Tracy's Cooking Adventures in Kenya

This is a journal entry from another July expeditioner.  Tracy volunteered her time and energy in the Koins kitchen, helping Emily with the food for our large group.  Tracy created some delicious new dishes for our expeditioners.  Expedition food has come a long way in the past few years.  With limited food options, and stores far away in Mombasa, being creative is key to providing a well rounded, tasty meal 3 times a day.  I personally am indebted to Tracy, as my kitchen skills are limited at best, and in Kenya are essentially non-existent.  The joy she found in working alongside the Kenyan kitchen staff, and presenting her food creations to the expeditioners was obvious to all.  With her help we enjoyed scrambled eggs, a delicious cornbread, birthday cake, and a variety of cookies, which were all new dishes for Kenya.

 

Tracy and Mama Emily in the KCC kitchen

Tracy and Monica work on dinner preparation

Tuesday July 17th, 2012
Written by Tracy Jackson

Today I woke up at 5:30am and made pancakes and eggs for everyone. Myself, Emily, and Ester are the three ladies that have been cooking here at the KCC, (Koins Community Center) and I LOVE it! I got to teach them how to make scrambled eggs for the first time.They had never seen how eggs can form if just heated. Random Africans surrounded the pan as I stirred. They all kept slowly saying over and over, "scrambled eggs!" Haha! They always have so much energy and we are even laughing that early in there. It just makes me want to do it even more the next day.

After a very loved American breakfast we all left to go milk the goats.When we got there they asked that we help water the shambas. (garden) About 15 of us went to the water to go scoop it up with our buckets. It was so muddy we had to let the one African woman scoop it for us while we carried the buckets out to the shambas. Each bucket waters about 2 1/2 plants and there was about 1/2 an acre of them. We finished about half the work, and realized we were out of time and couldn't milk the goats. :( It took us about 45 minutes to do that much)

Tracy and Heidi painting one of the Miyani classrooms

After we came back we went to the Albino school. It was nice to see they had a safe place to stay. They live at the school, and can do the other things they need to do there too. Unfortunately they can't go outside much. It's not safe. There is not a fence around and we were told there are some bad Africans out there who would love to swipe an albino child and sell them, or sell their body parts for trinkets. Ugh..so sad to talk about, but I am so happy that they are in a safe place. We gave them some hats, sun lotions and sunglasses. They were so happy.

Tracy painting a Bofu classroom

After we returned, I went back to the kitchen to get working on our next meal where we made potato balls. They are made from peeled, boiled then grated potatoes, formed into a pattie in your hand, then filled with chicken. We then rolled them into balls, and fried them. I like to learn how to make all these different foods.

Tracy running in the race to Bofu

Tracy teaching a kindergarten class

We also got a chance to to the Sean Michel's School today. It is a school for the children with disabilities. We painted nails, played ball painted faces, shot silly string,and had a great time meeting all the great kids.

Things I'll always remember about this trip:
*Pulling up to the KCC for the first time and seeing the African children surround the bus.
*Cooking in the kitchen and learning how to make all the new foods.
*Riding on a camel on the beach
*Almost convincing a handcraft wood salesman on the beach to buy my shells
*Listening to Benny sing
*Hundreds of children running towards our bus singing before the Zimmerman brother's dedication. 
*Carol Guest reading her magic book to the African teens.
*Listening to Buffalo's life story
*Feeding the monkeys mango
*Fighting a monkey for a basket of rolls
*Teaching Kindergarten
*Painting the schools
*Singing
*Finding jellyfish
*The safari
*Stopping at the mud hut when Cindy was there
*Learning to hold water on my head
*Shutting the door to the kitchen and dancing/singing with the women in there.
*Seeing elephants close up
*Shopping with crazy good prices
*Taking Sheryl to church
*Giving her my Book of Mormon
*Singing "Jerimiah Was a Bullfrog" for a class in the secondary school that didn't have a teacher.
*Shadowing Agnes.

Feeding a monkey at the hotel in Mombasa

Playing with the children at the Windridge school

Riding a camel on the beach in Mombasa

I love being here in Africa! The people here are amazing and I hope to come back soon.

