Mumias Week 1

After our last blog on Saturday, we met Mike for a few hours for a beer and to watch the rugby 7s on TV, which was enjoyable after 3 weeks of football football, football!

The time came on Sunday to receive our Kenyan names from the ladies at the feeding centre, and also to be treated to a performance by the orphans there - this involved much enthusiastic singing, dancing and even poetry recitals! George is now 'Nanzala' which means “the season of hunger” and Jess now has the name 'Nyarotso' meaning “hope for the future”. It was a really lovely afternoon, although we were slightly embarrassed when made to get up and join the dancing!

On Monday we helped with some data entry and again at the feeding centre, before heading (on motorbike) to Shitoto Girls for an hours' lacrosse coaching in the afternoon. It was interesting to see how they didn't quite pick it up as fast as the Bumini Girls; it was slightly more hard work!

We were able to meet and greet some of the football teams involved in the SCI league on Tuesday, as we visited them doing their community work (pothole filling), which is compulsory for membership of the league. They're a really nice bunch of guys, although were a bit overly keen to have their photograph taken with us! It was an interesting journey back to the Shianda SAIPEH office, as George was driving the motorbike with me and another man on the back! In the afternoon we headed to Bulindo Secondary School, where lacrosse was introduced by Storm last year. It was so encouraging to see how the sports department have been so keenly keeping the sport going. They've taken the trouble to get the rules off the internet etc. Also, the girls apparently have been practising almost every evening, and all really enjoy it. In fact, when we left them after the session they all stayed behind to carry on practising!!

Wednesday involved a visit to the feeding centre, but the day was dominated by a visit by the Mumias DC, so everyone was very excited by that! Unfortunately for us, even though it was very nice to meet her, we had to listen to hours of speeches in Swahili - not the most exciting thing when you don’t speak the language!

We were met in Shianda by Victor, Fred’s cousin, on Thursday morning where he showed us his home. We're staying in a genuine mud hut with very rustic toilets and shower room! Certainly not what we're used to back in England! It was a day trip for the nursery school that he helps to run, so we accompanied them all to Kakamega to visit the annual West Kenya Agricultural Show. The kids seemed to enjoy it although Victor said it was not as exciting as usual - slightly more factual and educational than entertaining and fun stands! But we did meet a really funny/strange Herbal Doctor man who claimed to have found a herb that cures HIV. Needless to say, we found it difficult not to laugh at this, especially when he showed us the letter he'd sent to the government in which he referred to "HIB/AIDS". George said, "Isn't it HIV?!" He also showed us an article which claimed that World Aid organisations have been infecting Africans with HIV so that they could be seen to be curing them. Not very convincing and we shortly thanked him and left.

Today, Friday, we were able to return to the nursery and help out a bit, saying hi to the children again. Later today we're going to St Mary’s School to teach lacrosse; it will be interesting to see how it compares to Bulindo and St Marys has also had lacrosse introduced previously.

Goodbye for now!

Jess and George xxx