Tag Archives: school

Feeling aged! (part II)

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You can read part I if you missed it.

This now brings us to Monday.  The plan was to go to C4KK, pick up Erastus and Moses, take them to Tala for a few school supplies then drop them at their new school.  We made it to C4KK, along with a chicken Bosco’s sister gave us on Saturday (I’m not a big live chicken fan, I prefer mine cooked and on a plate, so Bosco “chicken-sat” until we could bring it up to C4KK)

But upon looking around the compound we found a disturbing sight.  The guys who off loaded stone on Saturday did off load but they put it right on top of our barbed wire fence.  All I could think about was all the hard work our friends, Rod and Bobbie and Bosco and Roman had done putting in those fence posts and the guys had no qualms of putting the stone on top of the fence….perhaps on either side would have been better in my opinion!

Ok so that was frustrating but it was time to leave.  We got the boys school stuff packed into the truck and we were off.  We were close to half way to Tala when a lory (a large truck and this one was hauling sand) in the process of avoiding pot holes (which is close to impossible here) was not able to get back into his lane fast enough and hit the drivers side mirror of our truck.  The impact broke the mirror and sent it flying into the truck.  Chucks right arm was all cut up (remember our cars are opposite of those in the US) and I had a few minor cuts on my face.  Thankfully the boys in the back seat were ok.

After impact I touched my forehead and once I saw blood on my fingers I was pretty much done….I’m not good with blood, especially my own!  Much emotion/commotion was happening but suffice it to say the guy did stop (after we turned around and followed him).  Chuck simply wanted the guys license to get his information but he, at first, wouldn’t even get out of the truck and had his window rolled up!  Eventually he came out and we found out he was driving on an expired temporary license (big surprise there…not!)  When we tried to find a number to call police we were given a number of a guy who would call the police for us…what?  We sat for over an hour…no police, no information given and the guy desperately trying to talk his way out of this mess.  At first he suggested WE give him 5000/ksh so he could drop off the sand he had then get more sand and drop that at C4KK!  Are you serious…you hit us and want us to pay you!?  Let me think…..ummmm no!  Then he wanted to make an agreement that he would pay us over time.  Yea right, once you leave we won’t see or hear from you again.  ”no, no, you can trust me!”  He was really making this too easy…ummmm no!  We told him if he could pay for the mirror we’d call it good.  We found out the mirror would cost around 12000/ksh to replace and of course he didn’t have that so the next best thing was to deliver the sand he had to C4KK.  To which he agreed.

Now remember we still haven’t made it to Tala to get the boys school supplies and to school.  By this time it’s around 1:30pm and I’m about ready to fall asleep.  I think the surge of adrenaline finally crashed and I was also ready to crash!  Ann, house mom at C4KK, gave me an uplifting thought though saying the devil had plans but Jesus had overcome those. Amen and praise God He kept us all safe in what could have been a very bad accident.  And I was also able to find some peace in watching some little blue birds (not sure of their official name) before heading back to Tala.

The trip back to Tala was a bit anxious for me, every time a lorry went by my stomach would turn, waiting for impact again.  But we made it safely to town, got the boys school stuff and thankfully Bosco went with us so Chuck dropped me at home and they went to school.  Although the accident wasn’t much of an impact my body was still pretty sore and a headache to boot.  So I was glad to just stay home.

I really am feeling aged but I know this too shall pass (meaning the soreness not the aging part!) and I continue to be thankful for the mercy God showed us throughout this accident.

Kids have returned to school!

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Primary kids went back to school yesterday and with just the little ones back to school it was very quiet around here!

During the past few days the secondary girls all got their hair done (I’m still in the learning process of how they work with their hair!), supplies were handed out and encouragement was dished out in abundance.  Then today was departure day for the secondary students…oops not exactly.

We have two boys who are transferring out of their schools to join their brothers at a school closer to home and better equipped to teach (it was 4th in the District last year!)  Which brings me to the one snafu (so far) with the beginning of school.  One of the “transfer” boys was heading to his old school today with Bosco to pick up his possessions (mattress, foot locker, etc.) and to get his transfer letter which clears him from the school.  He was asked a few days before if there was anything he needed to take with him to make sure the transfer letter went through smoothly…nope he was all set.

Bosco meets him in Tala to head to school which is about an hours matatu (public transportation) ride away and they are off.  We get a call from Bosco saying all the teachers were in a meeting and they would have to wait because each teacher needs to initial the transfer letter to clear the boy.  After a few hours we get another call from Bosco saying the boy forgot a book at home and they won’t clear him without the book!  I won’t go into the frustration I felt or the phone calls back and forth to figure out a solution….they couldn’t find the book at any of the bookstores to purchase and were told they couldn’t leave money for the cost of the book.

Eventually the teacher (whose class the book was for) agreed to let us pay for the book, hallelujah!

