Today began very early (5:30 am) so that we could head on over to the Nairobi State Game Park. We spent 6 hrs driving through the bush looking for wild animals in their natural setting. It was AWESOME!! Pat got some great shots and I tried to get some live animal video footage. We saw a ton of giraffes, zebras, gazelles, ostriches, beautiful birds, and many more. Some highlight stories from today include:

We stopped at the “Hippo pool” (which doesn’t actually have any hippos in it) and a guard caring a big gun, like big gun, walked myself, Pat , Mike & our driver for the day. John is a brother of Mary who we have talked a lot about in previous post. We were walking quickly through the bush and saw crocodiles. Now, these were rather large and a little too close for my comfort, but hey that is why the guard took us out with the gun. I asked him if he shoots the gun a lot, and he said just to scare the animals away so that they don’t hurt anyone. I appreciated the gun today.

The Baboons: There were these picnic areas around the park area that had toilets (with out toilet paper of course but it had a DOOR! WHOO!!) Anyway, there is this sign that says, beware of the baboons. Well, lets just say they got VERY close (In fact I stayed in the van and took the picture out the window because I have seen to many animal shows showing baboons not being very nice to people.)

It was a really fun day seeing God’s amazing wild animals out in their natural environment. Just on a side note: The park only has one gate, to get in. So the animals can come and go as they wish, which is very cool. We then took our driver, John out to eat and so we went to the mall and had the choice of: African, Thai, Chinese, Italian, Turkey, and others. It was a pretty eclectic group of mall food choices, not the same in the USA. No, McDonalds or any other fast food chain that you can think of. Our African driver John wanted, get ready for it….PIZZA!!! So we got him his pizza and orange fanta and he was a happy man.

As for the rest of this day, we pretty much have hung out with the Pruitt’s (Our wonderful CMF host) talking ministry/computer issues and as I am typing this Pat and Mike are helping them get email set up and quicker speeds on their computer. Which will hopefully make their life a little easier. We also had dinner tonight at Java House and it was a delightful evening.

Today was our easy/play day. Tomorrow will be church in the slums, which I am so excited about worshiping in a completely different culture but knowing that we are worshiping the same GOD. That is SO powerful. Monday will be another day in the slums, taking a few nets to the children and bring the stories back home. Tuesday will be last minute needs & then we fly out later on that evening. That’s just the “Kenya Schedule” for the next few days. I have learned that there is American Schedule & there is Kenya Schedule. American Schedule is when you arrive at the time when your meeting is set. Kenya Schedule begins whenever, could be 30 min or hours later. So we will still be posting up dates to the blog. Sorry we haven’t emailed everyone; it’s just that internet is SO slow here (2K on average), so this is the best way to communicate to you all.

(written by Pat)

Today was the day that we did the main thing we came here for: introduce the Nairobi team to their new software. If this is news to you, I’ll explain. The ministry that was started here in 2000 has grown from 50 to well over 2,000 kids. Each child is sponsored by someone in the US, who pays for him or her to go to school, eat a good meal (this is a big deal here!), a uniform (they may only have an outfit or two), Christian teaching, a social worker to look after the needs of the family, etc. As you can imagine it can be difficult to maintain records of all of these kids, where they come from, birthdays, who their sponsor is, whether they’ve paid this month, etc. So CMF had a web database written to manage all of this information. Up until now all of this information was kept in multiple spreadsheets and databases and they had problems with info being duplicated and everyone having the current info. The downside to a web database in Kenya is the whole “web” part. Internet access in SLOW. You might remember the days of 56K dial-up speeds. Well, they would LOVE to have that fast. They routinely have something like 2-4K. It might go faster and then slow to a stop for several minutes at a time. Every few minutes someone will remind us that fast fiber optic cable internet connections are coming! It’s become the inside joke. They guess six months, but it could just as easily be two years.

Anyway, Mike and I held a training this morning on the new software for a couple dozen social workers and IT staff. These are mostly very basic computer users. So Mike and I did our best to keep things simple and stopped to allow them to ask questions. It was quickly obvious that the biggest questions centered on roles and procedures and not the technology tools we were presenting.

This team has been very successful with a simple, solid, and biblical ministry model. It has lead to tremendous growth. They are now at a crossroads to continuing that growth. Just like the talented leadership at a church plant has to adapt when their small church grows into a megachurch, this team will have to adapt to the different needs of a growing ministry. They have several new team members that they need to plug into these new needs.

