Kenya

So last week I had the opportunity to take a trip to Kenya.  I can’t believe it has only been a week since I left Debre Zeyit because it literally feels like two months.

It all started with this scenario in the Kenya airport:

Karen and I are walking over to get our Kenyan visa and a lady stops us and says “We are checking yellow fever certificates.”

I look at Karen and say “Enday?”  (which is Amharic for basically ‘ohmigosh’ or ‘wow’ or something of that affect-I don’t actually think you are supposed to use it as a question, but I do).  Then I ask Karen if she has hers (secretly hoping she doesn’t because I don’t want to be the only moron that doesn’t have hers).  Thankfully, Karen says no she doesn’t have hers (you like how selfish I am?).  So we stand there like complete idiots wondering if we are about to quarantined or something.  So I tell the airport lady that we don’t have ours and she asks us where we are coming from.  We say “Ethiopia” and I felt a bit of judgement and hate coming off of her.  She asks us how long we have been there I say “Four Months” and Karen says “One and a half years”.  More disdain and hate from airport lady is flung our way.

She tells us to follow her and the other group of ill-prepared travelers.  We sit outside of an office and she calls people in one by one and they aren’t staying in there too long so we think we will be on our way shortly.  Until she calls “next” and Karen and I go in together.  We then get this big long hate speech about how she let the other people slide because they were only passing through Ethiopia but because we have chosen to live there she can’t possible let us walk into her country without the certificates.  Meanwhile, Karen and I are not fighting with her, we just want to handle this as quickly as possible.  She continues her tirade about Ethiopia having an endemic of yellow fever and she doesn’t even know what to do with us.  She tells us we have to get the shot, we say okay, she tells us how much, we say we don’t have any shillings, she tells us where to get some, so we traipse all over the airport trying to find a place to exchange money, finally find it, money exchanger lady asks us for our passports, we say the shot lady kept it, money exchanger lady gives us a death look but exchanges our money anyway, we go back to shot lady, only to discover she is not actually shot lady, the real shot lady comes, shoots us, we go back to the not really shot lady, stands there while she yells at a man who has no certificate and other airport personnel, she signs our certificates, we proceed to the visa line, only to be ridiculed by the visa dude for not having our original yellow fever certificates with us.

So we finally get through the visa line, go downstairs, find our luggage, only to discover that we don’t have anyone waiting for us.  We make some phone calls and discover that our ride left us because we never came out.  She, thankfully, came back and we were on our way!

We stayed in the guesthouse of a non-profit that rescues street kids in Nairobi.  They go to the slums to minister to the boys and they work a points system.  The boys can earn points for a variety of good behavior.  Once they have enough points they are moved to a farm in a more rural part of the region.  On the farm the boys are given an education with a lot of it focused on agriculture.  They are trained in all things agricultural in hopes that they will find a job one day.  And to help in finding jobs there are farmers that work with this project and when the boys graduate these farmers employ a lot of the boys.  It is a wonderful project and I enjoyed spending time with the boys.  We had a praise and worship session with the boys and it was so wonderful.  I took pictures and video but because of the sensitive matter of these boys prior lives I will not post them.  Most of the boys were involved in gangs and there is still animosity going on.

Kenya is an interesting place.  Nairobi is a very built-up city.  It feels first-world, not third-world.  Nairobi was kind of weird for me though because it felt like I was in Florida and DC at the same time!  In Nairobi we went to the elephant orphanage, the giraffe park (where I kissed a giraffe), and went to an actual mall (we don’t have those in Ethiopia).  

A few days into the trip we drove to Mombasa and were very excited to see the beach.  Mombasa was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO hot and humid!  It was ridiculous!  I couldn’t believe how much I was sweating!  The first night we were there we went to the beach and Karen and I rode a camel on the beach.  That was so cool.  The next day our main plan was to lay on the beach all day.  Well, I bought sunscreen in Mombasa because I forgot it at home and let’s just say that it was useless!  We laid out in the sun for 2 hours and both got burnt.  I mean, burnt.  So the next day we were in pain.  We laid around with ice on our backs and just moaned and cried.  We took a night bus from Mombasa back to Nairobi overnight and got back to Nairobi and we just wanted to go home.  But our flight wasn’t for two days.  So we basically hung out at the guesthouse moaning.  

The trip to Kenya wasn’t what I expected but I did have fun seeing elephants, kissing a giraffe, riding a camel, riding a motorbike ‘cause taxi was too expensive, and checking out the ministry down here.  There was definitely some uncomfortable parts of the trip, ridiculous Indian Ocean sunburn, unimaginable heat and humidity but I God confirmed something during this trip.

Debre Zeyit is definitely my home.  I can’t really blame my not-so-great trip on Kenya.  Kenya is actually a great place but it isn’t my place.  There are things in Kenya that people may define as “better” than Ethiopia.  Like, there aren’t squatty potties everywhere, you can actually flush toilet paper, the food shopping has more variety but Kenya doesn’t have my heart.  God has definitely made Ethiopia my home and even though things are cleaner and prettier in Kenya it can never capture my heart like Ethiopia has.  

What I miss about Ethiopia:

*The cool mornings.

*Running in the mornings.

*Spicy foods.

*Fiker & Rebirra.

*All 145 kids in the BCI program.

*Evening prayer with my favorite habesha.

*Sleeping mosquito free.

*Dimples.

*New Zealand.

*Wind.

*Amharic.

*Couch mountain.

*Buna!!!!!!!

*Having goats follow me.

*Moose.

*Bajaj.

*BCI staff.

*Morning devotions with BCI staff.

*The shower in the guesthouse (it is great, even though it doesn’t have a shower curtain).

*My purple blanket.

*My fan.

*And just the feeling of “I’m home”.

Thank you to Margaret, Robin, Yolanda, and Miriam for showing us around!  You do a great job here with those boys.  I pray blessings over your life and ministries!

It has been fun Kenya, and I will miss my new giraffe boyfriend, but I can’t wait to get home tonight.