Unaenda wapi?

"Unaenda wapi?" means "Where are you going?" in Swahili. We are finally heading to KENYA! After a 12 hour layover in the Ghana airport, we are now boarding Kenya Airways for about a 4 1/2 hour flight to Kenya. (That is, if Emma is doing her time change and math correct!) Please pray for continued safe travel and our sanity after spending such a long time cooped up in a small airport. After all the time spent together, hopefully we've had some good bonding with our team members!

Children's home

We arrive in Nairobi at 5:30 in the morning on Saturday, which is 9:30 PM EST on Friday night. (8 hour difference from home!) We'll try to sleep on the plane and start the day by getting showers, changing and heading to the Havilla Children's home. We will be doing some chores around the home and probably do some crafts with the kids while we are there. Please pray for us as we spend time with the children and miss our kiddos back home!

Kenya- here we come!

Right now we are over the Atlantic Ocean on our way towards Africa! The picture is supposed to be of us flying- or skydiving- or something like that. We are scheduling these posts in the next 10 days to update you with our tentative itinerary to give you an idea of how to pray for us and give you an idea of what we might be doing. We flew to Atlanta this morning, had a 4 hour layover, met up with the rest of our team and are now on our 16 hour flight to Ghana. Please pray for safe flights and good attitudes on our long journey. We'll have a lot of time to get to know our team members from Atlanta, Alabama & Texas, so please pray for those new relationships that will be forming as well! Asante Sana!

Leaving on a jet plane...

Can you believe it? We are leaving for AFRICA early tomorrow morning. AFRICA! We went down to Atlanta last night for a cookout to meet some of our team members. It was a really good time and we are very excited to get to know everyone more in next 10 days. We'll update each day with our tentative itinerary and list some specific ways that you can be praying for us!

we're going to KARIMA!

We just got some exciting news about where we will be serving in Kenya.  We leave in 42 days- can you believe it???  Here is some information about the community of KARIMA.

Bordered by two rivers, Karima closely neighbors another community,  Kwambekenya. It's name is a Kikuyu name meaning "small hill".

Karima's greatest need is WATER, as they are dependant upon agriculture as the main source of income. 

Education is also a major need here. Like many Kenyan communities, Karima has an abundance of youth, who they recognize will be the future of their community. The primary school is overcrowded with more that 1,000 students, and is in need of additional classrooms and teachers. This makes learning difficult, thus preventing many children from advancing to secondary school.

Along with the youth, there are a large number of widows and single mothers struggling to provide for their children and grandchildren. Karima is also home to the Tumaini Children's Home, which currently houses about 60 orphans, with capacity for about 100.

Karima is unique, in that it is a melting pot of people from different areas of Kenya. The community saw a surge in populations back in the early 1990s due to political instability in nearby areas of Kenya. Members of the Kikuyu tribe that were evicted from their homes, migrated to Karima, and eventually settled there.

There exists a different, but positive dynamic among the people, as they build a culture in their community and learn how to work together towards growth and stability.

Our team will be working on a water project while we are there, as well as having the opportunity to do relational things like home visits and working with the children in the community. It's so exciting to be able to visualize what we will be doing in Africa in just over a month!  

Some Words

Hello to all. Riley here. Emma and I received a book all about Kenya and what we should expect. It's becoming more and more real. Well I thought it would be fun to share with you some Swahili. So here are some.

How are you? Habari yaku?
Hello, Good Day = Jambo
No worries/no probelm = Hakuna Matata
Please= Tafadhali
How are you? = Uhoro waku
How old are you? = Uri na miaka iigana


there are some of the words. Hope you enjoyed them just do me and Emma a favor and not pop random ones out on us cause I know I can't pass yet. I'm not sure about her. hehe

It's been too long since we've posted updates about our journey to Africa this summer-Sorry!  We had our first meeting a couple weeks ago and time has flown by since then.  So we'll start with saying how the first meeting went.  Lacey and Riley drove up for the meeting.  After a yummy dinner at Donato's, we headed over to Crossroads Coffee Shop.  Most of our team was there and it was fun getting together to start forming relationships with each other.  We watched a video and talked about some logistics (shots, fundraisers, etc...)  Angie, our team leader, talked about the importance of unity within our group.  

We had our second meeting yesterday.  Obviously Riley won't be able to make it up to all the meetings, so there were only three of us at Crossroads Coffee Shop last night.  We recieved booklets that include great information about the 410 Bridge, Kenyan culture and a little bit of what to expect on our African journey.  We had some encouraging time in regards to fundraising and God's plan for each of us going on this trip.  We ended the meeting in a prayer time for our team.  Our next meeting is May 28th!

The beginning of this journey is requiring a lot of FAITH in terms of money.  We know that money is not a big deal to God, but it's been hard knowing and accepting that God will provide what we need to go on this trip.  Our team has a fundraiser- a big yardsale- on June 6th.  Riley has a weekly babysitting job that is going towards her funds; Emma has some graphic and photography jobs to put towards hers.  We're excited to see God provide and are really looking forward to our journey that is just 63 days away.  

Here are a few Swahili phrases that we plan on using on our trip:

Jambo (Hello, Good day)

Asante Sana (Thank you very much)

Sasa? (How goes it?)

Sijui (I don't know)

Hakuna Matata (No worries)

Tafadhali (Please)

Una umri wa miaka ngapi? (How old are you?)

Since Kenya used to be a British colony, many Kenyans do speak English, but it will be fun to learn some phrases to show our new Kenyan friends that we care to learn about their culture and language.  

We'll try to keep everyone posted a little more often!