Almost there...

So, July 20, which means that I have less than four full weeks left here in Kenya. I have had a good time and enjoyed it here and the work that I am doing, but I am excited to be coming home and seeing all of my family and friends, and yes I am excited to go back to school.
The last two weeks have been kind of up and down. I am feeling much better since the last time I posted, but the cold that I had is kind of going around the house. Mwende was sick and I was sick and now Catherine and Pastor have not been feeling the greatest and Sylvia has also been under the weather this week. It's really tough with people being sick especially with the baby and trying to take care of her and keep her healthy. So please keep the health of this household in your prayers and especially the baby.
So that was the low of the last couple weeks, the high was a trip that we made last week to a place called Ndabibi. Catherine and I went up with Pastor for the Sunday morning service with another couple people. There were supposed to be more of us but they couldn't get the church car working, and we couldn't all fit in Pastor's car. It was a small small church, like one would expect. One room, made with mud walls, very small, like smaller than a typical size classroom in a school in North America. Very few of the people knew English so it was completely in Swahili. The girl that came with us translated a bit to let us know what was going on, and their pastor was conscious of us as well, and provided translation, and whenever Pastor Mutangili spoke he paraphrased what he said in English as well. As guests, they wanted us to greet the congregation, which is standard practice here in Kenya, so we were able to introduce ourselves and say where we were from with the Swahili that we had learned the beginning of the trip, but other than that Pastor Mutangili translated for us. As well, most of the congregation was probably in their teens and younger. They had a special presentation by the Sunday School, and probably about a third of the people there went up front because they have so many children there. They were cute, and they kept staring at us because we were fun, but that was alright.
Another interesting thing about this trip was the reason that Pastor Mtangili was going. In the church denomination that we are working in (AIC, Africa Inland Church), a person has to be an ordained minister in order to administer the sacraments. Most of the exposure I have to this has been at EBC where the general thought that is held by most (I think) is that anyone can do this, I have been present where students will present people with communion or baptize people. However, this is not the case here. So, because the pastor was not an officially trained, ordained reverend, he could not serve Holy Communion, and that was why Pastor Mutangili had to make tat trip up, so that could be there to administer it. So, I found that to be interesting.
Another special thing about this day was the celebration of a brick-making machine that the church was able to acquire. They are looking at expanding and building another building and wanted to do it out of bricks instead of just the mud walls. However, the brick-making machine could be very expensive to rent and to be able to buy one on their own would have been very difficult as well, and building without it would have been a very long and hard process. So, one of the long-term AIM missionary doctors raised the money for it with the help of his supporters and was able to buy this machine for them. So, they will use is for the new building and then allow people to use it for homes in the area, and there are also many other things that they will use it for. So, this was a very special day for them as well.
One of the things about this trip that was not fun was the dust. It was EVERYWHERE. We met up with the doctor on the way there and with all the dust from driving we couldn't even see them behind us. By the time we got back there was dust all over us. I made the mistake of wearing black shoes, and they were brown by the time we left. This seems to be the kind of dirt that is typical here in Kenya. Even in the city there is quite a bit of dust. However, out in the country like that the dust gets in your hair, your mouth, all over your skin. And, there is now water-rationing in the city of Nairobi so we've only been getting water for about 1 1/2 days/week for the last couple of weeks and I think it'll be like that for a while, so when we got back there wasn't even much we could do.
So, that was the big thing that happened the last couple weeks. Everything else was pretty routine. Last week we missed out on a few things that we've normally been doing because Pastor and Sylvia have not been feeling well, so at times there was not much to do. Things around here are also starting to wrap up. The elementary school we've been going to starts exams on Wednesday, so we're finished with going there now, which is definitely a sign that we really are finishing up our time here. I would like to ask you to pray that we would not be focusing too much on coming home, as much as we're both excited about it, but to keep our focus on what we're doing here as we finish up the next 3 1/2 weeks. Thanks so much for reading!
Kwa Heri,
Steph