Day Three

We had another quiet day for the most part yesterday.  Jim and I took a walk down the street with a few others to go to the local "Walmart", known as Nakumatt.  It's NOT a Walmart, and it definitely has Kenyan flair, but we were encouraged by the amount of stuff we could find there.  

We purchased a few snacks for the kids for the next three weeks at "Africa School" (our orientation), and walked around just to see what groceries we will be able to get once we move into our home in three weeks.  We left the kids at the guesthouse with one of the RVA moms, and took in our walk through Nairobi without them.  

It's hard to describe, and we didn't take any pictures, because we really wanted our camera to come home with us instead of getting stolen!  There were many people on the sides of  the street walking.  It's a main road into downtown Nairobi, so there were matatu (public transportation... very crowded little vans) stops every so often.  And plenty of other automobile traffic right next to the path.  It was a bit of a rainy, misty morning, so we got rather muddy along the way.  

It's dirty (but not overwhelmingly so), and the buildings are often run down, compared to American standards.  There are little makeshift buildings (shacks?) in places, there are nicer, large buildings being built in others.  We saw five armed guards or policemen in the store, and more outside.  And by armed, I don't mean a little firearm like our policemen carry in the states.  We are still getting used to the thick accents when English is spoken, and ready to know a little Swahili to make communication more comfortable.  So I suppose all this to say: we were on sensory overload!

So after that outing, we came back and enjoyed the guesthouse grounds some more.

The bird books are still packed so we can't identify these birds, but they're pretty!

Passionfruit flower

A look out past the guesthouse grounds

We got the kids a treat at Nakumatt... strawberry milk!  (There's also pineapple, coffee, bubble gum, banana...)

So now we are off to our orientation in Machakos, Kenya, for three weeks.  We'll have a lot of cultural activities, lots of learning about living in Africa, and who knows what else!  The internet may be limited there, so we'll keep in touch when we can, but it may be a while.  Thanks for your prayers and love!

Day Two

Last night didn't go as well as the first, all of us but Joel were up and ready to begin the day at 1 AM!  Hopefully our eventful day will help us sleep a little better tonight.  We got up at 5 minutes 'till 8 (breakfast time) and ate a quick breakfast and went off to church next door at Nairobi Baptist Church.  The 8:30 was the "youth and young adults" service, but we felt right at home.  The service was about two hours, and we were invited to a special chai time afterwards since we were visiting.  They prepared us chai, and prepared the kids hot chocolate, who were delighted.  I think that it warmed Faith up to being around all the strangers quite a bit!  They were pretty tired because of the restless night, but did very well considering that.  In this video, you can hear the later church service going on in the background of the kids playing after church (this is the playground at our guest house.)  I thought it was kind of fun to hear the sounds of Sunday morning here!

After lunch, we were picked up by the Fowlers (friends of ours from our candidate week with AIM in 2008) who are serving in Uganda, and will join us at orientation.  They took us to the Giraffe Center here.  You can feed the giraffes and there were also warthogs and tortoises to see.  Jim is enjoying getting glimpses of different birds as well, both at the guesthouse and when we are out and about.

It was also our anniversary, so it has been a fun day to celebrate.  We've never spent it with so many people!  We are thankful for this time to rest, Tuesday after lunch we head down to Machakos, Kenya to begin our orientation.

Happy 6 years!

We made it!

Jambo from Kenya!  We have arrived, and after crashing into bed at midnight local time, we are ready for our first day in Kenya.  I’ll take a little time to tell you about the trip, and then there are some photos from the journey at the bottom of the post.

Thursday morning was spent loading the truck with everyone’s luggage at AIM headquarters.  There are a good handful of other families, couples and singles heading to the field with us, many of whom are then headed to RVA after orientation.  It’s been great to meet so many people already, and Faith and Joel are grateful to have some new buddies.

We had a commissioning lunch with the staff of AIM and the families of the missionaries that hadn’t said goodbye yet, shared a little about ourselves and shared our last stateside prayer requests.  We were prayed over, loved, hugged and sent on our way.  We were loaded into passenger vans and drove off to the airport about 2 pm.  We arrived around 3 pm and brought everything into the airport.  It’s a giant mess when everyone has at least 8 bags (except most of the singles), as well as all the carry on baggage one could possible take.  There are a few older kids, and that helped immensely with keeping all the younger kids happy and corralled.  (One 6-year old, four 5-year olds, three 3-year olds, and one infant.) 

