Roger the RAT that is. He died, and I couldn’t be happier. Bwana Asifiwe, SANA!!!
Many of you know me very well and how I name just about everything. The ducks at the pond, my GPS, the Ape hanging from my rear view mirror, even Joe the over-achieving rooster when I first arrived in Nakuru, Kenya. Well since Roger began with an “R” it was only appropriate to name my annoying Rat roommate that name.
I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry. I CAN DO EVERYTHING THOUGHT HIM, JESUS CHRIST, WHO GIVES ME STRENGTH.~ Phillipians 4:12-13
I know I haven’t shared a lot about my living arrangements here in Kenya. I am not much of a complainer anymore these days in my seasoned years. I have learned, as Paul did the secret to life is being happy in all circumstances. I have been homeless before, lived in a commune, a dorm, with 40 women in one room, many apartments, had a perfect little house in Prairie Village (aka by KC people as “Perfect Village”), then lived in a half million dollar home with a pool, a double wide in the backwoods country of NC, a tent by lakes and rivers, and then countless other living arrangements and now well… it really isn’t all that bad. To be honest with you though, I am very grateful that it is not a grass or mud hut. Trust me I have visited them to pray/counsel with some of the rural tribal people and I am not sure I would be too excited to live 24/7 in one of those. Not that I couldn’t learn to find contentment there. It’s just the whole culture shock thing would have been a little in over the top if that was where I was going to stay at the beginning of this mission trip, especially moving from Beigeville, Johnson County, KS USA.
The house has a cement floor, and cement walls. It has a tin roof, and some type of particle board ceiling. It has two bedrooms, a cooking room, a living/dining area, one inside bath to be used by the family and an outside latrine and bath stall to be used by the slave quarters and guests like me. I am NOT very good at estimating square footage but if I had to guess I would say it is about 600-800 square ft. and that is very generous. Mind you I have had closets bigger than the kitchen which only consists of a sink with no water, but a line that could run from the rain tank, and an area where a charcoal stove is put for cooking. There is also a coffee table for chopping and a tree stump for the women to sit on while they stir each course over a charcoal cooking stove.
The house is on maybe two acres of land, that has a chicken coop, a 5x5 outside cooking area, an underground tank for water harvesting (rain), a 10 x10 “servants quarters” where 3 other pastors live and the rest is all garden area. The current issue of drought has killed all the cowpeas we had planted so no green crops on the east side, but we still have the kale on the west side. One side of the plot has a 10 to 12 foot cinder block fence. Some of the cement block fences plots in this area and the school have extra protection with broken glass at the top of the fence to prevent thugs from trespassing. The fence between our one neighbor is wooden about to fall apart and made out of branches broken off trees. We have bars on the inside and the outside of the windows and the doors, which made me wonder, is this what it feels like to live in KCK? Or parts of Durham, NC.. hmmmm things that make you go hmmmmm LOL
Anyhow, back to Roger. Well after the first week of sleeping here or not sleeping because my time clock was messed up I could hear something upstairs running around. It took me at least two weeks to get up the guts to ask the family what in the world is that running up in the attic, which by the way the crawlspace is completely open and in my room, which I share with Assistant Pastor Jotham’s sister, Millie and the baby, Isabell. She left her family, a husband and 2 other children, in the village up near Sudan and Uganda to come live with Pastor Jotham and Jael to try and get some medical treatment in the city of Nakuru. Three of us sleep in the same room. I asked the Pastor about the visitor above us, he said “um no maybe it is a mouse”. Maybe he was afraid of my reaction, so he said it was a mouse. Sometimes the vocabulary is so different here I have a hard time understanding what they mean. So anyway when Millie told me it was a rat I thought no it has to be a squirrel. Or maybe I was just trying to convince myself it was something other than a RAT.
See Roger was starting to wake me up. Every morning around 3 or 4am it would make a bunch of noise crawl down the closet which is not built in but stationary, and try to get under the door to scavenge for food. Millie was so sweet, as is the entire church and she gave up her bed for me to sleep on when I arrived. So she and the baby slept on a foam mattress on the floor. Eventually, thanks be to the grace of God, I was able to buy another bed for her and the baby to get off the floor. Millie told me and Pastor Jotham that the previous night Roger tried to nibble on her toes. Oh my goodness. Carpenters build hand made NICE bed frames for about $45.
See you don’t want to offend Kenyans by rejecting their generosity, for instance Millie (short for Milka) always insists on washing my clothes and sheets. They get very hurt and frustrated and a little angry if you don’t eat all the food or let them serve you somehow or whatever, so I let her wash my clothes by hand. Every week she hand washes them and hangs them to dry. She wanted to iron them to but I insisted, t-shirts and broom (supposed to be wrinkled) skirts do not need ironing. The only thing I have to wash is my underwear, and it is kind of a taboo secret thing too. You must wash those inside, and then when you hang them you MUST cover them properly with a shawl. Otherwise if I don’t have my underwear, not my bras, properly covered, I have shown the neighbors and the men staying in the slave quarters that they, the women, didn’t show me how to properly wash my most private clothes. Yep, culture shocks all the way around, and sometimes daily.
