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 Charlie Knox26, m, resident of spa, northern ireland, a thinker, who tries to be real, enjoys the company of nala(left), indebted to jesus for his grace and instruction in life and whose, amongst other things, studying sports science at UUJ. enjoy rugby a whole lot! |
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Tuesday, July 24, 2007 Kwaheri (Goodbye) Kenya WARNING: VERY LONG POST!  So the trip that myself and matty (my co -leader) dreamed of over one and half years ago, and that we'd spent so much time and effort preparing for is now over. The completion of our time in Kenya has definitely left a void in my heart now that it's over. I'm quite sure that it won't take long for it to be filled but at the moment it feels fairly acute, something i think i'm glad off. To miss it means it got into my heart...... and that it definitely did! What a journey it has been, from the initial meetings with Habitat deciding on where we would go, to the launching of the project in the rugby club wondering if anyone would want to go, to the formation of the 15 man team and all the fundraising to get them out there, to the big event itself when we headed off into africa just over 2 weeks ago.I left for Kenya with alot of hopes, many of them for the boys i was taking out. It nows brings me a real deep sense of pleasure to look back and see that our hopes were not only met but far exceeded. As one of the kenyan guys said at the end of our visit, 'God's tick was on your visit'. It's hard to know where to start telling you about the experience. The whole team feels like that. We debriefed in Doha Airport (Qatar) on the way home and each member struggled to put words to the deep and very real things they had experienced. What we all knew is that we'd had the trip of a lifetime, that we'd been part of something very special and that we'd connected with some amazing people both within our team and those in kenya.  Our primary task out there was of course the building. We built on  two separate sites for two families in the Bungoma Region. Both sites were located in the middle of agricultural land. The crops included corn, maize, nuts and beans but the predominant one was sugar cane, harvested to supply the local factory. There were hundreds of thousands of acres of this stuff reaching about 8/9ft tall fully grown and just for the record it was very tasty..not unlike candy floss! We travelled each day to work in a matatu. These are the local taxi's and resemble our Toyota Hiace vans except they have windows and seats. Health and safety wasn;t much of a consideration as each day we bunged 21 people into the van. This was fun. By the end of the trip we had sung alot in those vans, sweated a lot together, prayed a time or two, concious of the what could happen if we ever crashed and indeed crashed twice. The crashes took place within 3 or 4 minutes of each other on our last day. The daily thunderstorm had soaked the top layer of clay on the roads and the driver who was insistent on driving at normal speeds spun the van hitting the ditch. Both occasions required us to get out and get the thing moving again with a push!! Thankfully noone got injured! Given the energy, enthusiasm and brute strength of most of our team (can't include myself in the latter category!) we manged to break all Habitat Kenya records for house building! A  house that usually takes the kenyan's a month and a half to build, we had finished in 7 days. The team did us proud in that regard and had a big impact on the locals. Apparently it's common for teams to blitz the building in the first few days before calving for the rest of the trip but our boys just kept going, fueled by the fact they were getting some extra fitness training, and a few competitions between each other. Our foreman or 'fundi' as he was known, congratulated the boys at the end of trip for their energy saying that if kenyans worked like our boys had they wouldn't be living in a developing nation. Who knows if this is true but it was a nice to leave a legacy of hard work. If there was ever a shortage of work on site we ended up playing with some of the local kids who had come to gaze at this strange bunch of mezungas (white men!) in their territory. We threw rugby balls back and forth, blew bubbles or just played with baloons. They just loved it! They also really loved having their photo taken and went mad when you showed it back to them through the screen!  During our time out at the sites we also got to visit the local Mufule Primary School. I could never describe to you how welcome we were made to feel at this place. Kenyan's make you welcome with lots of smiles and handshakes but most of all lots and lots of noise. The kids went mad when we were around..some of them had never seen a mezunga before! You just couldn't be in such an environment and not be touched in a fairly deep way....most of the team felt like that anyway! Another highlight was visiting the local rugby club. A crowd of 500 or so school students gathered around the pitch as we coached the rugby lads and then played them in a game of touch rugby. The combination of their lightening fast feet and our team being sapped of energy saw the locals winning 1 -0! At the end of our time with these lads they performed a war dance which was fairly intimidating. We responded with the Ballynahinch song which i think they enjoyed. We also handed over 4 rugby balls, about 15 cones and a few tag belts. These were accepted with a deafening cheer and lots of clapping. A very humbling moment!  We finished our time in Bungoma with a house dedication where the house we had completed was handed over to the house owners. This celebratory ceremony included singing, speeches and a meal. I also handed over a bible and a Ballynahinch Rugby Club plaque to the homeowners before cutting the string across the doorway to their new house. This was a special day. The owners had been preparing for this house for over 7 years when they first bought the bricks for it's construction. When we had wrapped up in Bungoma we headed south to the Masai Mara game reserve for a couple of nights and a day on Safari. This was an awesome experience. It was nice to return to some more normal food and to rest a little after all the hard work. Out on game drives we saw giraffes, zebra, cheetahs, gazelles, water buffalo, hippos, baboons, warthogs, wildebeast (migrating!), a tortoise and hyeenas. THe highlight though was when we saw a male and female lion awake from their sleep and go into hunt mode immediately, killing a wildebeast within minutes and all within 30 metres of our van. An unforgettable experience! We drove back to our lodge on a major high that evening helped along by the beautiful sunset.  Well this very long post this far only offers a snapshot into our trip. I haven't mentioned the trip to church that we had, the kenyan roads, our trip to carnivore restuarant, our accomodation in Bungoma, or the polygamist culture there. I haven't mentioned much about how well our team got on or the visit to the masai village but I've already rattled on too much so maybe later I'll say something about these things! To finish i would like to thank all of you who prayed or supported us financially. This really was the trip of a lifetime, one that I and my team will never forget. Please also continue to pray for us as we adjust to life back here and figure out what further associations our club can have with Habitat. Do also pray for the folks in Bungoma. We built on two sites and funded about 4/5 more. Unfortunately it will take a lot more building before poverty housing in that area is eradicated. Right I'm beginning to get bored of myself! posted by charlie | 5:02 PM | Monday, July 23, 2007 Home Just back from Kenya. Had the time of our lives. It'll take me a few days to gather up my thoughts and photos before i share them. Enough to say Africa was absolutely beautiful, it's people so warm and hospitible and our team absolutely brilliant. After a year and a half of planning I can't believe it's all over! I'll post in a day or two! While we were away the club ran an article about us http://www.hinchrfc.com/Latest_News/Kenya/news2.htm posted by charlie | 11:48 AM | |
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