University Students in Kenya

Nancy and Purity Mrabu, a Koins sponsored university student

The young man sat on the porch of the Koins Community Center, hoping for a meeting with me.  I was unaware of his situation regarding education.

Chirongo had finished secondary school at Mnyenzeni Secondary, and had successfully applied for admittance to Chuka University, in Kenya.  He needed approximately $ 950.00 to be admitted for his first term of school.  In the fall of 2009 he went to the university, only to find out that the $900.00 he had in hand from Koins was $ 50.00 short, and he was not admitted to school.  He had no means to get the needed $ 50.00.  His family could not help.  He was heartbroken.

It was eight months later that I made my trip to visit the village and my scholarship students.  I had not been told of his educational challenge.  As we sat together, tears filling his eyes as he told me his story, he meekly pulled Kenyan shillings out of his pocket.  He had, for eight months, held every single shilling in a safe place, hoping that when I returned to Kenya, he could explain his dilemma and get some aid.

Holding that amount of money for that long was a feat of excellence.  The money represented his new life, his chance to improve his circumstances, his way to a future; and he was not about to squander it on anything EXCEPT an educational opportunity.

Chirongo, a Koins sponsored university student in Kenya

Today, Chirongo is in his last year of a computer science degree at Chuka University.  He smiles, he laughs, he is outgoing and engaging.  His life is changing because of the tuition that Koins has covered.  His life will be drastically different from the one he might have had without the education he has received.

Koins for Kenya also has students majoring in law, education, environmental studies, accounting and engineering.  They will make a lasting difference in life inside Kenya.

Koins is currently sponsoring 15 university students who have qualified to attend university.  These kids are the best of the best – the top of their class.  They have endeavored to improve their lives and the lives of their village.  We believe this is the essence of educational help in Mnyenzeni.

This is where the Scholarship Program can use your help.  We are constantly looking for sponsors, both for our secondary students and especially our university students.  Your contributions can change their world.  You can make an eternal difference in the advancement of the village, the people, and the families of Mnyenzeni.

If you want to invest in Mnyenzeni in a lasting and enduring way, please sponsor a student.  You can develop a relationship with him or her.  You will see report cards and receive letters.  You can watch as your student grows, matures, and becomes a leader in the community.

The chance to sponsor a student is the chance of a lifetime.  Secondary students’ tuition is currently $350.00 per year if the student is in the village. We have about 12 students who have scored so highly on Level 8 testing that they are in national schools around Kenya. Their tuition ranges from $ 600.00 to $1,450.00 per year, but their education is truly a “prep school” education, and we expect all of them to easily move on to university.

University tuitions range from $ 1,200.00 to $ 3,000.00 per year, depending on the school and college of study.   

At this time, we have several students who have qualified for a university education, but do not have sponsors.  Their hard work and scholastic excellence is hanging by a thread.  If we do not find sponsors for them, we will not be able to support them in this dream for a better future.  It is not necessary to pay the entire scholarship all at once, and you can even sponsor a portion of a scholarship if you are not able to fund a full scholarship.

Looking for an area to make a difference?  Want to help change a life?  Do you want to build a monument to improvement in families and communities?  Here it is.  

Go to the donations page and click on the Scholarship Fund line in the Donation Destination drop box, and help us help these kids in ways you can never imagine.  

If you have questions, contact me at Nancy@koinsforkenya.org. 

Asante sana, 

Nancy Littlefield

Scholarship Coordinator, Koins for Kenya

Jessie's Kenyan Experience

Jessie was one of the adults in the July expedition group.  Her work experience involves Occupational Therapy, so working with the kids at the Sean Michels School for Special Needs Children was a natural fit.  She found herself stepping outside the comfortable during her two weeks in Kenya, and that experience changed her:

Jessie with students at the SMS

My trip to Africa with Koins was nothing less than amazing.  Throughout my life I have not been much of a spiritual person. This trip showed me there is more that is out there that I have yet to recognize. I was able to witness and experience a kind of divine intervention that I previously would have never acknowledged.  One such experience happened one day when I was working in the clinic. Naomi came, got me out of the patient screening room, and told me my help was needed in another area. I had no idea what I was going to be doing until we walked into the room where they were doing wound care.  Once I became aware of what I would be helping with, I became quite alarmed. I have always been a very squeamish person and have been known to faint at the site of blood. My initial reaction quickly changed as a sense of calmness prevailed over me. I stayed and assisted with treating, cleaning, and bandaging of wounds for over an hour that day. I did have a few incidents where I felt a little woozy and doubted my ability to continue with the process of cleaning out wounds but the feeling very quickly passed and I was able to continue. This is just one example of an incredible ability to defy the boundaries of my comfort zone while in Africa.  