Back to Roger, well three weeks was about all I could take. Then I started to pray really hard. Lord, I am not complaining, really. You have provided a very nice place for me to stay, and food, internet, television, electicity, and to think about it Lord embarassingly I am quite spoiled. But Lord, you know how important sleep is for me. If it be in your will can you please have Roger find a new home very soon before I KILL one of your creatures. Perhaps the neighbor’s house would be a better home for him. After a week of waiting for my prayers to be answered, I took things into my own hands. I know we are supposed to wait upon the Lord, well I am a human and I will make mistakes and I really just didn’t care if that prayer was answered anymore or not. I was tired of Roger waking me at 3am! When we walked to town yesterday, I was determined we are getting rat poisoning, and I WILL KILL ROGER. Patience is not a fruit of the spirit I have been blessed with, yet, but y’all must be patient with me ‘cause GOD IS STILL working on me.
Anyway I believe Roger must have went to rat heaven last night, as what I heard of him last night was just a lot of radical squirming, flopping and very strange not normal noises. I thought I heard some squeaks, but that could have been the baby Isabella’s breathing. But as for ROGER, he never made it down the closet. Bwana Asifiwe!
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven; a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill, and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.~. Ecclesiastes 3:1-8
May you RIP Roger…….
I will NOT miss you, nor will I have to repent for killing you. Now I can have full 8 hours sleep, and I am a very happy American Kenyan Mzungu (white person).
Friday, January 21, 2011
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
BOYZ 2 MEN: The Kalenjin Tribe Initiation into Manhood Tradition
When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a MAN, I put away childish things. 1 Corinthians 13:11
I remember in High School the men’s sports clubs, particularly basketball or CHS letter club would have an initiation “session” with the elder classman. Usually this initiation involved drinking a weird mixture of eggs and other junk, maybe jumping into a whirlpool full of icecubes with just their underclothes on and being forced to stay in there for 30 minutes or more. Maybe one of my old classmates can help me remember what they had to do in good ole Cimarron High, but being a girl, we didn’t have to experience initiation. I seem to have gotten old and cannot remember all the memories of my youth. Man it stinks getting old.
I also remember a particular initiation ceremony I partook of which was held at the TKE fraternity very close the women’s dorm called Ford Hall. I remember at that initiation the goal was to get the little sisters of the fraternity um lets just say very happy in the alcohol spirit sense. I remember eating a tequila worm that night and it just about “to killed me” with too much tequila. Oh my, those are NOT the days I want to remember so well. Yikes.
My memory also recalls that now in America almost ALL initiation ceremonies of any kind in the High School and/or College levels are strictly against the law and punishable by the court system, even up to imprisonment. If those responsible for initiation parties and or practices are found that they are putting others at risk by making them do things that are considered dangerous to their health by consuming intoxicating substances and or ritualistic practices, those parties can spend time in jail. This would ruin their potential career while still in college, if over the age of 18 years old.
During my stay in Nakuru, I have learned that certain tribes also have initiation ceremonies where young boys gain their right of passage into manhood by completing a certain initiation process. This tribe called the Kalenjin tribe initiates their young men by circumcising their young men at age 12 years old. Then during the healing process there are certain things they are taught by men leaders and teachers of the tribe.
Mind you there are 42 tribes in Kenya. Talk about having racial issues. I am not sure how many classes of people there are in the Indian culture, but can you imagine 42 tribes in a state the size of Texas all fighting, judging each other, and having their own mother tongue language….YIKES…Then the racism due facts they cannot do business with certain tribes and they can’t sell to certain tribes. Then they are expected to NEVER intermarry and if they do they are considered outcasts among their own tribal people. If the husband of a mixed tribal marriage dies, which is the case of my house mom and the Pastor I am living with at this time, the wife must go live with the husband’s tribe and not even her own mother if she cannot provide for herself. You know I think there was a great woman in the bible named Ruth who chose to do the same thing. But these women do not get to choose, they must go live with the husbands tribe.
One thing I MUST tell you about this Kalenjin tribe, which is really sickening and sad is that they are one of the tribes in Northeastern Africa that still practice the FGM/FGC of little girls ages ranging from 8 to 10yrs old. This is a practice where they circumcise little girls and then sew them back up to prevent them from losing their virginity before marriage. They only leave a small hole for urine to escape, and during the process of “sewing” there private part back up they sometimes use thorns to hold it together till it forms a massive scar. Many girls die from the process, or they have life long infections, or they cannot conceive. It is a horrible practice straight from the pit of hell. Then when the parents present the girl in marriage there is proof she has never been with another man, she has the scar. Also in this mutilation of the female private parts all pieces that give the female pleasure in relations with her husband are removed, because that tribe does not want the wife to enjoy her husband. In this manner he has the right to have many wives and the men practice polygamy and have many children.
Two weeks after I arrived, the local news announced that there had been a rescue of 100 girls from this AWEFUL tribal tradition. GO GOD!!!!!!
Pastor Jotham is of Loyha tribe. Many of the Pastors and church members I work with have chosen to intermarry with tribes they went evangelizing with over a 3 year period to find their wives. My house mom was of the Kalenjin tribe. I hated the Kanenjins until I found out this fact, and I was confused because she is so quite and reserved and oh the love of JESUS just resonates off every fiber of her being. How God, HOW can SHE be a Kalenjin, and oh Lord PLEASE tell me she isn’t cut. Lord I just don’t know how I could handle it if she shares her memories with me. Well when I finally asked her about it. I was informed that her mother was a Christian and she was saved from this horrible “tradition” of keeping their child pure before marriage only by the fact that her father died when she was 3 yrs old. Her half sisters are all cut. PRAISE GOD! Her father had many wives, and she has many siblings whom she isn’t all that close to or talks about. When I first arrived, Jael my house mom took me for a walk out by the cliff, my special spot. Then she took me through the bush, out to the area where maybe some of you remember I posted a couple of pastors almost got cut by a couple of tribal men with machetes before the baptism at the river. Anyway she told me that I could sit at the top of the cliff alone, but never go down through the cliffs and NEVER to the bush. She said it was “OK” with her with me but NEVER alone.
