Wednesday June 20th we were up and out by 6 a.m. to be taken to a local small airport where we were greeted by 3 African Inland Mission Pilots [AIM] who were going to fly us from Nairobi to Kisumu - I remember they called one of the planes ‘the mosquito’ which held 4 or 5 of our Team plus one pilot - the other propeller plane held the remainder of the Team and 2 pilots [our luggage was to arrive later in the day after the plane returned to Nairobi and then flew back - that Great Rift Valleygives you an idea of how big or small the 2nd plane was] It was a great day for flying, clear skies no turbulence and I was fortunate enough to have a ‘window’ seat. We flew over the Great Rift Valley, saw a huge canyon that was the result of a Volcano many years ago.

Fortunately, Gary & I have flown in various types of aircraft over the years and landed on many types of ’airfields’ - not so for most of the Team, so as we were approaching Kisumu many were wondering ‘where is the runway?’ only to discover that the runway was a cleared grassy strip - but our landing was beautiful. We were welcomed by some of the staff from Christ’s Gift Academy, which is our final destination and still requiring a drive. After a delightful morning tea - we boarded the SUV type autos and started our trek to Mbita. We also had our first introduction to what would affectionately be called an “African Massage”, as most of our time in a moving vehicle would be over, bumpy, dirt roads with a fair amount of potholes. Given that Kenya was greatly influenced by Britain, the driver sits on the right hand side of the vehicle and of course drives on the opposite side of the road than those of us living in the U.S. - but there we discovered you drove on whichever side of the road was less bumpy. To our relief we found the closer we got to Mbita the less company we had on the road in the form of autos. Now we had other company on the road, cows, donkeys, chickens, goats and of course people, but we being the bigger - they did yield - eventually.

We arrived in Mbita late morning and were first taken to the Nursery/Pre-Primary portion of CGA [would be the equivalent to pre-school and kindergarten] Wish I had some photo’s to include but if you visit the site you will have some idea of the scenery, but for now - you will need to use your imaginations. When I say ‘taken’ actually, we dropped off on the main road [dirt] and then we walked in to where the school building is [on dirt] we were greeted by the Nursery/PP staff and think it was at least 40 students [could have been more] ages 4 to 8 years, all in their uniforms. They had a program and welcoming prepared for us which was very well done, considering that for most of the children their intro to school just started in January, which means that is when English became the main language they were hearing for at least 8 hrs. a day. The “Mother tongue” is Luo - that is the main tribe in Mbita.

After the program we made our way up the road [dirt] and hillside [dirt and rocks] to Christ’s Gift Academy [CGA] where we met the rest of the staff, taken for a tour of the buildings and had lunch. Rice, beans, Chai (African tea - tea with milk and sugar) Ugali (a staple African food - ground maize fixed like mashed potatoes) Sukuma wiki (a fried or boiled vegetable like spinach, usually mixed with onions) were more or less the staple food for our lunch meals. The children have nourishing porridge each morning and then their lunch early afternoon. More on that later - back to now just Wednesday afternoon! After our meal and a short meeting with “Auntie” Judi [you can read her info on the CGA website - that gives a great description and photo's of the campus etc.] the children grades 1-8 had a program prepared for us. Think it was around 4 or 5 p.m. by the time we made our way back down the hill and down the road a bit to Safari Village which was going to be our ‘home’ for the next 11 days. The photos from the Safari Village site are good. I must admit though we only got to see the Hippo’s once - much to our dismay - they were swimming and come up for air in a similar manner as dolphins [but of course no where as gracefully :-)]

We were all checked in to our ‘rooms’ and then had dinner - the food - was local fare and good. Although after two nights of serving us tilapia with the heads and tails, I think the kitchen staff discovered that we American’s were not too keen about that and began to filet them for us - very yummy. In actuality, I found the food agreeable, lots of carbs but there was also lots of walking. Each hut/cabin did contain a twin bed for each occupant with its own mosquito net; shower, sink and toilet - albeit don’t think many ‘hot’ showers were available - mostly tepid to cold - but since we were at the Equator the coolness was ‘refreshing’, besides complaining wouldn’t have made the water any warmer. Oh and electricity - we did have that, lights were not to bright, not sure if that was so they didn’t attract mosquito’s or just not great power as the electricity was either ‘solar power’ or a generator, which was probably powered by the solar panels which did require ‘sun’ :-) but again at least ‘bright lights’ didn’t attract flying insects. . :-) And for my younger friends, at night the monkeys would play on the roof of our cabin! Think we all made it to bed early Wednesday night after a very full day.

Kenya Report - Part III