I’m sorry that I’ve not written sooner. I’ve been having problems with my internet connection and also have been very busy. I’ll give a little run through of what I got up to last week. First thanks to Paul for uploading the pictures! It looks like I can only email them from here and that takes long enough.

Monday: I arrived at the COWART office to meet the VCT staff (Voluntary Counselling and Testing for HIV), some of the karate boys and as I mentioned before, Sister Lucy. There is a project at the moment called ‘Cash for Work’ where up to 12 guys can earn 300 Kenyan shillings (Less than £3) for about 5hours working. Either digging rubbish pits, drainage or making dustbins. They are all very friendly and really seem to be glad to be doing something rather than sitting around at the roadsides like many of the young men here. We also went to visit the shamba (Field) where the project is growing sweet potatoes for sale to try and raise some money for karate uniforms and other things. I also made my first visit to the near by secondary school (St Frances) to see an introduction to a karate programme we are starting. Even the headmistress joined in!

Tuesday: We went to see the new office in Kericho and I learnt the loophole of the free space. I am to teach music and drama to the primary school kids (aged 4-14). The school have never had any drama clubs before but seem to have some very high expectations of what I might do. We will see what happens there! Piia and I also went to visit a new peace building club in a school about an hr away. It’s in an area where there are 3 different tribes and where there was very bad post-election violence in 2007. The club talks about the different kinds of conflict and how to avoid it. It went very well and there are another 3 starting soon.

Wednesday: Again there was Cash for Work. Piia and I also worked very hard cleaning and painting one of the rooms for the games and library centre. It doesn’t look great by English standards but by Kenyan it is almost perfect. In the afternoon I also went with one of the VCT’s to St Frances to help with a COWART club on HIV transmission. I think I need to read up on it all a bit more so that I can work out a more interactive way of communicating rather than just standing at the front and teaching. The girls were very bored and didn’t really join in very much. Back home We had another very large meal and as usual I could not finish what I was given. For me a very small piece of Ugali (maize mush) is enough but for my family 5-6pieces is still not quite enough!

Thursday: I spent the morning with my sister Memo doing some jobs like taking the maize off the cob, washing the dishes and even some clothes. Everything gets so dusty here but you learn to live with being slightly dirty all of the time! Even the water is dusty! Weldon, Piia and I were due to go and sort out the new office in the afternoon but I arrived very early. (Early is not sensible here….everyone is ALWAYS late!) So I was just sitting in the reception of the school trying to be invisible (again being white is a disadvantage!) but the headmistress came and grabbed me to give me a tour of the school and to get some of the lower primary kids to sing some of the songs they know so that I have some ideas what to do with them. I still have no idea! I’ll start with teaching Our God is a Great Big God and see how it goes from there. If they can find some recorders that would be great but not essential. When Piia and I were heading back to Kiptere the matatu guy tried to charge us 70Ks instead of 50Ks, we had a bit of a disagreement but eventually won and made our way home.
Friday: We went to visit the District Officer of the area to talk to him about some work camps we want to do in March. We will have some international and local volunteers removing eucalyptus trees from the river and planting indigenous trees because the eucalyptus take all of the water. The DO is very interesting especially since it seems that no one knows which tribe he belongs to, so he is very peaceful which is uncommon here. In the afternoon I returned to Eland school (where the office is) to see what the older children had prepared to show me. I am a little intimidated by the challenge of teaching them especially the very little ones (youth worker not children’s worker!) But we will see what happens. I’m starting with songs for the little ones and drama games for the older leading to an Easter performance.

Weekend: On Saturday 3 of the ICYE Kenya staff came to Kericho to discuss the work camps and we pretty much did nothing the whole day which was very nice!
On Sunday I returned home for a family party for my brother and sister who are going away to school next week. Most of the village turned up and there were speeches to give them advice on studying hard and not getting in with the wrong crowd. It was really nice to see the whole community there to support their young people. Some even contributed money towards the school fees. I will be very sad when Memo my sister goes off to school (though there is possibility she might go to day school which would be better!)

Monday: We were around for the Cash for Work guys in the morning and then a staff meeting in the afternoon. So not really very much happened, Except we rigged up the PA system we bought in Nairobi to motivate the boys into digging drainage!

Tuesday: I was in the office on my own for the day as Piia and Weldon stayed in Kericho. I organised the library and planned a little for some public speaking drama training I will give on Wednesday. We have a team of people who will be encouraging people into being tested for HIV and to know the facts. On Saturday we will have a little presentation outside the office to tell people where we are. Here they call it ‘Mobilising’… a word they seem to use for everything!

Overall I am having a good time. The organisation is sometimes frustratingly unorganised; I don’t really know what I am supposed to be doing from one day to the next yet. But maybe eventually I will get into the way of life here and will feel more at home. At least once a day I have a moment of thinking how far away from you all I am and how long a year is but it only lasts a moment or my head will spin too much. Best one day at a time!
I will find out my address so that perhaps any of you would like to me write with news of good old England it would be much appreciated!

1) my house in Kesainet village
2) My room (can you spot anything interesting?)
3) a view of Kibera slum in Nairobi

Today I met the nun who is one of the board members of the COWART organisation. She's actually from Galway and really lovely. She somehow detected Irish roots in me, I'd not realised they were so obvious! She thinks I should come to 7am Mass on Sundays which means I'd be leaving home at around 6:30am to get there but it's in English so maybe I'll make it as soon as I can remember the way to the office and church from deep down in the village!

I now have 2 sisters and 5 more brothers, I'm not entirely sure I've even met them all yet as I met so many relatives yesterday they have all blended into one. Those I have met, I really like and it's also nice to have my own room but slightly awkward since I'm not sure how many family members are sleeping in the other rooms too. The house is super super rural but I think I will get used to it quite soon. Even the pit latrines are not that bad really.

I'm very very tired and would like to sleep for a week but there is no time since I think I start running drama clubs next week!

Lesson 1 : Milking the cow

Lesson 2 : dont eat red kidney beans for 2 meals in a day.....

Lesson 3 : Get quicker at squashing the massive spiders before they get away

Lesson 4 : Always remember to remove your glasses before drawing water from a 20ft bore hole.... (I did remember, so far...)

Hello!
I'm in an internet cafe in the centre of Nairobi. I will be in Nairobi until next Sunday I think. We're at a monastery retreat centre in a place called Karen.
Apparantly it's the rich place where all of the white people live!
This weekend it's the mid year camp for the other volunteers and ours starts on sunday. There ...are 2 other volunteers here that are starting now and 2 more arriving on sunday. One from Austria, USA, Germany and Iceland. Today we caught a Matatu which is a small mini bus that they get as many people as possible onto, Basically the Tube but on a bus! It's maybe 22C but not too bad, it's been raining and so it's not too hot.
The first night I stayed in the Kenyan YMCA which was an interesting experience, especially as the guy who collected me from the airport at11pm just dropped me off and said 'someone will come for you tomorrow...' But I got some sleep and am now being looked after by the ICYE kenya people, They are much more organised than... the English ones,even if they do everything late! It seems that being late is the national hobby, well i have practice at that right?!
The food is ok, cabbage and rice with some kind of fish last night and bread for breakfast. Lots of tea!
I'm not sure what is going on most of the time but that's ok, I'm just very tired and could do with a very long sleep but apparently tonight we are going out in Nairobi and could have to stay out till 6am... as you imagine I can't really say no I'd like to sleep :-p so Kenyan clubbing it is then!
I hope you are all well and I'd love to hear from you, I'll reply when I can.
Take care, Dont get too cold! xxxxx