Oh how I love to go out by the cliff where I spend many of my mornings in quite time with the Lord as I watch the African rhythm begin its day. See there is this strange musical like rhythm about everything in Africa, from the crazy way people walk, ride their bikes, the picky pickies (aka motorcycle taxi’s), or the public transport buses (14 passengers), to the cattle, sheep drives in traffic as they move from water to grazing pasture land, or even the sounds of the animals. At all hours of the day and night there is a specific sound and rhythm that seems to beautifully flow and just gives you this amazing drive to carry on. You can actually feel it in your chest. I don’t know if true African’s or Kenyans can feel the rhythm of Africa, but I see it, feel it, and sense it in EVERYTHING, everywhere. In all the major cities I have been in all over America, London, and Paris, I have never experienced anything like this perfectly timed movement of people, mechanical objects and animals.
Oops Rabbit, lol if any of you have seen that movie “UP” you know what I mean. Sorry I got sidetracked I hope you can follow my writings as they hopefully are written exactly how I talk. Lol….
Anyway as my house mom and I were out on our walk, she pointed to the bush. Then it was explained to me that area is where her tribe has a ceremony for young boys to become men. Then she explained the process to me. At first I shared with someone on Skype how I thought that was kind of cool as they had to go through something really painful and then they were taught the traditions of their tribe.
Later the Bishop’s sister in law, Mwatime (I call her Muah for short), explained the truth to me as we were sitting in the grass waiting for pastors to find the perfect spot for 6 souls to become baptized. Those boys are put in animal skin from head to toe, the only opening they have on the animal hide is for their eyes. If they get an infection from the circumcision they are taught which weeds will take it away, and if it is painful, tough you must learn to fight in pain. You are not fed any food or drink, you must hunt or eat wild greens, bushes or berries to survive. You drink out of the river that all the animals drink out of and if you get sick, tough it out.
They do many dances at night and the parents/family members can go watch them dance. You cannot tell which son is your son, because the mother puts one small mark the size of the circumference of your small finger somewhere on the skin to identify her child after 30 days. That is if the young man chooses to allow his mother to see him after the final dance. Many of the young men never return to the parent’s home. The men of the tribe train the 12 year old boys how to steal, lie, fight, use weapons and basically become thugs. They are taught to beat women, cheat on their wives, and have many wives. They are told to from now on you treat your own mother and grandmother as if she were dirt.
When the pastors were chased away with machetes, I was probably 20 or 30 yards away as they jumped in the river to escape the men, they were having the 30 day ritual. I didn’t see the scuffle but I did hear it as there are many types of tall grass in that area. The men did not want us to see the boys without their skins on, nor did they want us to use the river that close to the boys as they might see and hear what we were doing down at the river.
Oh Lord Touch that tribe…
LOL.. WELL GOD ALREADY DID EXACTLY THAT….regardless of my pleas to HIM, He already had the wheels in motion. He is just too cool!
Two weeks after the exciting baptism I was invited with many other pastors, the Bishops wife Fridah, my house family and a few other church members to another initiation of boys to men in the Kalenjin tribe, across the river. I was kind of leery about going, then I found out this was a party to celebrate the Christian version of Kalenjin initiation of boys to men. I could not wait to see the twist on this tribal tradition.
These 12 year old boys are circumsized by a doctor, not a tribal leader with a unsanitary knife, in a church and attended to by a nurse in case of infection. If they have infection they are treated with 21st century medications. They camp out for 30 days at the church and learn to dance a WAY COOL DANCE. I really wish I had trained the pastor who loves to let me just sit and enjoy the ceremonies while he takes all the pictures, how to use the video of this dance. Then the boys memorize many scriptures at the church and recite in perfect unison back to the family and crowd. They give small testimonies and tell their favorite verse. There is a huge feast, every celebration there is a ton of food, I am NOT losing the amount of weight I was hoping to by now, but you have to understand how much they love food, and feeding pastors and missionaries. Oh my. ….
After the feast the boys and family are hugely recognized. Let me tell you something about Kenyans, whenever there is a microphone around you can guarantee that every member of the family will be recognized and they will talk. Everyone loves the mic… lol. Anyway there was about 8 women with me and the Bishops wife and we had to leave a tiny bit early because there was a marital problem way out in the Kalenjin mud housing area where the husbands family were trying to get rid of chase away the wife and children because she was not a Kalenjin. We all rushed there to consol, counsel and pray with her. She was of the Louyha tribe, I think they are cousins of Obamas Loua tribe. Regardless we did not get to see the ending of the boys to men celebration and witness the non Christian men and boys waiting outside the plot compound to fight the men and the boys of the Christian family because they broke tradition of the tribe and did not send their boys to the bush to become ‘real’ men.
But you, LORD Almighty, who judge righteously and test the heart and mind, Jeremiah 11:20
So you know through all of this I have learned not to judge a certain group of people, just from the tribe or culture they have been raised in. Shamefully, once again I was a little mad at God for a while for letting certain practices occur here to his children, the youth of the Kenyan people. Especially when I thought of the special relationships that mothers have with their sons then once again I have to realize Romans 8:28
Once again I am reminded how GOD is in control, and I am not.