Painting the new classroom at Miyani

Jessie playing with SMS Students

Greeting students at Miyani Primary school

Jessie and one of the sweet SMS girls

Jessie shadowing Betty

Pounding corn with a baby on your back, all in a days work in Kenya

Life as I knew it before Kenya (B.K.) has changed. I am still just on the cusp of trying to accept, process and understand it all. This trip was everything I had hoped for, needed, and much, much more than I could have ever expected. I met some remarkable people who have become lifelong friends.  I am so excited about the future and am eager to see what it has to bring. Thank you Bret, Ingrid, Jami, Sue, Cindy, Leah and all the locals at Koins for opening  up, making possible and sharing this experience with all of us who are so privileged to have taken part in this expedition. I know every single person who was on this trip has been touched deeply by the experiences we had and shared while in Kenya.

Christopher - Bofu Celebration Day

This journal entry is from Christopher, one of our youth expeditioners.  The youth expedition was an entirely new concept this year, with the youth living in mud huts, in a village, away from the comparative luxury of the KCC (Koins Community Center).  They used latrines, which will be used by the Vikolani primary school once the expedition is done.  They slept in hammocks in their huts, took bucket baths in bath huts made of palm leaves, and essentially, lived about as authentically as a group of Americans can in rural Kenya.  It is interesting to observe their perspective on their experience.

Wednesday July 11, 2012

Written by Christopher Osborn

What a day!! We woke up at 5:45 and found that we were already late... We made the trek to the KCC, where we prepared for the race to Bofu. This race is a pretty big deal.  People come from all of the villages to get a chance to run a 7.2 mile race, across the arid Kenyan hills, for a monetary prize of great value. When we arrived at the KCC around 7:00, there were already over 50 Kenyans waiting. And the race starts at 8. 

We ate breakfast at the luxurious KCC, which is a 5-star hotel compared to our dirt floor huts. Most of the youth ate scones, while several of us, the ones who were going to run, stuffed them in our packs for after the race. We tied our shoes, filled our bottles, and pinned our numbers on. Since Kenyans run at leopard speed, all white people were allowed to start the run with the women, who began the race 20 minutes before the men. We took a photo with all of the runners and lined up. I heard someone yell something and we started running. 

The road to Bofu

I found myself left far behind by the women, who sprinted from the start...and didn't stop! I ran down the road, which is just a wider dirt path. I ran up and down hills, looking out over the valley as I went. This place is simply beautiful! It is dry and dusty, but the streams are lined by massive palm trees. This view is what kept me going when I wanted to give up and walk. Looking out at this amazing 360 degree view, and stepping back a bit and thinking, "I am in Kenya, in Kenya, running the longest run I've ever ran, against Kenyans, who are not only twice as fast as me, but are barefoot! I can keep going."

Christopher running to Bofu

As with every day, every twenty or so steps someone would yell "Jambo!" and I would reply with "Jambo!". I especially love it when the children yell jambo. Some of the adults would go on to say something in Swahili or Duruma and I would just smile back, because I can't understand one word they say. Every so often, I would pass one of the checkpoints where the others were waiting to hand out water. Unfortunately, the water isn't safe for us to drink, so I would run past just saying hello and receiving some encouragement.

Water station along the race route
  

I knew that the men were fast, but it surprised me when the men would pass me at double my speet, and that's not all, while we were going up a hill.

When we reached Bofu, a small group of children started running with me after greeting me with "Jambo!". They ran with me until just before the finish line, which was a row of yelling Kenyans. I nearly collapsed when I stopped running and Jami was there asking if I needed any water. I realized that I had completely forgotten about the liter water bottle I was carrying!

