon to them, fortunately it was interpreted as
they did not speak English. I finished
around 10.45 and then everyone else wanted their say, including the prospective
MP. We were invited for tea in the village, but we explained we had a long journey
and needed to get on our way, there is no thing as a quick cuppa in Kenya! We
were just off schedule with a 11.15 departure.
Peter needed a lift to Brooke
and Linda bought some tea from the men by the roadside. It was then full speed
ahead to Nakuru where we were scheduled to meet Boaz. Our conference had been
cancelled as they needed the day to plan the funeral. We had made the decision
not to stay in Nakuru overnight, but head back to Nairobi. However, we were
going to meet Boaz for coffee and hand over the last bag.
It took a couple of hours to get
there and we caught up with Boaz, another former student, and then started the
long journey back to Nairobi. It was a tiring journey on the single track road,
with lots of slow lorries, evidently everyone returns to big city for their villages
on a Sunday afternoon. We stopped at the Rift Valley view shops and Linda
bought some material. It was about 6pm by the time we reached the Hilton. We
have a lot less baggage to carry up now.
On Monday we left the hotel at
10am and went to the Giraffe centre so Linda
could feed the, giraffes, costs £8 to get in prices have gone up! Linda was
happy feeding the Giraffes until one of them dribbled down her top, more
washing for me. After this we went to the Kazuri bead factory so she could
spend some more money and I sat and read the paper drinking black coffee. It
had a Garden Coffee shop where you could drink anything, as long as it was
black coffee, which suited me. Linda went on a tour, spent my money and then
found some monkeys to amuse her before we finally left.
Our next stop was the Galleria
for a spot of lunch and more shopping. I bought some Kenyan coffee beans for
home, might as well use up the spare luggage with something useful. Linda found
some more craft shops and bought some more material, I did find a belt I liked
but the store owner didn't want to negotiate low enough so I walked away. We
returned to the hotel and spent the evening relaxing and repacking our cases.
On Tuesday we went for a walk
around the area and then sat by the pool catching up on emails and reading
before going to the airport in the evening for the flight home.
We have given away six bags, around
85 tops, a large quantity of pens and pencils, running equipment, knitted items
(including hats, blankets, tops, puppets), bibles, theological books, machine
knitting books, balls as well as making financial gifts to several individuals.
Thanks to everyone who has supported in some way.