Moral of this story, everyone including me may not recall Corinthians 13:13? But I need to remember this verse in Corinthians a little more, you might recall it because is recited at almost every Christian wedding.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. ~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Oh in 10 days I get to attend a Kalenjin wedding. The bride and groom are Christians the family members are not. They attend the church at Salgaa where I gave my first sermon. This wedding should be interesting, although I do have many pictures of the pre-pre-wedding practice. Where maybe 30 family members got to use the microphone and it was very ceremonial and actually kind of cool, but that is a story for another time.
Maybe a story of two weddings….with movies I am working on. Stay tuned!
I remember in High School the men’s sports clubs, particularly basketball or CHS letter club would have an initiation “session” with the elder classman. Usually this initiation involved drinking a weird mixture of eggs and other junk, maybe jumping into a whirlpool full of icecubes with just their underclothes on and being forced to stay in there for 30 minutes or more. Maybe one of my old classmates can help me remember what they had to do in good ole Cimarron High, but being a girl, we didn’t have to experience initiation. I seem to have gotten old and cannot remember all the memories of my youth. Man it stinks getting old.
I also remember a particular initiation ceremony I partook of which was held at the TKE fraternity very close the women’s dorm called Ford Hall. I remember at that initiation the goal was to get the little sisters of the fraternity um lets just say very happy in the alcohol spirit sense. I remember eating a tequila worm that night and it just about “to killed me” with too much tequila. Oh my, those are NOT the days I want to remember so well. Yikes.
My memory also recalls that now in America almost ALL initiation ceremonies of any kind in the High School and/or College levels are strictly against the law and punishable by the court system, even up to imprisonment. If those responsible for initiation parties and or practices are found that they are putting others at risk by making them do things that are considered dangerous to their health by consuming intoxicating substances and or ritualistic practices, those parties can spend time in jail. This would ruin their potential career while still in college, if over the age of 18 years old.
During my stay in Nakuru, I have learned that certain tribes also have initiation ceremonies where young boys gain their right of passage into manhood by completing a certain initiation process. This tribe called the Kalenjin tribe initiates their young men by circumcising their young men at age 12 years old. Then during the healing process there are certain things they are taught by men leaders and teachers of the tribe.
Mind you there are 42 tribes in Kenya. Talk about having racial issues. I am not sure how many classes of people there are in the Indian culture, but can you imagine 42 tribes in a state the size of Texas all fighting, judging each other, and having their own mother tongue language….YIKES…Then the racism due facts they cannot do business with certain tribes and they can’t sell to certain tribes. Then they are expected to NEVER intermarry and if they do they are considered outcasts among their own tribal people. If the husband of a mixed tribal marriage dies, which is the case of my house mom and the Pastor I am living with at this time, the wife must go live with the husband’s tribe and not even her own mother if she cannot provide for herself. You know I think there was a great woman in the bible named Ruth who chose to do the same thing. But these women do not get to choose, they must go live with the husbands tribe.
One thing I MUST tell you about this Kalenjin tribe, which is really sickening and sad is that they are one of the tribes in Northeastern Africa that still practice the FGM/FGC of little girls ages ranging from 8 to 10yrs old. This is a practice where they circumcise little girls and then sew them back up to prevent them from losing their virginity before marriage. They only leave a small hole for urine to escape, and during the process of “sewing” there private part back up they sometimes use thorns to hold it together till it forms a massive scar. Many girls die from the process, or they have life long infections, or they cannot conceive. It is a horrible practice straight from the pit of hell. Then when the parents present the girl in marriage there is proof she has never been with another man, she has the scar. Also in this mutilation of the female private parts all pieces that give the female pleasure in relations with her husband are removed, because that tribe does not want the wife to enjoy her husband. In this manner he has the right to have many wives and the men practice polygamy and have many children.
Two weeks after I arrived, the local news announced that there had been a rescue of 100 girls from this AWEFUL tribal tradition. GO GOD!!!!!!
Pastor Jotham is of Loyha tribe. Many of the Pastors and church members I work with have chosen to intermarry with tribes they went evangelizing with over a 3 year period to find their wives. My house mom was of the Kalenjin tribe. I hated the Kanenjins until I found out this fact, and I was confused because she is so quite and reserved and oh the love of JESUS just resonates off every fiber of her being. How God, HOW can SHE be a Kalenjin, and oh Lord PLEASE tell me she isn’t cut. Lord I just don’t know how I could handle it if she shares her memories with me. Well when I finally asked her about it. I was informed that her mother was a Christian and she was saved from this horrible “tradition” of keeping their child pure before marriage only by the fact that her father died when she was 3 yrs old. Her half sisters are all cut. PRAISE GOD! Her father had many wives, and she has many siblings whom she isn’t all that close to or talks about. When I first arrived, Jael my house mom took me for a walk out by the cliff, my special spot. Then she took me through the bush, out to the area where maybe some of you remember I posted a couple of pastors almost got cut by a couple of tribal men with machetes before the baptism at the river. Anyway she told me that I could sit at the top of the cliff alone, but never go down through the cliffs and NEVER to the bush. She said it was “OK” with her with me but NEVER alone.
Oh how I love to go out by the cliff where I spend many of my mornings in quite time with the Lord as I watch the African rhythm begin its day. See there is this strange musical like rhythm about everything in Africa, from the crazy way people walk, ride their bikes, the picky pickies (aka motorcycle taxi’s), or the public transport buses (14 passengers), to the cattle, sheep drives in traffic as they move from water to grazing pasture land, or even the sounds of the animals. At all hours of the day and night there is a specific sound and rhythm that seems to beautifully flow and just gives you this amazing drive to carry on. You can actually feel it in your chest. I don’t know if true African’s or Kenyans can feel the rhythm of Africa, but I see it, feel it, and sense it in EVERYTHING, everywhere. In all the major cities I have been in all over America, London, and Paris, I have never experienced anything like this perfectly timed movement of people, mechanical objects and animals.