Just as I was about to hit publish for this post Chuck tells me the boy will be spending the night at school because three of the teachers basically blew them off…after the meeting Bosco went to one of the three to get their signature, the teacher said wait he had something to do…that something was LEAVE!  The principal wasn’t any help either, he told Bosco either leave the boy or take the boy, he didn’t care.  Yup that pretty much sums up the prevailing attitude of the school system here.  Now the boy will stay overnight, get the signatures (hopefully since they were there all day and couldn’t get all the signatures) then head home. Tomorrow he is also supposed to go with the other “transfer” boy to their new school and pick up their admission letters!

Seems nothing ever runs smoothly, according to plan or on time here and you really have to learn to just accept what you can’t change and roll with the punches.  Saying that however doesn’t make it any less frustrating, but God will work out the details as we continue to follow His lead in helping the kids.

Please pray for God’s will be done in this situation and all we encounter.

Flooding….

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Sorry it’s been a few days.  We’ve had crazy weather, no electricity and non-existent speed on internet.

This is just across the road from C4KK!  The neighbors toilets were underwater.  Thankfully the water receded before it reached the kids but it was a sight to see.

Before everyone heads back to school the girls got in a game of ???.  They didn’t know the name of it but it seemed a lot like jacks but they are playing with stones!

Even Viggo received a present in my mom’s care package!

Today the primary kids went back to school and it sure is quiet here :) and tomorrow the secondary kids leave for school.  That will really make things strangely still around  here!  But the kids are pretty excited to get back to school.  Please keep all our kids in prayer as they continue to focus and strive to do their very best in school.

The Lord has blessed us with both electricity and pretty fast internet (for us anyway) so I’m trying to get things updated but forgive me if it’s a couple days again for an update…you can never rely on either here!

Back to school!

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It is almost time for kids to return to school…secondary students will be off and gone for approximately 1 1/2 months (before returning home for mid-term) and our primary kids will be going back to school on a daily basis.  I believe Ann (house mom) is ready for school to begin!  Having 28 kids 24/7 gets a bit tiring, but she’s been doing a great job!

Being “shaved” (getting a haircut) is on the list of preparations before heading back to school:

Emma is being shaved while Isaac waits for his turn and Bonface was already shaved.

 

Bonface and Dan show off their bald heads!

 

 

Slacker!

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Did not get a blog post out yesterday or the day before.   Here are my excuses:

  • day before yesterday internet was really lousy and I just didn’t have the fight in me.
  • yesterday we had kid stuff (more on that in a minute)
  • plus yesterday I tried 3 times to get a blog posted from my phone and it kept deleting the draft [aarrggghhh]

Now for more on the kid stuff:

 

We had a meeting with our secondary (high school) kids, they are back home from completing their first term of 2012!  Grades overall were good and we are looking to transfer 2 boys to another school which we have a really good relationship with and is #4 in the District!!  The reasons?  One school raised their fees 6000/ksh (approx. $71) the day we showed up to drop off the kid at school in Term 1 and has now raised fees for Term 2 another 7000/ksh (approx. $83)…both with no explanation.  The other school had a riot last year and hasn’t recovered, therefore education is not a priority for them at the moment.

It felt really good to talk to these kids as a family unit, letting them know they have a support system.  Plus I don’t think anyone has ever asked them their opinion about their classes, why they received a particular grade or what they see for their future.  We also had some “parental” talks….don’t leave the compound without permission (teen boys tend to think they know it all!), decide between getting your hair done (weaves are big over here for the ladies and the girls can only have it done during break because they aren’t allowed to have this done during school) or having a scarf for the cold mornings, no you can’t have all the lotions/perfumes/hair coloring you want!

I could see some taking it all in and even questioning a few things (yeah!) but I also saw a few not being too interested in the whole thing….guess that’s part of being in a family, different attitudes/personalities/objectives but that’s exactly what we told them.  We are a family and we all need to cooperate and talk about issues that come up.

So I’m sorry for slacking off the past few days…oh and by the way we are still out of running water, that doesn’t have anything to do with getting a blog post out but goes to state of mind!

More stones….

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Five additional stones have been stacked bringing the total to 56 stones!  Thank you!  For more info on “stacking the stones” please visit our website for details.

I would also like to express my thanks for another person sponsoring a child!  It’s been (and will continue to be) a time of great reliance on God’s provision…school fees will be coming due the end of this month for the secondary students.  Which means around $3,700 is needed in addition to the regular funds needed to run C4KK Children’s Home.  But when I start to feel a bit overwhelmed with it all God shows me yet again how He knows the situation.

C4KK Children’s Home currently has 10 kids waiting for sponsors…of those there are 6 in primary and 4 in secondary.  If the secondary monthly sponsorship seems out of reach ($70) we encourage anyone to “share sponsorship” to help cut the monthly (or yearly if you prefer) commitment down per person.

Please visit our “Sponsorship Gallery” to see these great kids….we’ve had fun sending letters back and forth between the kids and their sponsors, a few of the kids have drawn pictures and it seems they are all  having a good time getting to know each other via these letters.  If you feel lead please prayerfully consider becoming a part of a child’s life here in Kenya.

