Meeting People in Mtito Andei

“We walk together.”

Those were the words of the district officer (similar to mayor) of Mtito Andei when we met with him to discuss our plans in his town. The past few days have been a little slow going but important. In order to start the work we want to accomplish while we are here we need to meet with government officials in the area to get approval and other local philanthropists that can give us advice and help us get things started. We have met the aforementioned district officer, children’s officer, Kenyan Wildlife Service ranger, and a woman named Mama Mercy. The day before yesterday we drove down to a safari lodge just past the town of Voi (it’s about halfway between Mtito Andei and Mombasa) to check out the accommodations of the place we will be taking the 10 volunteers when the come. While we were there we also met Mama Mercy. She was a very inspiring woman who has created a women’s’ group in her community named the Imani Women’s’ Group. From what I understand the premise of the group is: Empower and educate the women and mothers of a community and they will be the branches to spread that information to the rest of the community. With her group they have fought against child labor, early marriage of girls (she said some girls are forced into marriages at 12 years old), rape, and destruction of the environment by charcoaling and poaching. They have also provided education and training on various subjects including HIV/AIDS and how to prevent the passing during childbirth. And not only that, but she has helped start many other women’s groups in the area who work to accomplish similar projects. Travis was thinking, and I agree, that it might be very beneficial for Rosina and Mama Mercy to meet as they can both share their knowledge and help each other. If we can find women here in Mtito Andei who desire to start a group like Imani, we would love to help them get it started.

Another group we met with recently is the chief and elders of the Kampa (sp?) tribe who wish to start a safari lodge on their land and get out of the charcoaling and poaching business. They have a long way to go, but we hope that we can support them as not only would this greatly help the environment but also it would help the community by providing a stable income and jobs. While we were there we took a tour of their land and had a meal with the tribe members. I can’t remember the name of what we ate, but it consisted of corn, beans and a green herb. While we were eating, some women who did not speak English were sitting nearby talking amongst themselves and decided to give us names. Travis and Jen were given the male and female version of the same name of mwenda and mwendwe, meaning ‘the one who loves’, and I was given the name mwekali, which means ‘the one who remains.’ The baffling thing about this was that no one there knew that I was the one who was staying for 6 months, longer than everyone else. Eddie tried to get the women to tell him why they gave me that name, but he got no answer. He called it a prophetic naming.

Today we met with many of the primary and secondary schools in the area for two reasons; first, to scope out a place I will be teaching at, and second to talk with the principals about introducing solar cookers. As charcoaling and cutting down trees for cooking is a major environmental problem, we are working with a Kenyan organization based out of Nairobi to try to introduce the idea to communities here, South of Nairobi. We’ve decided to go to schools because of the massive amount of charcoal and firewood they need to cook lunch for their students. Meeting the students was a complete joy today! The students were so excited to see us visitors and crowded around us so close that there were times we couldn’t move! They were yelling, laughing and smiling and it reminded me why I am here! All of the kids were so interested in our cameras and loved seeing pictures of themselves on our screens and would scream and laugh every time they looked at them.

After seeing a bunch of schools we went to Baraka Orphans headquarters and met with the Baraka ‘Mamas’. These were by far the most energetic, full of life, full of love old women I have ever met! They were just as excited and energetic as the children to meet us! These women are caregivers (like foster parents) for Rosina. While we were there Rosina officially introduced us to Baraka Orphans and all of its projects. At the end we all had tea, and it was the sweetest, tastiest tea I have ever had. As a testament to their hospitality they offered to slaughter a goat for us, but we said if they we wished to do so, it would be better to wait until the other volunteers arrived.

Among the mamas was a beautiful baby girl that they had rescued, probably about 6 months old. Rosina explained that her mother had sold her for only 3,000 Kenyan Shillings.

That converts to about 37 U.S. dollars.

I thank God for Rosina and women like her that are here for children like that girl, and for more than 1,870 other children.

P.S. Our means of Internet here is USB drive modem (called Safaricom). But the way they charge isn’t per minute but its by how much information you download or upload. Because of that it would be extremely expensive to upload my pictures using Safaricom. As such I will wait until I have plenty of pictures and then go to an Internet café that charges per minute.

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