Living in Kenya is an adventure! We arrived on August 22, not sure what we would find at the Nairobi International Airport. Earlier in September, the International Arrivals terminal had burned! But we were so pleasantly surprised to go through immigration and customs with no issues. The first day we arrived, we needed to attend to some issues with our vehicle – so we had to find new tires, have a couple of cables replaced (the speedometer cable and the fuel gauge cable), and had to have the clutch adjusted. Unfortunately, while we were out of the country, the back doors quit opening – and one of the outside rear-view mirrors was damaged. We had everything pretty much in working order by Saturday afternoon, and headed for Narok! We spent our first weekend ministering among the Masai in the Narok area. What a blessing they were to us as well! Monday morning, we headed for our home in Kakamega. Let me say, the roads to Kakamega are horrid! Words cannot express how bad they are! What should have taken us only about 5 hours to travel took us nearly 8 hours! But we finally arrived, and began to get settled.
I have become accustomed to finding surprises (some not too pleasant) when we first arrive. This trip was no exception! We were so grateful to see that our ceiling had been fixed and replaced. However, in the course of replacing the ceiling, the electricity was terribly disrupted, and we had no lights in our bedroom, nor in our dining room! So, we were trying to unpack our belonging in the dark – with only the flickering light of a burning candle! By the next day, an electrician had come and repaired the broken lights – and we were back in business!
One morning, shortly after our arrival in Kakamega, Donna was taking a shower and there was a fire in the bathroom! I was getting ready to open the house, when I heard her screaming “fire! Fire! Fire!” I ran to see the wire that connects to our shower head had caught fire along the wall – so I switched off the electricity in the bathroom, and put out the fire. A quick call to the electrician got the problem repaired – we needed to re-wire the area – and the shower was working once again!
The next morning, however, the shower did not produce any water! We had the tank filled, but it would be empty within a few hours! We could find no leaks or problems in the pipes…but obviously there was a leak somewhere! Finally, Donna found the leak, and we knew we needed to replace a part on our toilet. It took us three days to find that part! So for three days, we had no water in our house! What a joy! When the part was finally found and the toilet was fixed, we were so excited to take a shower again – but the water did not flow into the shower! So, we had to find a plumber to come and fix our pipes! An exciting report from this is that after we repaired the toilet and the pipes coming to the house, we have only had to have our tank filled very five days instead of every-other day! We are very happy with this development as it will keep our expenses a bit lower.
You can see there are great challenges living in the bush of Western Kenya! But all in all, we are so excited and count it such an honor to be here, living our dream of teaching all nations!
I have become accustomed to finding surprises (some not too pleasant) when we first arrive. This trip was no exception! We were so grateful to see that our ceiling had been fixed and replaced. However, in the course of replacing the ceiling, the electricity was terribly disrupted, and we had no lights in our bedroom, nor in our dining room! So, we were trying to unpack our belonging in the dark – with only the flickering light of a burning candle! By the next day, an electrician had come and repaired the broken lights – and we were back in business!
One morning, shortly after our arrival in Kakamega, Donna was taking a shower and there was a fire in the bathroom! I was getting ready to open the house, when I heard her screaming “fire! Fire! Fire!” I ran to see the wire that connects to our shower head had caught fire along the wall – so I switched off the electricity in the bathroom, and put out the fire. A quick call to the electrician got the problem repaired – we needed to re-wire the area – and the shower was working once again!
The next morning, however, the shower did not produce any water! We had the tank filled, but it would be empty within a few hours! We could find no leaks or problems in the pipes…but obviously there was a leak somewhere! Finally, Donna found the leak, and we knew we needed to replace a part on our toilet. It took us three days to find that part! So for three days, we had no water in our house! What a joy! When the part was finally found and the toilet was fixed, we were so excited to take a shower again – but the water did not flow into the shower! So, we had to find a plumber to come and fix our pipes! An exciting report from this is that after we repaired the toilet and the pipes coming to the house, we have only had to have our tank filled very five days instead of every-other day! We are very happy with this development as it will keep our expenses a bit lower.
You can see there are great challenges living in the bush of Western Kenya! But all in all, we are so excited and count it such an honor to be here, living our dream of teaching all nations!
RSS Feed