Oops Rabbit, lol if any of you have seen that movie “UP” you know what I mean. Sorry I got sidetracked I hope you can follow my writings as they hopefully are written exactly how I talk. Lol….
Anyway as my house mom and I were out on our walk, she pointed to the bush. Then it was explained to me that area is where her tribe has a ceremony for young boys to become men. Then she explained the process to me. At first I shared with someone on Skype how I thought that was kind of cool as they had to go through something really painful and then they were taught the traditions of their tribe.
Later the Bishop’s sister in law, Mwatime (I call her Muah for short), explained the truth to me as we were sitting in the grass waiting for pastors to find the perfect spot for 6 souls to become baptized. Those boys are put in animal skin from head to toe, the only opening they have on the animal hide is for their eyes. If they get an infection from the circumcision they are taught which weeds will take it away, and if it is painful, tough you must learn to fight in pain. You are not fed any food or drink, you must hunt or eat wild greens, bushes or berries to survive. You drink out of the river that all the animals drink out of and if you get sick, tough it out.
They do many dances at night and the parents/family members can go watch them dance. You cannot tell which son is your son, because the mother puts one small mark the size of the circumference of your small finger somewhere on the skin to identify her child after 30 days. That is if the young man chooses to allow his mother to see him after the final dance. Many of the young men never return to the parent’s home. The men of the tribe train the 12 year old boys how to steal, lie, fight, use weapons and basically become thugs. They are taught to beat women, cheat on their wives, and have many wives. They are told to from now on you treat your own mother and grandmother as if she were dirt.
When the pastors were chased away with machetes, I was probably 20 or 30 yards away as they jumped in the river to escape the men, they were having the 30 day ritual. I didn’t see the scuffle but I did hear it as there are many types of tall grass in that area. The men did not want us to see the boys without their skins on, nor did they want us to use the river that close to the boys as they might see and hear what we were doing down at the river.
Oh Lord Touch that tribe…
LOL.. WELL GOD ALREADY DID EXACTLY THAT….regardless of my pleas to HIM, He already had the wheels in motion. He is just too cool!
Two weeks after the exciting baptism I was invited with many other pastors, the Bishops wife Fridah, my house family and a few other church members to another initiation of boys to men in the Kalenjin tribe, across the river. I was kind of leery about going, then I found out this was a party to celebrate the Christian version of Kalenjin initiation of boys to men. I could not wait to see the twist on this tribal tradition.
These 12 year old boys are circumsized by a doctor, not a tribal leader with a unsanitary knife, in a church and attended to by a nurse in case of infection. If they have infection they are treated with 21st century medications. They camp out for 30 days at the church and learn to dance a WAY COOL DANCE. I really wish I had trained the pastor who loves to let me just sit and enjoy the ceremonies while he takes all the pictures, how to use the video of this dance. Then the boys memorize many scriptures at the church and recite in perfect unison back to the family and crowd. They give small testimonies and tell their favorite verse. There is a huge feast, every celebration there is a ton of food, I am NOT losing the amount of weight I was hoping to by now, but you have to understand how much they love food, and feeding pastors and missionaries. Oh my. ….
After the feast the boys and family are hugely recognized. Let me tell you something about Kenyans, whenever there is a microphone around you can guarantee that every member of the family will be recognized and they will talk. Everyone loves the mic… lol. Anyway there was about 8 women with me and the Bishops wife and we had to leave a tiny bit early because there was a marital problem way out in the Kalenjin mud housing area where the husbands family were trying to get rid of chase away the wife and children because she was not a Kalenjin. We all rushed there to consol, counsel and pray with her. She was of the Louyha tribe, I think they are cousins of Obamas Loua tribe. Regardless we did not get to see the ending of the boys to men celebration and witness the non Christian men and boys waiting outside the plot compound to fight the men and the boys of the Christian family because they broke tradition of the tribe and did not send their boys to the bush to become ‘real’ men.
But you, LORD Almighty, who judge righteously and test the heart and mind, Jeremiah 11:20
So you know through all of this I have learned not to judge a certain group of people, just from the tribe or culture they have been raised in. Shamefully, once again I was a little mad at God for a while for letting certain practices occur here to his children, the youth of the Kenyan people. Especially when I thought of the special relationships that mothers have with their sons then once again I have to realize Romans 8:28
Once again I am reminded how GOD is in control, and I am not.
Moral of this story, everyone including me may not recall Corinthians 13:13? But I need to remember this verse in Corinthians a little more, you might recall it because is recited at almost every Christian wedding.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. ~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Oh in 10 days I get to attend a Kalenjin wedding. The bride and groom are Christians the family members are not. They attend the church at Salgaa where I gave my first sermon. This wedding should be interesting, although I do have many pictures of the pre-pre-wedding practice. Where maybe 30 family members got to use the microphone and it was very ceremonial and actually kind of cool, but that is a story for another time.
Maybe a story of two weddings….with movies I am working on. Stay tuned!
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
BUT GOD...............
