Tuesday

Steve got in town last night to prepare for the Saddleback teams arrivals on thursday. So last night was spent catching up and hanging out.
This morning we went to Oasis and hung around the center.
Ive been meaning to take pictures of our walk that we take each day to Oasis and have always forgotten.
We leave our compound, walk through Milimani, and walk these train tracks right up to Oasis...



The tracks

Later we took John Ekai, formerly of House 2 to boarding school at Purpose Driven Academy.

After dropping John off and seeing some of the Oasis kids who board there we had lunch at the Alakara Hotel, and then went to see property which could hopefully end up being the new Oasis site. We were super excited to see it and its just around the corner
from our house.



The property used to be a hospital and training center, but the woman who owned it passed away about 2-3 years ago so the property has just been sitting there ever since...






Can you imagine the classes that could be held in here?




Crematory Table, uuggghhh...



Allison and I thought this was the creepiest looking hallway complete with door...Anyone remember the Shinning?


Around the other side




View from inside..beautiful


This was one of my favorite parts...the open field for the kids to be able to play soccer and other games on a field and not have to worry about smashing their toes on the train tracks.


The property is beautiful and would be amazing for Oasis' educational and vocational schools they want to build. It brought tears to my eyes and made me so happy to imagine all the center kids runing around that compound. Especially the older boys who its too late for them to go to regular school but not vocational school. It made me so excited to think of boys like P.I.G., Charles, Babu, Etao, and Collins, who are running out of time, but if Oasis' vocational school works out they can recieve some great training...this is all excited theory right now, but its great to think of the possibilites...so pray

Kamau's First Day

Today we took Kamau to school for his first day. He was just moved into House 3 last week, and today marked his first day in school ever. And being Kamau, he was of course ridiculously cute.



He was a little nervous...


But after a few minutes he fit right in... Turns out hes in class with Teresa, formerly of Oasis. Let's play Where's Waldo, can you find her?


Because Kamau is now in House 3 and Patrick is in class 4, Patrick was moved over to House 1 and Kitale Forest so he could join Evans in class 4.

Pato's first day at Kitale Forest

Sunday Sunday

After church today we had Martin, Johnstone, and Bram over to hang out. Steward and Moses come over all the time and these boys hadn't been over ina long time.
We had beans and rice for lunch then watched wrestling with Ayub and played soccer...
It was so fun and of course it was documented with pictures

Martin


Emmanuel


Emmanuel and Bram





Allison and Stone are totally good at balancing



Martin and Stone


Stone loves making this face...


Bram and Stone




We had so much fun. Words can't express how much we love these kids.

Girls House Dinner

Last night we had dinner at the girls house. It was our last friday night dinner with the girls until we go home. Crazy. Just like these girls...



They sang and danced

This one goes, "Mama in the kitchen, cooking chipati, how many chipatis did she cook?" and then you have to say a number and count around the circle. Whoever it lands on has to put one finger out... The girls kept saying huge numbers like 35 or 42 so it would take forever to get someone out...But eventually it was down to me and Dorcas...I won!





The party then moved outside for a little bit and apparently they all love to pose with the same bush






Janet


I closed the evening with my best impression of an immigrant...

Picture of the Day

So Im walking from our new house to our old house and I come around the bamboo fence and find this on the other side...



Ayub has never done this and I thought it was hilarious so naturally made him stay put so I could take more pictures...



Ayub is my favorite for reasons such as these.

Update on Simon

We went to Freda's yesterday to pick the kids up to go swimming at the Kitale Club like usual.
I was hoping that Simon had stayed, after his many threats to leave. I found him as I walked into the hospital, just after he had been treated.
He said he wanted me to take some pictures.
The burns look a lot better than Tues. All the white stuff is just treatment to sooth and heal the burns.

Dinner With Richard

On Tuesday we went over to Richard's and had dinner with him and 2 of the kids that live on their compound. Freda's granddaughter Ida and a boy named Davis.
Freda has been in America since the beginning of January and comes back next week, so its just Richard and the kids at their house.
Richard and I were talking the other night and he mentioned how he loved Western movies. I asked if he had seen "Tombstone", a personal favorite, Western or otherwise, and he said he never had. So we decided to have dinner and watch Tombstone.


Between power outages and Davis & Ida's playing we had a nice dinner and watched "a cinema." It was a nice evening. Richard said that Davis had a lot of energy but we didnt really believe him because hes so quiet. I guess we were wrong....




I gotta give it to the kid, he's got personality...