getting back to civilization.

Hello All!

Us infront of our hut.

It feels as though we haven't made a blog post in forever!

A view of Kisegi from the water - Lake Victoria

For the past two and a half weeks we have been living in a small town called Kisegi, and working at the Kisegi Orphanage School. During our time there we were teaching - Math, Science (Kyle) and English, Computer (Kate) and working with the director and headteacher of the school to get some things for the school that they desperately needed. Firstly, Kyle and I bought 6 desks for the students in Pre-Unit (the desks hold about 4 students at a time) who were previously sitting on the dirt floor during their lessons. They love their new desks! and were very proud to show us which "spot" was theirs.

The classroom pre-desks, pupils would just sit on the dirt floor.

Classroom with new desks!

 We also were able to give a donation to the school to put towards getting a fence put up around the school and the playing area, to keep the local drunks (fishermen...) away from the kids. Apparently, the men who stay out all night long to catch omenna (the tiny fish, we know as minnows that they EAT.. ew) return home in the wee hours of the morning and drink in a building quite near to the school. Kyle and I had to deal with removing unwanted visitors more than once.

Some of the Standard 3 students at Kisegi Orphanage school.

Other things we did while visiting the Lake Victoria area: mostly visited with our family. Introduced them to things like ipods - which Mr.Zachary liked VERY much. He kept mine clipped to his shirt at all times, which was funny. He showed it off to all his friends and I let him keep it the whole time we were staying there. It made him so happy. His favorite bands were The Who, Kid Cudi, and Daft Punk. Good choices, Zachary. He was even able to wire up an ancient looking stereo and play it over the speakers. We also introduced them to binoculars, which were pretty amazing to them. Even the kids at school thought it was cool how it brought the lake right up next to them. Zachary liked to use it to spy on his brothers working in the shambas from our sitting place near the hut. He said he "liked to know their secrets" Hahaha. What a creeper... By the end of our trip we started calling Mr.Zachary "Daddy" Mostly because we went everywhere with him. We were his children, we couldn't even go to our house alone from the eating house. We also had security guards the entire time we were there, I felt famous.

Zachary and his daughter Vida, who was absolutely terrified of our whiteness

We also went to a football match, which was pretty fun even though I (Kate) have minimal interest in soccer. Whenever a team would get a goal, the whole fan section would rush the field and do flips, dance, and cheer along with the players. The celebrations only lasted a few minutes, until the referee blew the whistle... but then next goal, it would be the same thing. It was fun to watch.

We also went out on the lake in a wooden boat at a day trip one Saturday. The big islands on Lake Victoria are Mfangano and Rusinga. They were pretty far away, so we opted for the closer small island of Kiwa. It was super hot, and with the sun reflecting off the lake, we both got bad sunburns (Despite having sunscreen on) We had to explain to our family what sunburn is, and they thought we were kidding. Although being a bit crispy by the end of the day, it was very fun. The boat we were in had to constantly be bailed, due to three small holes letting water in, and we had no lifejackets (which only became apparent to me when we got into the deep, very wavy water). We also saw two hippos! I didn't get any pictures, mostly because we were speeding away from them. We were about 10 feet from the mother and baby - way to close to an angry mommy hippo.

Kyle pushing the boat out with some of the guys.

All in all, our second volunteer placement was very good. It was definitely much more relaxing than our time at the slum. The two projects have very different needs, and it was very nice to see another side of Kenyan life, where even those with little can be happy because they are with family. When we were leaving it was very hard to say goodbye. We were their first volunteers! Two of the eight wives of the husband (Eunice and Christine - the eldest mammas) even gave us gifts to give to our mothers, and told us to greet them for us. They want us to come back and visit with our families. I think my dad, Clancy would enjoy it a lot there - even the eating minnows part! I would like to hope that one day we will visit again. We will always remember our Luo family.

Eating Omenna and Ugali ... yum?

 Our next plans are to go say goodbye to everyone in Nakuru, have a quick meeting in Nairobi with our volunteer organization about our most recent placement (as we were the guinea pig volunteers for that project) and head onward to the coast to see Mombassa, the beaches, Watamu (sea turtles!), Malindi, and Lamu.We fly out of Kenya on the 19th, and are home in Canada on the 5th of April.

We will be sure to update whenever we can.

In Peace,
Kyle and Kate