So, I know that I haven’t been writing like I had promised when I first left for Kenya. Please forgive me. I have really been busy in the ministry and trying to get things to going here. Secondly, it has been quite an adjustment in just about everything. But I believe I have adjusted well and that issue is starting to slow down. Then to tell you the truth, there have also been some bad things happen here that I just couldn’t bring myself to share with everyone. But today we had a miracle aside from some of the healings we have seen, and we saw the hand of God working a miracle over a period of time.
When I first arrived I was very excited to share my visions of empowering women with some minor domestic skills and/or potential small business opportunities by teaching them some crafts, knitting, sewing, beading, etc. To my surprise, the church I am living/working with had the same vision along with other ideas to transform this entire community. To add to my excitement was the opportunity to create a 5 year “business” plan for the church, a job which was my passion in the corporate world. Yes, I actually was able to use the skills that I have a degree in and I couldn’t believe it was in another country getting paid absolutely nothing. Ha! I also had the opportunity to create and design a website for the church. It is attached below and you can learn a little about the slum community I am working in that has been oppressed for almost 20 years due to tribal wars, the political uprising, and many other horrible conditions some which I will have to explain later.
Anyway there are many things that I need to write about with pictures, but I need to share the news as of late. It begins almost a week before Christmas for me. Every Friday they have what they call home fellowships, which is very similar to what many churches in America practice. We have to rent the “home fellowships” as nobody here has a home that can seat up to twenty people, still the concept is the same¸ smaller groups of the church in environments that are more intimate. This particular fellowship Pastor Joseph wanted me to attend was in the neighborhood called the “Deep” which is one of the more depressed areas of the slums. Mind you, areas of the Deep still look like a war zone to me when we walked through it. But appearances didn’t matter to us or God because we had our fellowship, and it was wonderful. After the fellowship, one of the women asked the entire group to go with her to her friend’s house to pray over her friend’s baby who had been sick for a couple of months. So we did just that, then the Pastor gave the woman some money to take the child to the doctor. He had diarrhea and vomiting for almost two months, which was a direct result from not having clean drinking water. We left and I felt like everything would be ok.
Two weeks later, the first week of January, we had an amazing missionary team from Australia volunteer to come give a conference on breaking generational curses and strongholds. The first night I was walking home from the church and the Pastor stopped me to introduce me to the father of the little boy we had prayed for as they were having a conversation by the gate. He had died, and the father was asking the church to provide funds for the family to take the body to a rural tribal location and bury his child. The pastor could not provide the funeral costs, but was trying to consol him and offer him wisdom about burying his son locally.
I was crushed in so many ways when I found out this little boy had died. I cried in my bed and questioned God. I knew in my mind this child would be OK even if God chose not to immediately heal him, it was a simple visit to the doctor as they told me. Then things turned around and he died. God had healed a couple of other people on some other serious issues, malaria without medications, and now this? WHY?
I even got kind of angry at God a little because it seemed so unfair. It felt unfair to me that something that is taken for granted so easily in America as water is such a precious commodity over here and people are dying because of the lack of it. It actually made me sick to think of all the water that companies, apartment complexes and homes waste watering their lawns. How many mornings did I see it just running down the gutters. I actually felt guilty about purchasing cases of bottled water when I was home instead of using tap water. I could have saved the money and sent it to a country that needed it desperately. Now, out of all things, water is the one thing I miss the most. It is strange not being able to go to a faucet and get a glass of water.
Then I found out the truth....
The boy died because the parents decided to use that money for food instead of going to the clinic. Oh how this news made me sick. Then to know how much it cost to go to the clinic, about 350 shs (about $4). I guess when you haven’t eaten in a while sometimes your decisions are swayed. Fortunately, I have never had to be in one of those situations. The church tells me this happens all the time. Oh Lord please help me remember this verse:
And we know that all things work together for good for those that love the Lord, and to those that are called according to his purpose. Romans 8:28
Well I am not telling you all this sadness to make you sad. There is an awesome ending to this story, just be patient with me and I promise my next story will not be as long. In the budget I helped the church develop we had visions of many things, a water project, a feeding project, a school, and a clinic among many others to change the lives of the people in the community. As of late we have had a couple of American churches that have wanted to help with some of the projects, as some of them really aren’t all that expensive. But for various reasons, they have been delayed and we haven’t really been able to start on any of the projects. So I started getting a little discouraged.
Last week I started researching grants that we might qualify for assistance in our vision, and if you feel led please pray God connects me with a 501(c)3 organization so I can start applying for many of them. I have read many Grantor mission statements and I know without a shadow of a doubt that we would qualify for some which would make a huge difference in this community. Since I really didn’t have a church sponsor me over here, just prayer umbrellas of many churches, and I didn’t have an extra $2K to start my own 501(c)3 organization, once again I started feeling like I was up against a wall and felt more discouragement.
For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come pray to me and I will listen to you. Jeremiah 29:11
You know I thought I had faith, but the faith these people are teaching me, I have never experienced. I know everything is going to work out, I mean it IS God that is in control, right? Still at times it can get very discouraging, and you wonder why you are here and if you are even making any kind of a difference. So I start making plans for the easiest target to try and raise money for, the water project for a mere $2K. Then fear started to come in, I really hate to ask people for money. Kind of a bad quality for a missionary, huh…. lol
BUT GOD…..
For NOTHING is impossible for GOD! Luke 1:37
But God had other plans. Little did I know that He wanted one of the most difficult projects to be completed first before all other projects. The one project Bishop and I both KNEW would take at least 3 to 4 years to finish, He would put together in five months. Then to top it off, He took $8K out of my budget. HE ORGANIZED the project faster and cheaper than what we planned.
