I have to start by apologising for not updating my blog in almost a month, time just runs away with me here and now I am struggling where to start to update you with everything. For this reason it might be a bit a little all over the place, so bear with me!
The first Saturday of this month we did fundraising at the local supermarket ‘Tusky’s’. It’s a great way of raising local awareness of the charity and appealing to people to make food donations, which we greatly rely on to help with feeding the boys at the centre. All the staff take turns and work a 2 hour shift, where we talk to customers, and hand out leaflets. Two of the children also come along to stand by the food donation trolleys and say thanks! They love doing this as it’s a reward to be chosen to come with, its also good for them to see how people can be really generous and the effort the staff make in fundraising for them. I actually quite enjoy working my shift, its fun to talk to lots of new people, smile sweetly! and encourage them to give. In my 2 hour shift I managed to get some cash donations too, mostly from men who couldn’t be bothered to shop for the food! I worked the last shift of the day and it was great to see the 4 trolleys full of food donations we had fundraised that day.
The Saturday evening after Tusky’s I spent with the boys at the centre. Njenga one of the Kenyan staff organised a bonfire for the children. He is really into his scouting, and leads sessions with the boys during the weekly timetable. He certainly used his scouting skills, as he made the most impressive ‘scout’ fire I have every seen. Finished off with a Kenyan flag on the top! It was a great evening of singing songs, dancing and watching the boys really bond with each other.
On the Sunday I got up nice and early to go with the director and Toby a new volunteer to a Rhino game park. It was a private park, and really quiet, only seemed to be us driving around which was pretty special. The park was beautiful, and we saw many animals. I joked after paying the entrance fee that ‘if we didn’t see any Rhinos would we get our money back?!’ I can say I was not disappointed, we saw loads! There were even some hairy moments where there were so many of them right by the road we just had to patiently sit it out until they moved and it was safe to drive past them. We also saw 2 lions (Simba in Swahili) which was awesome! One was so old his face was all droopy and aged, like the King of the park!
Two of the international volunteers finished their time with us a couple of weeks ago. Nik who was from London, was here for 6 weeks through a programme that sends accountants out globally to organizations. She took unpaid leave from work, and is now back working at her previous job. Although short it was nice to get to know her and strange to see her leave as she arrived about the same time as me. Hopefully we will meet up in London when I get home. The other volunteer was Ann-Katrina from Germany, she had been volunteering for 6 months, working in the law department of AFCIC but also leading beadwork and math’s lessons at the centre. We threw them both a leaving tea at the centre, where we sang songs with the boys, and the staff spoke words of appreciation. It was especially sad to see Ann-Katrina go, not only did we get on really well, she had volunteered for the same time as I am planning too, it made me think that it will be me in her position in only a few months. Time really is going so quickly out here!
In my last blog update I spoke about the new reading project I was setting up in a local school. This is going well, and I now have another volunteer helping me out with the individual reading. The boys I am helping one to one are 16years old but their English reading is poor, so I am taking them back to basics and helping them improve. What’s lovely is they are really grateful for the help and really willing to learn. I also have a reading club with 11 more able students, we have just started group reading where I am getting them to practice reading out load to each other. I appealed to you for donations to buy desks for the classrooms, and so far have funds for two. These are being made this weekend and should be ready for class on Monday! If anyone else can help please let me know, the school is so grateful and is in need of lots of resources.
On the 11th March I took a week off work and with Adelaide a volunteer from America we traveled to Tanzania, and this Island some of you may have heard of… Zanzibar! Adelaide has been volunteering since September and has just a couple of months left, I was planning to maybe do this trip later on in my stay but I took the opportunity to go with her before she leaves.
So getting there wasn’t the most enjoyable of experiences, a 15 hour coach ride from Nairobi, with no i-pod as it has broken and I cant read as I get travel sick. Also apart from the border where we got our Tanzanian visa’s the bus only stopped for 15mins the whole journey! The views were pretty spectacular and I guess best described as your stereotypical image of ‘Africa’ but after 15 hours even they became monotonous. We finally arrived in Dar Es Salaam late in the evening and were greeted by a friend of one of the AFCIC staff’s who organised our accommodation for the night. The next morning we went to visit his project that he set up to help vulnerable children in his local village. That afternoon we got the ‘budget’ ferry – I say no more across to Zanzibar.
Arriving in Zanzibar we spent 2 days in Stonetown a beautiful small town with incredible architecture, narrow paths, and lots of life. The ‘gardens’ at night turned into a colourful food market with lots of stalls selling skewers of fish and meat, Zanzibar pizzas, sugar cane juice, and much more. From stonetown we also took a boat trip across to ‘Prison Island’ named this as it used to be an island for prisoners! It now has a tortoise sanctuary with these ‘giant’ tortoises, seriously the biggest I have ever seen! I got to see some tortoise ‘love’ which I found quite entertaining to say the least. After Stonetown we traveled an hour north to ‘paradise’. The whitest beach and bluest sea, defiantly the image of Zanzibar I had imagined. Apart from moving to another beach with even whiter sands, we spent the week relaxing, reading, snorkeling and socializing. It was a great trip, and something that I probably would never have done from the UK, but with budget traveling, and being so close in Kenya its great to have been able to have that experience.
Returning back to the Centre after a week away, it was so lovely to be greeted by all the boys. They had so many questions, mainly why my skin was now ‘red’! I tried to explain it was a tan, but they prefer it white apparently! I really missed them while I was away and it was a really warm feeling to be back with them and the staff, and back to my Kenyan reality. It was also great to see that in my time away we had recruited 5 new boys from Ruiru, where I do outreach work on Wednesdays. I have worked with them all on outreach and it was great to see them settling into the centre. The boys wanted to see my pictures of my trip so I created a slideshow for them, which we watched an evening this week.
This week has been really busy for me. After being away I have spent all day and most evenings with the boys catching up with the time I missed. I like the evening time, where they tell stories, talk about their day, and draw in their diaries – a project I started with them to record their time a the centre.
In 2 weeks it will be April holidays for the schools, and I am coordinating with one other staff member a 3 week holiday club for 500 children to prevent them from going to the streets. This means I am very busy creating the timetable, planning sessions, recruiting extra volunteers and getting everything organised. In my next blog I will talk more about holiday club as it will be happening!
The rains are now coming and it has started to rain a little but heavily everyday, I hear in the next couple of months it will rain a lot more! It is much needed, as the land is very dry. At least it reminds me of the UK a little.
I have written too much – so note to self, write less but more often! Thank you for reading if you made it here J
Please keep in touch, I love to hear all your news and know that life back home is the same as I left it!
Lots of Love x