I found Chase, who had somehow finished 3rd, (of the women...) and we sat down, ate our scones, and took a break. All of the runners were given a T-shirt, a wristband, and a packet of swedish fish! Boy oh boy! I have never enjoyed swedish fish so much before! And then another photo was taken, this time with all of the runners in their T-shirts.

All the runners in their race t-shirts

A small parade arrived. It was made up of several women dancing and a few men in cultural clothing with leather straps on their legs that had cans with rocks in them. They would stomp and dance, creating a strong beat. We paraded/danced over to the new two-room classroom. The building was dedicated and many more pictures were taken, the entire time the dancers outside still dancing. We walked over to a row of holes and every visitor got to plant and water a sapling. There was a large ceremony and it seemed that all of Bofu was there. The Skonnard family and the Guest family were thanked in an elaborate ceremony and given Doruma names. There were several activities and dances and songs for entertainment and at the end several people spoke. We walked over to the vans and had the opportunity to ride back to Vikolani.

Dancers at Bofu celebration

We had cabbage and ugali for lunch and most of the guys fell asleep in their hammocks. Benny, Caleb and I sat down in the hut and wrote in our journals for a while, trying to catch up because we have been so busy there hasn't been much time to write. We took turns in the showers because we didn't exactly smell like fresh linen after the race. There wasn't any warm water at the time, so my shower consisted of a cold bucket of water and an extra shirt for a towel. But did that feel great! I fixed our door handle because Ted was asleep. It is normally Ted's job because he designed the rope with  knots tied on the ends fed through a hole. Normally, when it breaks, someone yells, "TED!! You're door broke again!" and he comes and fixes it.

We broke out the guitars and ukelele and started playing and singing when a boy named Edwin came to our camp to teach us how to make slingshots. He started by showing us how to make marbles from the dirt. He made a pile of dirt and poured some water into the center and mixed it into a clay. After he would roll small balls and set them out to dry. We made our slingshots with his help and tried to shoot them. Benny and Gary can both hit a pole at over 10 yards!

The youth practicing with their new slingshots

We headed back inside and continued writing in our journals. All of the sudden Garey runs into the room and yells, "Chris!! I have some stuff for you!" We share our handwritten dictionaries. 

Benny in Kenya, July 7, 2012

We have returned from another successful and very busy expedition trip to Kenya.  This year, we had a youth group, as well as a regular expedition group.  The two groups overlapped, but since the youth built mud huts in the village of Vikolani where they lived for the duration of their stay in Kenya, we had enough room for all.

The next few posts will be from the youth group.  Jami, who dreamed up the Youth Leadership Expedition, planned and carried out all the details of it, had several of the kids type up a journal entry on her iPad, which will be what I post.
 

Saturday, July 7, 2012

Written by Benjamin Cardullo

After going to bed at 2 in the morning arriving from the flight, we woke up to the smell of chapatis in the morning  (chapatis being pretty much tortillas).  After breakfast we had heard of one of the turkeys being injured during mating, so they decided to kill it.  We got to see them chop off its head.  Post-mortem, the turkey continued to writhe and flap its wings. 

When we were ready to go to the village we will be living in, Vikolani, a bunch of kids from the local school greeted us and sang and danced for us.  They then continued to lead us to the village never letting up with their song or dance.  They had about three songs, repeatedly sung, which were highly entertaining.  When we got to Vikolani, they put on an official little show for us, which included a group of boys on the drums and some kids with an organized song and dance.  It was a wonderful representation of the Kenyan culture and it was nice to get to know the villagers better.  We were also introduced to the school leaders who were all working on building our mud huts, which truly showed how happy they were to have us there.  

Benny helping mud the huts

Jacob tossing the mud

After the show and introductions we helped finish the construction of our mud huts, which to be honest were better than most homes in Mombasa.  I got to go get water with the women, and we put wrapped scarves on our heads to keep from having hard plastic on their heads.  They could walk at a regular pace over treacherous irregular terrain with these buckets on their heads without even using their hands!  These weren't little buckets either, they were home depot sized, and the children were laughing at me as I approached the mud huts, my kanga cloth and shirt soaked through with water.  (by the way, this isn't Benny any more, in case if you are wondering why i am wearing a kanga cloth and carrying water on my head like a woman).  Mud huts, as you may have guessed, have mud walls with an inside of sticks.  We throw mud at the wall to close up holes.  Apparently, I am horrible at throwing mud at walls.  I didn't even know that is something you could be bad at.  