GO GOD! (As one of my dear mentors would say, *sigh* I miss her.)
Anyway we had planned to provide a scholarship for a nurse and a pharmacist to go to college and get the necessary education to open a free clinic. Then we would need some funds to construct a clinic. We knew it would take 3 years to complete because of the education piece.
He goes before me and after to prepare the way as we are taught in the old testament... “My Angel will go before you, and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittes, Perizzites, Cannonites, Hivetes, and Jebusites, and will wipe them out.” Exodus 23:23
Back in September, a young American woman named Haley held a free clinic on the church compound and since then she has been creating an organization to have mobile clinics all around Nakuru west and some of the more rural tribal areas. Since then she started a not for profit organization in honor of her brother so that she would be able to provide some medical assistance to those who can’t afford it.
She and her native nursing assistant must have really noticed the spirit within the pastors and the church here because they were looking for some land to put up a headquarter nursing station and YESTERDAY they came to ask the church I was working with if that would be something they would be willing offer in exchange for the ability to provide free services for their community. See when they had met with some of the other churches, they had given them the impression that the churches would try to make some money on the clinic, instead of offering free services.
This young woman has been in Nakuru, Kenya for two years. She has done all the ground work necessary to run the type of an organization she is going to run. For instance she will be getting all of the drugs needed for a clinic for free from the government. Which to me is absolutely amazing in it’s own right. See the government doesn’t assist any of its people in ANY sort of ways. It is completely different than America here. There is NO ASSISTANCE FOR ANYTHING. But the ministry (department) of health has a stock pile of medicines, because they are supposed to be sending out teams of people to distribute them. Because the government is so corrupt, they have chosen to pocket the money that is supposed to be used to send out the teams, and the medicine/vaccines are sitting there in warehouses expiring in their usefulness. When she went to the Ministry of Health to ask them about medicines and vaccines, they said “Here take them before they expire and you can come get more”. PRAISE GOD! We have a means for free medications!
GO GOD! Once again Romans 8:28…..Once again, GO GOD!
She has organized a whole list of volunteer nurses and community workers that are ready and willing to come to Nakuru West. The community workers do all kinds of things like help with family planning and nutritional follow ups. If the family does not comply, the community workers can actually report them up their chain of command, almost like a social worker in America, to the police who would force a mother to continue to take her child to a nutritionist if needed. In addition a nurse can distribute medicine without the need for a pharmacist.
PRAISE GOD! We have workers!
Now all we need is a building and believe it or not it isn’t going to cost much more than the water project. I can’t wait to see how God is going to play this one out!
So God willing we are going to have ourselves a free clinic in February!
I just can’t thank God enough. I can’t find the words to thank Him that I will not have to know of any more stories like the little boy from the Deep, because we can just tell a mother come to the church clinic for free.
Praise GOD!!!
I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move, nothing will be impossible for you. Mathew 17:20-21
When I first arrived I was very excited to share my visions of empowering women with some minor domestic skills and/or potential small business opportunities by teaching them some crafts, knitting, sewing, beading, etc. To my surprise, the church I am living/working with had the same vision along with other ideas to transform this entire community. To add to my excitement was the opportunity to create a 5 year “business” plan for the church, a job which was my passion in the corporate world. Yes, I actually was able to use the skills that I have a degree in and I couldn’t believe it was in another country getting paid absolutely nothing. Ha! I also had the opportunity to create and design a website for the church. It is attached below and you can learn a little about the slum community I am working in that has been oppressed for almost 20 years due to tribal wars, the political uprising, and many other horrible conditions some which I will have to explain later.
Anyway there are many things that I need to write about with pictures, but I need to share the news as of late. It begins almost a week before Christmas for me. Every Friday they have what they call home fellowships, which is very similar to what many churches in America practice. We have to rent the “home fellowships” as nobody here has a home that can seat up to twenty people, still the concept is the same¸ smaller groups of the church in environments that are more intimate. This particular fellowship Pastor Joseph wanted me to attend was in the neighborhood called the “Deep” which is one of the more depressed areas of the slums. Mind you, areas of the Deep still look like a war zone to me when we walked through it. But appearances didn’t matter to us or God because we had our fellowship, and it was wonderful. After the fellowship, one of the women asked the entire group to go with her to her friend’s house to pray over her friend’s baby who had been sick for a couple of months. So we did just that, then the Pastor gave the woman some money to take the child to the doctor. He had diarrhea and vomiting for almost two months, which was a direct result from not having clean drinking water. We left and I felt like everything would be ok.
Two weeks later, the first week of January, we had an amazing missionary team from Australia volunteer to come give a conference on breaking generational curses and strongholds. The first night I was walking home from the church and the Pastor stopped me to introduce me to the father of the little boy we had prayed for as they were having a conversation by the gate. He had died, and the father was asking the church to provide funds for the family to take the body to a rural tribal location and bury his child. The pastor could not provide the funeral costs, but was trying to consol him and offer him wisdom about burying his son locally.
I was crushed in so many ways when I found out this little boy had died. I cried in my bed and questioned God. I knew in my mind this child would be OK even if God chose not to immediately heal him, it was a simple visit to the doctor as they told me. Then things turned around and he died. God had healed a couple of other people on some other serious issues, malaria without medications, and now this? WHY?
