I almost do not feel prepared to write about Nairobi. i have found it difficult to translate my experiences and encounters, emotions, sights and sounds into legible thoughts. The vast, endlessness of the shabby make-shift market shacks and the chaotic sea of people is stifeling after the peacful Athi River. Everywhere we go are crowds of begging street kids, and we spent a lot of time getting to know them and bringing them fruit and vegitables.
The street kids all live outside of the city center, because the policemen here, who are merely theives and opressors in uniforms, armed with automatic rifles, beat them and chase them off the streets.
When visiting the slums, i feel a lot more peace. And as we walk through the streets crowds of children follow us chanting "how are you! How are you! " Because it is the only english they have learned in school, and it is actually what they call white people. I suppose because we are always asking it.
The living conditions in the slums are not good and are unjust. The gap between the rich and poor is enormous, and the rich treat the numerous, huge slums as embarrasing eye sores and nothing else.
Yet the people living in the slums have so much joy, and I really enjoy hanging out with them.
two nights ago I met a young guy named Douglas, and he was asking if the conditions in Nairobi, and in Kenya, were what I expected. I also asked him what he thought about the condtion of his own country. He explained about political corruption and violence, mass poverty because of lack of jobs, the need for good education for everyone and not just the rich, and the problem of the great divide between rich and poor.
I agreed with him and got to tell him a bit of my own world view. How change can only occur when the individuals spirit is changed by Christ. No people have ever been able to make significant and lasting social change towards justice. People are unjust by nature, and so we must change our nature by putting on Christ's. If the individual has real hope living inside of them, their lives are completely changed, and quality of life if better, even if their living conditions remain the same.
He commented how rediculous Americans are for talking about change and putting so much hope in Obama, which was refreshing because most Kenyans are have blind hope in Obama, mostly because he is from Kenya.
Douglas seems to have a really level head and is really aware of the problems around him, where many kenyans ignore them or except them. I think that he could potentialy be a really influential person.
I asked if I could pray for him, and I told him what I thought I saw in him. I hope to talk to him again over tea one evening.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Monday, January 17, 2011
Kenya
Hello!
I arraived in kenya ten days ago and have been staying at the YWAM Base at Athi River, which is in thwe middle of the bush bush, so I have had no internet.
This has to be short beacause I am at a internet Cafe right now in Nairobi, and I am a poor man.
My first days in Kenya have been amazing. Athi River Base has a wonderful community and I got to know a lot of the people there very well, as well as another DTS team from Germany who was staying at the same time.
I have kearned somucgh this past week just from talking to people and hearing there dreams and visions and the way they love people. The interdependent way of life here, with everyone helping to get things done and encouraging eachother and just worshipping with everything that we do, is the way that followers of Christ are built to live.
We have done alot of practical work this week. We helped with our freind Able's project, which is to build a village where married couples come to live with one or two of their own children and then they would adopt 8 to 10 orphans. This would give these children a chance to grow up in a normal family setting, with two good parents who establish strong roots in Christ for them. We helped by planting a garden and some mango trees and to cement a water well and chop the grass.
We also went to an orphanage called "Springs of hope", where helped paint their chapel, and others of us helped cut their grass, or played with the kids and helped with the babies. The woman who ran the place had a lot of caring and compassion in her eyes, and as we told her each of our names, she recalled one of her children with the same name who had lived at the orphange at one time or other (except Thorgills).
For two of the days we helped a woman named Angela who has a dream of building an orphange on a few acres of land she has bought. We helped by planting lots of shade trees, mango, and banana trees, and a shamba for flowers. It was beautiful to hear her faith in God's providence for her orphanage. And he has already provided clean water on her land, while all the wells around that place are salty.
On sunday we also visited a church in a town called Makitano, where Benjamin gave a teaching. It was a very interesting experience in the small aluminum shack church, with the preacher shouting for four hours in to his old, crackly speakers. They were very welcoming though, and it was amaing to see the Holy Spirit working in them.
Today we arrived in in Nairobi. It is pretty hectic here, but I really like the hostel we are staying in. We will be staying here for four weeks and then move north to a town beside Lake Victoria called Kusumu. While in Nairobi we will be helping with a ministry in the slums and visiting the orphans and widows.
I have been doing really well this first week. God has been teaching so much with the people I talk to and the culture I am living in, and just all the sights and the sounds. I wish i could write much, much more. Thank you for your prayers, and continue to pray for our team, for unity, that we will go where the Spirit leads, and know how to love people well. Also fow health, as some kind of flu was going through the whole group last week, but we are all feeling better now. Continue to pray for financial things, that God will provide everything and work out all the kinks.
I love you all so much! I will try to write more details later.
I arraived in kenya ten days ago and have been staying at the YWAM Base at Athi River, which is in thwe middle of the bush bush, so I have had no internet.
This has to be short beacause I am at a internet Cafe right now in Nairobi, and I am a poor man.
My first days in Kenya have been amazing. Athi River Base has a wonderful community and I got to know a lot of the people there very well, as well as another DTS team from Germany who was staying at the same time.
I have kearned somucgh this past week just from talking to people and hearing there dreams and visions and the way they love people. The interdependent way of life here, with everyone helping to get things done and encouraging eachother and just worshipping with everything that we do, is the way that followers of Christ are built to live.
We have done alot of practical work this week. We helped with our freind Able's project, which is to build a village where married couples come to live with one or two of their own children and then they would adopt 8 to 10 orphans. This would give these children a chance to grow up in a normal family setting, with two good parents who establish strong roots in Christ for them. We helped by planting a garden and some mango trees and to cement a water well and chop the grass.
We also went to an orphanage called "Springs of hope", where helped paint their chapel, and others of us helped cut their grass, or played with the kids and helped with the babies. The woman who ran the place had a lot of caring and compassion in her eyes, and as we told her each of our names, she recalled one of her children with the same name who had lived at the orphange at one time or other (except Thorgills).
For two of the days we helped a woman named Angela who has a dream of building an orphange on a few acres of land she has bought. We helped by planting lots of shade trees, mango, and banana trees, and a shamba for flowers. It was beautiful to hear her faith in God's providence for her orphanage. And he has already provided clean water on her land, while all the wells around that place are salty.
On sunday we also visited a church in a town called Makitano, where Benjamin gave a teaching. It was a very interesting experience in the small aluminum shack church, with the preacher shouting for four hours in to his old, crackly speakers. They were very welcoming though, and it was amaing to see the Holy Spirit working in them.
Today we arrived in in Nairobi. It is pretty hectic here, but I really like the hostel we are staying in. We will be staying here for four weeks and then move north to a town beside Lake Victoria called Kusumu. While in Nairobi we will be helping with a ministry in the slums and visiting the orphans and widows.
I have been doing really well this first week. God has been teaching so much with the people I talk to and the culture I am living in, and just all the sights and the sounds. I wish i could write much, much more. Thank you for your prayers, and continue to pray for our team, for unity, that we will go where the Spirit leads, and know how to love people well. Also fow health, as some kind of flu was going through the whole group last week, but we are all feeling better now. Continue to pray for financial things, that God will provide everything and work out all the kinks.
I love you all so much! I will try to write more details later.
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