Two Weeks in Turkana

As I sit here in Nairobi, land of vibrant colors, clean vehicles and cool air, I am sad that I am not still in Turkana. After 3 weeks in Kenya, I made it up to Turkana with my stuff and began learning how to live life there. Since I begin my next transition tomorrow and my Turkana impressions will soon begin to fade I wanted to share them now.

Zebras by the road!

The first day of our drive up to Turkana was nice, with decent roads (even with the speed bumps), cool temperatures and wonderful scenery. The zebras were the best part by far. I just keep saying to myself "How cool to see real, live, wild African zebras." They were just grazing by the road.

The sign at the equator was pretty neat also. We stopped to take pictures from the car and this lady with her donkey tried to move him out of the way. I like the animals in the pictures.

It only took us about 6 hours to reach Eldoret. We had a nice lunch at a restaurant along the way and then dinner that night with friends of my teammate. It was great to visit with and meet other missionaries and hear their stories of life in Kenya. We stayed at a guesthouse there in Eldoret and had a nice breakfast. Then the not so fun part of the trip began.

The changing landscape.

We headed north and picked up one of the mission workers at another town. It was good to have him with us to speak Swahili and help if there were any problems. He had come down from Turkana, the day before on the bus. Poor guy had to endure those roads 2 days in a row! I don't even know how to describe those roads to you, or should I say lack of roads, since most of the trip was spent driving off the sides to avoid more of the potholes, but even that didn't really work and we shifted from side to side many times. There wasn't much traffic, but when someone did come along you just hoped that your side of the road was the good part at that point.

Camel welcoming committee. 

The entire trip took about 10 hours. That did include a stop along the road for lunch and a bathroom break. Literally both of those were along the road. No rest areas on this route! You could see the landscaping changing. The dirt was lighter brown and sandier. There were fewer trees and plants. You could also feel the change in temperature and the dust really began to fly. I should have taken a picture of what my hair and clothes looked like when we arrived.

Thanks for all your prayers during our trip. We made it safely with only 1 flat tire. That is improvement from my previous record of 2 in one day! Luckily we were in friendly Turkana territory when it went flat and the worker with us got the spare on quickly and then we were back on the road. We arrived in Lodwar before sunset and had a few camels to greet us along the way.

My home, lots of room for visitors!

I don't think I have ever been so happy to arrive anywhere. I spent a few hours assessing my new digs and doing some basic cleaning (shower, bathroom and bedroom) and slept well that night. The next few days were filled with more cleaning, unpacking and organizing, with a few trips into town for food and supplies. It was fun discovering the items left by other missionaries. A cow hide covered drum, a few walking sticks, a bow (no arrows found yet) and some Turkana baskets and trivets. I have used most of those items to help decorate the house.

Language learning.

I was learning how to live life in Turkana and learning that the heat seemed to slow my body and my mind. Language learning was difficult, but another missionary and I spent 3 mornings learning basic greetings, questions and responses and of course how to say "What is this?" A very important phrase when language any learning.

You learn a lot about a culture by learning the language also. Interestingly, I learned that the Turkana don't have words for "Thank you", "Please" or "Sorry". It is a hard for me to comprehend that they wouldn't need or want words like that.

The language helper also told us that they are "color deficient". They don't have words for orange and purple is just described as blue-black. However, we did discover that they have many words for all shades and variations of brown. That makes sense in this culture, where most things are brown or tan or chestnut or chocolate or....well see we technically have lots of words that could describe browns and versions of it also!

The language helper gave me a Turkana name, since Shannon is hard for them to understand and say. I am Apetet, which is a thorny tree. Which one? I couldn't even tell you, since there are many thorny trees everywhere. I will need to wait and see if that name sticks or if I get a new one from someone else.

Ladies at a farm sharing how thankful they are for the well and irrigation so they can grow food to feed their families and sell. 

The rest of my time in Turkana consisted of 3 days in the bush visiting farms, a nice Easter Turkana

Learning how to do a budget. 

church service, then Easter dinner with other missionaries, and lastly 3 days of meetings about accounting and budgeting with the Turkana church leaders and others involved with the ministry here. The days were long and hot, but the information was good and I learned a lot about Turkana and the people and churches here by listening to their discussions and seeing what they put in their personal and church budgets and what they didn't.