I even got kind of angry at God a little because it seemed so unfair. It felt unfair to me that something that is taken for granted so easily in America as water is such a precious commodity over here and people are dying because of the lack of it. It actually made me sick to think of all the water that companies, apartment complexes and homes waste watering their lawns. How many mornings did I see it just running down the gutters. I actually felt guilty about purchasing cases of bottled water when I was home instead of using tap water. I could have saved the money and sent it to a country that needed it desperately. Now, out of all things, water is the one thing I miss the most. It is strange not being able to go to a faucet and get a glass of water.
Then I found out the truth....
The boy died because the parents decided to use that money for food instead of going to the clinic. Oh how this news made me sick. Then to know how much it cost to go to the clinic, about 350 shs (about $4). I guess when you haven’t eaten in a while sometimes your decisions are swayed. Fortunately, I have never had to be in one of those situations. The church tells me this happens all the time. Oh Lord please help me remember this verse:
And we know that all things work together for good for those that love the Lord, and to those that are called according to his purpose. Romans 8:28
Well I am not telling you all this sadness to make you sad. There is an awesome ending to this story, just be patient with me and I promise my next story will not be as long. In the budget I helped the church develop we had visions of many things, a water project, a feeding project, a school, and a clinic among many others to change the lives of the people in the community. As of late we have had a couple of American churches that have wanted to help with some of the projects, as some of them really aren’t all that expensive. But for various reasons, they have been delayed and we haven’t really been able to start on any of the projects. So I started getting a little discouraged.
Last week I started researching grants that we might qualify for assistance in our vision, and if you feel led please pray God connects me with a 501(c)3 organization so I can start applying for many of them. I have read many Grantor mission statements and I know without a shadow of a doubt that we would qualify for some which would make a huge difference in this community. Since I really didn’t have a church sponsor me over here, just prayer umbrellas of many churches, and I didn’t have an extra $2K to start my own 501(c)3 organization, once again I started feeling like I was up against a wall and felt more discouragement.
For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come pray to me and I will listen to you. Jeremiah 29:11
You know I thought I had faith, but the faith these people are teaching me, I have never experienced. I know everything is going to work out, I mean it IS God that is in control, right? Still at times it can get very discouraging, and you wonder why you are here and if you are even making any kind of a difference. So I start making plans for the easiest target to try and raise money for, the water project for a mere $2K. Then fear started to come in, I really hate to ask people for money. Kind of a bad quality for a missionary, huh…. lol
BUT GOD…..
For NOTHING is impossible for GOD! Luke 1:37
But God had other plans. Little did I know that He wanted one of the most difficult projects to be completed first before all other projects. The one project Bishop and I both KNEW would take at least 3 to 4 years to finish, He would put together in five months. Then to top it off, He took $8K out of my budget. HE ORGANIZED the project faster and cheaper than what we planned.
GO GOD! (As one of my dear mentors would say, *sigh* I miss her.)
Anyway we had planned to provide a scholarship for a nurse and a pharmacist to go to college and get the necessary education to open a free clinic. Then we would need some funds to construct a clinic. We knew it would take 3 years to complete because of the education piece.
He goes before me and after to prepare the way as we are taught in the old testament... “My Angel will go before you, and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittes, Perizzites, Cannonites, Hivetes, and Jebusites, and will wipe them out.” Exodus 23:23
Back in September, a young American woman named Haley held a free clinic on the church compound and since then she has been creating an organization to have mobile clinics all around Nakuru west and some of the more rural tribal areas. Since then she started a not for profit organization in honor of her brother so that she would be able to provide some medical assistance to those who can’t afford it.
She and her native nursing assistant must have really noticed the spirit within the pastors and the church here because they were looking for some land to put up a headquarter nursing station and YESTERDAY they came to ask the church I was working with if that would be something they would be willing offer in exchange for the ability to provide free services for their community. See when they had met with some of the other churches, they had given them the impression that the churches would try to make some money on the clinic, instead of offering free services.
This young woman has been in Nakuru, Kenya for two years. She has done all the ground work necessary to run the type of an organization she is going to run. For instance she will be getting all of the drugs needed for a clinic for free from the government. Which to me is absolutely amazing in it’s own right. See the government doesn’t assist any of its people in ANY sort of ways. It is completely different than America here. There is NO ASSISTANCE FOR ANYTHING. But the ministry (department) of health has a stock pile of medicines, because they are supposed to be sending out teams of people to distribute them. Because the government is so corrupt, they have chosen to pocket the money that is supposed to be used to send out the teams, and the medicine/vaccines are sitting there in warehouses expiring in their usefulness. When she went to the Ministry of Health to ask them about medicines and vaccines, they said “Here take them before they expire and you can come get more”. PRAISE GOD! We have a means for free medications!
GO GOD! Once again Romans 8:28…..Once again, GO GOD!
She has organized a whole list of volunteer nurses and community workers that are ready and willing to come to Nakuru West. The community workers do all kinds of things like help with family planning and nutritional follow ups. If the family does not comply, the community workers can actually report them up their chain of command, almost like a social worker in America, to the police who would force a mother to continue to take her child to a nutritionist if needed. In addition a nurse can distribute medicine without the need for a pharmacist.
PRAISE GOD! We have workers!
Now all we need is a building and believe it or not it isn’t going to cost much more than the water project. I can’t wait to see how God is going to play this one out!
So God willing we are going to have ourselves a free clinic in February!
I just can’t thank God enough. I can’t find the words to thank Him that I will not have to know of any more stories like the little boy from the Deep, because we can just tell a mother come to the church clinic for free.
Praise GOD!!!
I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move, nothing will be impossible for you. Mathew 17:20-21
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