After lunch we held a smaller training/meeting with the CMF missionaries and the Kenyan IT director. We laid out a plan for them to play around with the web database for a couple of weeks until the head of CMF’s Urban Poor ministries visits. At that point they can talk intelligently about what policies and procedures to adopt. Then two weeks after that the CMF staff person who uses the web database all day long is coming to work with them on ironing out some of the kinks.

Since we finished a little early in the afternoon and the Maasai Market was still open we went with our host family, the Pruitts, to shop. This was Mike’s introduction to heavy-handed sales tactics of those at the market. For instance, one thing Katie bought they told us was 90 and half an hour later I got it from them for 42. I didn’t buy anything. Everything that looked good I already had. Katie was a bit overwhelmed and is too soft to get a good deal.

Tomorrow was supposed to be another training day, but we decided we don’t need it. So someone is taking us to the Nairobi Game Park tomorrow at 6am. I’ve never been there and I’m looking forward to seeing how it compares to the wild and open Maasai Mara.

Pat

WE HAVE ARRIVED!!!  More than 24hrs, since leaving the US on Tuesday, we arrive in Nairobi in good spirits and safely.  Our trip began in the Indianapolis airport where I (Katie) was just walking around a store waiting until our time of departure was announced.  I got to talking to one of the clerks and she asked me where I was headed, and I told her and said I was going on a mission trip.  She then asked me if I was Muslim.  This would be a first for me, so I replied, no I am a Christian.  Thus, our first leg begins.

The flight to Minneapolis was quick and uneventful trip.  We had a couple about 2 ½ hrs before our next flight so we decided to eat a nice meal.  We all opted for safe options and food that we new would agree with our system.  As we are sitting in the terminal literally seconds before boarding, CNN starts talking about a computer system shutdown I am beginning to get a little nervous, so thanks to Dr. Root I took my special pill to help me relax and sleep and boy does that pill completely chill you out.  It was AWESOME and a pill I won’t take for granted!!!!  This flight went really well and pretty quickly too.  We had a whole bunch of movies to choose from and before you new it we were in Amsterdam. 

We had like a 4 hr. layover in Amsterdam, so we went to these comfy lounge chairs (after we explored a lot of the shops, which I bought a sleeping mask, since we would be traveling in the day time and I desperately needed to get some sleep.)  Pat and I got a little nap in while Mike kept watch of our luggage. 

Onto our flight to Amsterdam to Kenya:  The plane was pretty empty, so we could spread out if we wanted to.  Both Pat and I got to sleep; I slept quiet a bit more since I had my special sleeping mask.  (Those things really do work) 

Now, we arrive in Kenya and the crazy timing adventure begins.  We get off the plane and buy our $50 visas, but they only wanted bills that are dated 2000 and after.  Fortunately we were able to pull enough to get all three of us in.   All our luggage arrived (HUGE PRAISE) As we are getting ready to pass through customs, which was literally a wave of the hand through, no checking our bags or nothing.  There are all these people singing and screaming (not like scary screaming, but like seeing someone famous) Get this, some of the Kenya Olympians were coming back and then these pop star rappers.  Which I don’t know who they are yet, but we’ll find out because were we had stopped and put our luggage the whole group of them, plus, photographers, plus screaming girl fans, where pushing there way past us.  I felt like I was the celebrity.  It was CRAZY!!!
Anyway, we finally locate our awesome CMF friends and our now getting ready to head to bed after a wonderful snack of Pop Corn, which tasted OH SOOO GOOD.  We have a big day ahead of us, with training, and walking through the slums.  So pray for us.

We Love You All
Pat & Katie

Daddy and Hannah practicing for softball in the 2028 Olympics. Oh wait, no more softball

Last week I got a surprise check in the mail from a job I did not expecting to be payed. Then Katie and Hannah left me alone the other night and somehow I found myself wandering the aisles of Fry's Electronics

I ended up getting a new radio for my Rodeo. The Rodeo's radio had an analog tuning dial with no presets that hissed a lot. This new one has preset radio stations! It also has a USB port on the front that I can plug in my iPhone or iPod into and listen to Car Talk while it charges my iPhone! I love it!