Did you know last Monday was a holiday. Apparently Kenya has lots of holidays and it was Easter Monday. I mention this, because I was so thankful for it, because they left the electricity on all day! It is typically off during the weekdays for 6-9 hours but you just never know which days it will be off or it they might leave it on all day. You might get excited when it is still on at 10:30 only to have it be shut off just after that.

Batman and Robin our guard dogs!

I know this is just life and I am adjusting so please don't think I am complaining. I am so thankful and blessed to have a house with concrete walls and floor. I have electricity and running water, with water tanks that I am learning to remember to fill when the electricity comes on. I have a washing machine, refrigerator and freezer. I even have an air conditioner in my bedroom. I enjoyed that more than I thought I would, I set it at 30 C and sleep well (yes that is 86 F and it is wonderfully cool compared to outside that room). I am very blessed and thankful to have furniture, like my dining room table that I can wipe the dust and sand from 3 (or more) times a day. I am thankful for the 2 dogs and the guards that help make me feel safe and protected at the house. I am thankful that the snake that tried to come in the house, only made it onto the porch, before my screaming and hysterics made him go out under the other porch door. I am thankful that I had 2 weeks in Turkana to begin to adjust and see how to live life there. It was rather tiring, but I was really sad to leave.

I got some good deals and useful items at this yard sale. 

I flew back to Nairobi yesterday and the 2 hour flight in a/c was much more pleasant than the drive. I am now ready for my next transition with a move tomorrow to the language school where I will live for 4 months.  Please pray for me during this next transition and for my language learning. The life of a missionary is full of transitions and right now I am ready for a routine and a place to unpack and stay for awhile. Please also pray that I continue to be healthy and stay warm. After being in the dessert heat Nairobi's 80's feels like natural air conditioning, but I am heading to higher elevation and this is the beginning of "winter" here, so it will be cool. I have my sweaters and fleece blankets ready. I even bought some Maasai blankets today at a big yard sale at one of the international schools. The lady who sold them to me said I should just wrap up in them when I go to class so I can stay warm. She was really sweet and even demonstrated for me. I enjoyed talking to her and buying from her.  It makes me even more motivated to learn Swahili and Turkana so I can speak to these people in their languages and begin to make real connections with them.  I am so thankful for my two weeks in Turkana and I wanted to share these thoughts while I had a little down time before my head begins to swim with Swahili. The adventure continues and I can't wait to see what else God has to show me and teach me during the next 4 months. I'll keep you posted. Thanks again for all your prayers and support.

Have You Ever Prayed for Loose Lug Nuts?

This was my prayer Tuesday night as we had our second flat tire of the day and the vehicle sat on the

Sunrise in Kenya!

side of the road in the dark. But the story of my “Maasai Adventure Day” really began many hours before that.

We started out bright and early (well dark and early) at 5:40 am to get through Nairobi before rush hour and to avoid the predicted Matatu strike. Due to new rules about governors on their vehicles, there was suspicion that the drivers would park and block the roads. Luckily that didn’t happen and we had no problems as we headed south toward Tanzania.

We reached our first stop, a little over 2 hours later, about 40 km north of the border. I was hoping to see Mt. Kilimanjaro, but it was a foggy morning and we just weren’t close enough. The plan for the day was to meet the Kenyan pastor and a survey team, then head out to another area where the survey would be done to gather data and determine whether it was a good place to drill a well. We started by meeting the pastor in town and had tea with him and another gentleman. Toward the end of our visit, the other gentleman mentioned that our tire was going flat. Very good to know this before going out into the bush. So we headed across the street to the tire repair shop.

We pulled up and a number of men began to assess the situation. Likely the tire would be flat soon so a repair was in order. I had a long lesson on the process of repairing a tire with a tube and split rim. I didn’t even know what that was before then. The longest part of the process was actually removing the lug nuts. They were on so tight and it took multiple men working with different lug nut remover thingy’s (yes I will eventually learn what they are called), a long pipe used for extra torque and lots of sweat! Finally the tire was off, rims eventually separated, hole found and repaired and the whole thing put back together again.  Praise God.

One stop shopping!

During this time I was able to observe the people setting up for their town’s market day. I made friends with a little boy who played hide and seek with me around the corner of the buildings and through the windows of the butcher shop. I also learned that the Kenyans’ are really good business people. The tire repair place was also a Kinyozi (barber shop) and phone charging and repair store. Talk about one stop shopping, too bad my phone was charged and working and I haven’t decided to shave my head….. yet! What a blessing to have the flat in a town, in the daylight and to have some great experiences while I waited.