We had to check everything in with British Airways, some people taking longer than others depending upon the BA staff member.  We checked in individually at the first-class counter while there were no customers there, had a wonderful man help us, and it took about five minutes for each of us, 20 minutes total.  Another family took close to two hours, which was a long and frustrating time for them.  We waited for each other, so by the time we could go through security, we had less than 45 minutes before our plane was supposed to depart.   No time to buy snacks, fill up water bottles, or write a quick note online to say the least!  We ran to the plane, and the door was shut behind us. 

Our family chose to sit in groups of two, and that worked well.  The kids had a little more attention, and kept a little quieter than they might have with interacting with each other!  On the first flight we were served supper, and the kids watched a movie while eating, and we told them it would be bedtime right afterward.  Joel got about 2.5 hours of sleep with Jim, and Faith got about 25 minutes with me.  She rested well, just not long!  We got up for a little breakfast at sunrise and shortly landed in London.  When changing planes in London, there is more security to go through.  So about three long lines and a long walk later, we got to rest a little in the London airport. (By resting, I mean sitting and taking off our bags… no sleep for the weary!) The kids enjoyed some coloring and interacting with their new friends. 

Then it was time for flight number two.  Our goal was to keep the kids awake a little more to help them begin to adjust to their new time zone.  They tried, but they both needed little morning naps.  I woke Joel up after another couple of hours.  They enjoyed movies and toddler TV on their individual screens in the airplane.  I will admit that I slept for quite a while Joel watched his TV after lunch… and who knows what else he was doing!  We were definitely in survival mode at this point.  The kids did well on the plane.  Of course they were kids, and they were tired most all the time (they never got a full night’s sleep in New York before we even left) but they listened to us well for the most part and enjoyed the adventure.  By the way, British Airways was WONDERFUL with the kids.  I’m pretty sure they feed the kids more than the adults!

We landed in Nairobi at 9 PM, regrouped and headed to immigration.  Jim and I were questioned about what we were doing quite a bit.  It made me a little nervous!  Others were questioned heavily like us as well, but some not at all.  And we were one of the first families to go through, so it was a little intimidating.  Nothing out of the ordinary, and we have nothing to hide, but we had been given very clear instructions about what to say, which we followed, and we sure didn’t have any practice for this situation!  (The feeling I had a lot last night and this morning was that ‘I’ll be glad for the day when this feels like normal life!’)

We headed downstairs in the airport to get our baggage, which felt like Newark, take two, but we all made it through customs without any more questioning, so that was helpful... we were ready to go to bed!  We had a few AIM AIR (AIM’s aviation ministry) pilots who were behind customs with us to help point us in the right directions and such.  That was nice… normally you can’t have help in that area of the airport.  At this point, it’s close to 11 PM, and the kids are just ready to be done with the traveling.  We got things loaded and sorted (most of our bags are arriving at RVA this morning, while just a few stay with us for the next three weeks) and climbed in a bus to come here to the Mayfield Guesthouse, where we arrived just about midnight.  The kids had “Daniel Boone” stories (what we tell them when we don’t have any books to read) and we all fell right to sleep.  We got up at 7; Jim and I took wonderful hot showers (something I never had at all in Kenya the first time, so that was comforting) and woke the kids up for a breakfast of cereal, toast and bananas. They weren’t too hungry this morning, since we woke them up so hopefully they’ll make it to lunch!  They are now playing happily on the playground.  It’s wonderfully cool here.  It’s probably 65F outside.  I’m putting on long sleeves the next time I go out!

So that was our trip.  Thank you for praying, and please continue to do so!

AIM Headquarters in NY:  Loading up the luggage truck

Everyone's things (not nearly all of it!) in Newark Airport

Last sight of the US for (ack!) two years!  You can see Central Park... this is New York City.

Faith enjoying doing some little crafts in London's Heathrow airport.

Joel playing with his new airplane toy in London.

Faith sharing her coloring book with a new friend

Mary helped us pretty much the whole way with our kids in the airports and getting everything around.  She is 16, coming to RVA with her family as well, and pretty much did the trip by herself so she could help us.  What a blessing!

First sight of Africa... the Sahara desert.

We landed in Kenya!

Faith happy to finally be at her new home!

Our room, last night.

Good morning, Kenya!

Our guesthouse, a beautiful place.

WE'RE OFF!

We're on our way!  Talk to you on the other side in a few days!  Pray hard!