We ARE in KENYA

We are having an amazing time with our Maasai friends in the Rift Valley below the Ngong Hills.
I been able to have meetings with the girls who have finished secondary school and are now eager to continue their education. Some want to be teachers, others accountants, air hostess and also a lawyer. The girl who wants to be a lawyer is looking toward helping the Maasai community with their land issues as well as other topics.

I had another meeting of girls who are in secondary school and some of the post secondary girls came along since Koi Tirima was going to be our guest speaker. Koi was a professor of English at Olympic College in Bremerton, returned to Kenya to donate a kidney to her father and now has decided to stay. She is a professor at the Methodist University in Nairobi. She will be an important link for the girls. During their April school break she will do a 2 day workshop for them.

Meeting with the MWEEP women has been a real JOY. They are women of determination, courage and the will to make a difference in their lives, the lives of their families and the community.

We've been here at the right time to be part of a male circumscion ceremony - 2 days.
We were invited out in the BUSH to meet one of the MWEEP member's family. We had an hour of driving on tarmac and then 2 hours on dirt roads where it had rained--sliding all over the place but we were in a 4 wheel drive vehicle and we MADE IT. Another round of stories.

Tomorrow is the BIG DAY. December 15th, MWEEP is hosting a solar cooker class.
Look at the following website: www.solarcookers.org
Jon and I have been practicing with the cookits at the homes where we've stayed. So far we've made successful break and ugali. The rice didn't cook long enough. We took a cooker out in the bush and not one thought it would turn out but it was successful even on a partly cloudy day.
Each woman attending the class will receive a cookit.

On the 18th we will have our last day in the village at Lucy's home (she was the 2nd woman that Jon and I helped go to school to be a teacher). Amanda and the boys will fly into Nairobi on the 17th and they will go with us. We'll stop in Ngong to see some of the women who came to the business class (Project Baobab) -- egg business and dairy. Then on down into the valley to see a few more businesses. Jon and the boys will play football with some of the kids. Then the boys want to herd the goats with some of the boys and of course carry a stick like the Maasai boys.

Pictures are soon to follow.
We have much to be thankful for, many blessings and our safety and health. Those of you who are praying for us, THANKS.
Things are not always easy but God has been faithful.

Loanna