A big thank you again for any and all help you can give.

Mid-term is over

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First let me get this off my chest….I really dislike the schooling system here in Kenya.  Want details?  Ok, here’s just a few:

  • high school students boarding is crazy.  If we had a decent high school near C4KK the kids could walk to school on a daily basis
  • why do you (schools) simply teach to an exam instead of teaching some critical thinking?
  • since the kids board we have to supply all their needs (soap, toilet paper, etc.) for living at school.  Not that those items wouldn’t be purchased if they stayed at home, but there would certainly be less chance of them being stolen!
  • on top of supplying the needs we’ve also been requested to buy text books (you’re the darn school, supply the material!)

Oh, I could go on and on but that’s not what this blog post is about.  Mid-term has come and gone (the last of the secondary students return to school tomorrow) and that meant more shopping for daily required items like soap, toothpaste, shoe polish, etc.  Plus a few extra items like pants and tennis shoes which were stolen from school (aarrrggghhh).  We’ve put our foot down with items on their list like sugar, hot chocolate, watches, etc. because with the number of kids we are working with makes it next to impossible to buy these “luxuries” for each child.

But even without sugar they are doing well in school (they probably didn’t think they could live without sugar, but ‘lo and behold they are!)  They’ll be in school for the rest of the month than return home in April for a month off.  Meaning April will be a loud month at C4KK!

 

Surprise Sabbath

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You may recall me telling you about “plans” here in Kenya, if not you can read about it here.  Yesterday we had “planned” to pick up 3 boys in Tala from their mid-term break.  They said it would most likely be around 10am.  Ok, we stayed at home and waited…and waited and waited.  We called C4KK to see if anyone there had heard from the boys, nope.  So we ended up having a surprise Sabbath.  By the end of the day the matron (Ann) said most likely the school had decided to change the mid-term release date to today (Friday).  But we received no phone call from either students or administration.  The thought for me was if there had been an accident it was highly unlikely that all three boys would not be able to call, so we continued to wait.

I didn’t open my computer up the entire day…I take that back, I did open it so we could watch The Kings Speech (DVD player is broken).  We read (I finished book #2 of The Hunger Games trilogy), talked and basically never stepped outside all day!

Today we headed into Tala around 10am and would pick up the boys if they were there and if not they’d have to take a matatu (public transport).  Went into Sunny Lucky to pick up some rice and spaghetti (Ann needed more of these items because all the secondary kids are here now, meaning 8 additional mouths to feed for a few days) and just as we were about to leave, who walks up but the 3 boys.  They said the school decided to take their pre-mid-term exams on Wednesday and Thursday (instead of Tuesday and Wednesday) making it necessary for the kids to leave for mid-term Friday not Thursday as planned.

Kids are all now safely at home and it sounds like a youth group out there!  It’s fun listening to them all discuss grades, classes, teachers, etc. just like a family should!

 

Settled

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Saturday I wrote about a student who had a few items stolen from him at school.  Yesterday we visited him and basically calmed him down.  He was pretty distraught over the incident because he has a strong sense of morality and a genuine fear of God.  He couldn’t understand why a fellow student would want to do this and kept saying “he has no fear of God.”

We explained to him these things happen in a fallen world and our options are to either be angry about it (which I admit I was at first) or know that God is in control and ask for His help throughout (made it to this point very early Sunday morning through prayer).  His foot locker needed to be replaced because the thief couldn’t break the padlocks on it so instead broke the hinges.  We happened to have an extra foot locker at the house, thank you God!

He was given enough money for a new uniform shirt and transport back home at mid-term (both of which were stolen).  He is planning on giving his transport money to the school accountant for safe keeping!  Once he saw things were working out, we weren’t mad at him and we could all move forward, he was much calmer and you could see the stress leaving his face.  He is currently #1 in his school and we encouraged him to let this go and focus once more on his studies.

Yes it was a bummer we had to pay to replace stolen items, that the incident happened in the first place, a trip had to be made to the school and he was stressed for a few hours but I thank God He worked it all out smoothly, or as smoothly as it gets here in Kenya!

What to do

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Today we received a phone call from one of our secondary students saying his foot locker had been broken into.  His pocket money and second uniform (along with other various items) had been stolen or broken.  I understand theft happens everywhere but what frustrates me is the school will most likely do very little to investigate. (I will let you know if I hear otherwise) They will search for the stolen items but more than likely they have already been sold.  The school will make no offer to reimburse for any stolen items nor give any explanation as to how this happened in the first place.

And trying to get information (cost of another uniform) is worse than pulling teeth. Then getting the items back to the student is another “adventure”, one which looks like we may be embarking on tomorrow….yippee, Kenyan road trip (using my sarcastic voice, forgive me).

Seems no day goes on without some sort of wrench being thrown into the mix. Praying for God’s continued mercy as we work through yet another situation.