Saturday, September 22, 2007

AFRICA IT IS

Greetings from Nairobi Kenya

It feels a little like being 'beamed up' in that we went from 'anticipating a relaxing island autumn' to 'arriving in Kenya' is a matter of 2 weeks.
We will move to Eldoret next week sometime and settle int our home away from home.
We are blessed to use the CRWRC office Internet today. We hear that power outages are very common in Eldoret but will do our best to keep up the blog.
We find the Kenyan people to be very friendly and relational. There is an addition being made to our accommodation right next door using lots of man power and heavy labour.

Impressions of Nairobi:
  • chaotic traffic with lots of pot holes and abrupt edges to the roads
  • lots of interesting sites of people doing everything from driving Mercedes to selling firewood at the side of the road
  • friendly Kenyans with beautiful smiles
  • had our first taste of negotiating prices - we were not buying anyway
  • learning lots from experienced folks at CRWRC
  • adorable children
  • lots of ex pats in the area we visited today

We have been warmly welcomed and really appreciate the accommodation arranged for us.

Our 2 days in Burlington were wonderful - many great and passionate people sharing their knowledge and experience with us. One fun piece was watching a volunteer hanging up photos of Mali which Nanci B with CCC shared after her Discovery Tour.

Ron just spotted an enormous bird on the roof of the building next door - it looks like a cross between a pelican and a heron and it looks about 1 M tall.

Tomorrow we have made a plan to go to church with Henny and Hans whom we have just met. They are a lovely hospitable couple for Ottawa.

Cheers for now.

Monday, September 10, 2007

WHERE IN THE WORLD?

WHERE and WHAT is next ?!?!?!?

After an amazing month of kayaking, boating and camping, we have just celebrated the 25th anniversary of Christ Community Church with an amazing service at the Port Theatre. What a joy it was to have our three consecutive pastors there to celebrate what God has done and to look expectantly to what is next….. we do love our church family!

In the midst of all this we have been called to Kenya for 3 months of volunteering with the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee as International Relief Managers. We leave on September 17th. We will be back early in the new year. The condo will have friends keeping it warm for or return in early January.

In the meantime we are enjoying a visit from Annika, Marty’s lovely wife. Marty has been in Athens with his work. Our friends Dave and Laura leave tomorrow for 10 months – see you in Kona!
On the sad side of life, we are very concerned for our dear Thomas’ health as he is hospitalized in Thailand with pneumonia. One day at a time … trusting for God’s healing touch. Stay tuned for good news very soon …..