After that,  we met up with the survey team and headed out to the bush. The pastor said it was only an hour trip out, but to me it felt like over 2 hours, with a few stops for goat and cattle crossings. I wasn’t quick enough to get any good pictures of the cattle. That was the best, when they came at us and just parted and went around us as we stopped there.

We made it out to the area to survey and the team started. From my very over simplified view, they were using seismic readings and electric conductivity to assess where there might be water. As the day went on some Maasai men and women ventured out to see what was going on. I was lucky enough to get to spend a few hours smiling at and beginning to communicate with these ladies and their babies. I practiced some of my Swahili and learned a little Maa (the Maasai language) also. They were very sweet and very curious about everything I did. I have continued to pray for these women and would ask you to also. The flies are bad out there and the baby’s face was constantly covered due to her runny nose. I do not know if I will get back to this area to see them again, but I will keep praying for them and for water to be there and for a successful well to be dug.

Please pray for these women and children!

It was about 11:30 when we arrived and over the next 6+ hours the survey team gathered their data in multiple places. Daylight was getting short and the best option would have been to get right on the road back to the town where we planned to stay for the night. However, the pastor said we must come to his house for a late lunch/dinner. We obliged and graciously but quickly ate our rice, meat stew and chapate, then got back on the road with only about ½ hour or daylight left. It was slow going, but things were going well until we reached a spot in the road where 3 trucks were stopped. There were many people riding in and on the trucks and I guess one was broken down and blocking the road. The Kenyan who was riding with us back to the town said we should try to go around on the side. That was all fine until we were stuck there in the ditch, not able to go forward or backward. As many of you know I pray a lot when traveling in vehicles in other countries and there were many prayers that day already, but now I started praying for release from that dirt and from behind those trucks. After some work the 4 wheel drive was engaged and 4 men (one with a machine gun) helped push us backward onto the road again. In a few more minutes the trucks all managed to move over enough for us to successfully pass on the other side. Praise God we were on our way again without incident and I was thanking God for those peaceful and helpful people on that dark road.

By the time we arrived in town to drop off the Kenyan traveling with us, we had decided that driving back to Nairobi was a better choice than staying at the guest dorms. I know sometimes decisions seem not so smart in hindsight, but at that moment it all made sense. I was ready to be home and I figured God had got us through the worst parts of the day safely! It had to be easy from there. Right?

So to the north we headed, making good time, since there was very little traffic.  Then I heard it. That sound that you try to ignore, but you just know it is not good, the second flat tire in less than 12 hours. At this moment I thanked God that we were on a good paved road, with a large shoulder to pull off on and not much traffic. However, I was beginning to worry. I had not forgotten how much time and effort it took many men to remove those other very tight lug nuts, in daylight, with many tools. At that moment I began to pray out loud and ask God for loose lug nuts. Hey, He says ask and it will be granted.  By the grace of God, in only 15 minutes Gene had all the lug nuts off and the spare on and we were on the road again.

I am very thankful that God answered my prayers that day. I had not only prayerd for the loose lug nuts, but also for Gene’s safety since this tire was on the right side (ie road side) of the vehicle, for very little traffic coming that way and for no one to stop and try to “help”. (Friends had a bad experience with that before, not everyone really stops to "help".)

God provided us safe and quick passage the remainder of the way home. I kept praying for this the entire way and was very happy when I recognized the roads again. An hour earlier, I felt like a cat, running out of lives and we were definitely running out of tires. The whole day was a gift from God and I thank Him for the wonderful people I met: the ones who repaired the first flat tire, the little boy who played with me, the women and children I met, the survey team, the gracious pastor who fed us and the men who pushed us out of the ditch. I am thankful for a good place to change a tire for the beautiful stars we saw that night and for being challenged rely on God over and over again. That has been a common theme since I have been here in Kenya.

Goats crossing the road!

Thanks you for all your prayers for me, my teammates and the ministry and people here in Kenya. I could feel your prayers that entire day. Thank you. Thank you. I ask you to continue to pray for us here in Kenya and for missionaries all over the world. They all need your prayers.

Please continue to pray, as this vehicle is now getting new tires and being serviced, It is the vehicle we will take up to Turkana next week. It is a two-day trip and I ask for your prayers for safety, no vehicle problems and a good, peaceful overnight rest before we begin our second day of traveling.  I am so thankful for my “Maasai Adventure Day” and for God’s answered prayers for loose lug nuts!

James 1: 2-4

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.