Carrying water back from the water hole

Back to Benny.  When we were done working for the day some of us headed straight back to the KCC camp at Myenzeni but some others, including myself, took the scenic route back.  We saw how Kenya functions agriculturally and we got to see the Koins farming lands and how they help the local community.  

Kenyan farm

Youth at the baobab tree at Windridge school

When we got back we had lunch and soon headed for a hike up to the Windridge school in Chikomani.  We got to see a bit more of the Kenyan culture and life style.  Upon return we all got to take long needed showers and the Brown group helped prepare our dinner of the previously deceased turkey, and some pilau, which is a rice dish.  After dinner we had our peaches and pits meeting, which is pretty much the high and low lights of our day.  The bottom line is that Kenya is amazing, and this was a wonderful first day of our trip.  

Live from Kenya

We have an expedition in Kenya.  Actually, we have two, as we have the Youth Leadership group in Vikolani, and we have the regular expedition at the KCC.  Altogether, it is a large group of Americans immersed in Kenya.  

We have had a very busy couple of weeks.  I will be adding more entries outlining our activities, and lots of photos.  

The top photo is the new Hidden Springs school at Bofu.  The opening ceremony was held last week.  There was another race hosted by Monica, the Race to Bofu, which brought out about 20 Kenyan women this year, compared to the 2 that ran last year.  

We planted trees behind the new school building, part of the opening ceremony.

We had several dances performed for us at the opening ceremony, all part of the cultural experience of an expedition.

Much of the group leaves for Mombasa tomorrow.  The remainder leave Saturday.  We have almost finished our work here.  There will be many blog posts to come outlining our experiences.

Asante sana,

IVL

Turkeys and Chickens in Kenya

Bret has regular visitors while staying at the KCC.  Sometimes they come to say "hi" or "welcome", sometimes they come bearing gifts, as is often the case of the families of our scholarship students.

A scholarship student and his family bring a duck as a gift to Bret

With the help of Self Reliant Agriculture, we are teaching villagers how to grow bigger, stronger and healthier chickens.  Chickens in our village area are common, but rarely do they have any size.  They are usually scrawny because they are exposed to sickness and disease without receiving the necessary antibiotics, while running wild foraging for their food. Our chickens receive the best of care from the time they exit the egg, never touching the Kenyan soil until they are over a month old.  Antibiotics are administered regularly to fight off the common avian illnesses that are so prevalent here, and our feed is the best available.  In return, our birds are healthy, with higher egg output.  The villagers are seeing the returns of keeping healthy animals, and are beginning to adopt the methods we are teaching.  The end result is to provide eggs and meat for the children on a regularly basis, and our strides are beginning to pay off.

Chicks in an enclosure get a healthy start

 Turkeys are VERY rare in Kenya, and fetch a price that is more than twice what they cost in America.  The Head Teacher at the South Summit School, Mama Mishi, had an outlet to sell turkeys, but had sold her birds in order to pay medical bills for her daughter that was born last year with Downs Syndrome.  With her contacts and willingness to care for the birds, we launched a private venture to raise these birds. 

Mama Mishi's daughter, Chizi (cheese-ee), entered the hen house to show us one of the nests that is full of eggs. There are four more nests just like this one, indicating that Thanksgiving platters in Mombasa will be filled with our birds.

 

 This Tom is a great model showing the overall health of our flock.  And there are more healthy birds strutting around our turkey enclosure.

The most exciting thing about our current work in Kenya is the innovative new projects, and the ability we have to incorporate fresh ideas into the work.  We are well established in the community, and our continued support of village schools and students, as well as multiple other projects has earned the trust of the villagers.  They are beginning to come to us with new ideas, and the partnerships we are creating will provide great opportunities for the future.

IVL