Hello everyone and pole (sorry) for the long delay in writing. It has been a crazy, busy week/weekend. We traveled to Nairobi last Thursday to pick up our visitors from Michigan, Kelli and Therese. We made arrangements to meet at a restaurant at 1pm in Nairobi, we arrived around 1 (after trying for an hour to find parking) then waited…and waited…and waited. Chuck tried calling Kelli several times but no answer…I began getting quite worried and began wondering what we would do if they didn’t show up, would we leave Nairobi and have them catch a ride to Tala or what? We decided to order appetizers and wait some more, then after we ate those we just ordered lunch when we saw a group of white people walk in. Chuck and I had only met Kelli once (a year before) so we weren’t quite sure if it was her, so I got up and went to their table and asked if she was Kelli…yup it was her and my nerves felt much better knowing she made it to Nairobi! Thank you Lord!
Kelli and Therese had arranged to have their bags at the restaurant at noon so we could eat lunch then head to Tala so we could miss the traffic jams in Nairobi. After we had lunch (we finished around 4pm) we checked with their driver and the bags had not left Nakuru yet, which is about an hour away 🙁 Then the driver wanted us to meet the bags at another location, so we drove another 1/2 hour to get the bags. We waited there for another 1/2 hour and heard from them again to meet them someplace else…aarrrgh. So we drove another 1/2 hour and finally received their bags and left Nairobi around 7pm! We all decided we wanted to take all their bags with us and not try to find another driver to take the bags to Tala, so we jammed the bags (4 for them and all the shopping we had done during the day) and all of us plus our driver into the vehicle and took off.
Our driver took directions from their driver in order to avoid the traffic jams, got lost twice and had to ask directions (not a good thing at night in Nairobi) but we ended up on a “road” that we drove through the plains of Kenya. It was definitely a back way to get to Tala! The “road” was bumpy, rough, winding and sometimes not even a road…Therese and I both were getting car sick and poor Kelli was stuck in between us trying not to look at either of us, while Therese and I didn’t want to talk to each other for fear of throwing up all over.
Just in the nick of time we made it to a good road and Therese and I breathed a sigh of relief! We finally made it home around 9:30pm, then the work began! First we had tea to relax a bit then we had to move our bed into our new bedroom (which isn’t finished but we needed the old room for our visitors), put the visitors beds in the room, mattresses on the beds and make sure they were comfortable…then it was on to our room where we had to make our bed, put up the mosquito net and move all the suitcases out of the old room to the new room. By the time we went to bed it was around 1:30am and we were exhausted but thankful Kelli and Therese made it safely!
Then during the next couple of days we kept busy (with Kelli and Therese’s help) getting the house somewhat livable for all of us…shower curtain up, towel rack in the bathroom, sitting area cleaned up so we could actually sit, dressers moved to our room and other such stuff. Saturday we brought Kelli and Therese to Nice View for movie night (SpiderMan) and they had a good time with the kids just hanging around, talking and taking pictures:
On Sunday we came back to Nice View to do crafts with the photos that were taken:
and we found a couple of very good artists!
Whew…what a whirlwind weekend then upon arriving home Sunday evening I was greeted with my new roommate!
Introducing Bella:
Bella likes sleeping on our bed but she doesn’t know how to get down so she’ll mew until someone hears her to get her down, but I’m hoping she’s a predator so the spiders, mice, rats etc. will run far, far away!
That’s what’s been happening here in Tala over the past few days, please forgive me if I’m not back for a few days as our Internet connection at home still isn’t good and until we get an actual desk to sit at I can’t stand and type at the same time! Plus we are heading back to Nairobi on Wednesday to take Kelli and Therese back to the airport for their return to the States. It’s been such fun having them here and now (hint, hint) we have a guest room for 1-2 people to stay, so come visit us!
Thanks for your understanding and the friendly jabs on Facebook for not keeping in touch…your love and support are greatly appreciated even if I’m not on the Internet to tell you!