Thank you Village Volunteers for your thoughtful and inclusive vision, and generous insights in bringing local leadership to the forefront of an inspired adventure for the volunteer traveling to Kenya. All along the way, I felt the guiding hand of Village Volunteers, subtly making sure I felt cared for and safe. There wasn’t a moment I felt unsafe or confused. Even when I was in Kenya during the terrorists as I was leaving, I knew I had the support of a driver to get me safely to the airport and a home to stay in. I walked throughout neighborhoods where people went about their business, setting up their outdoor market stalls. One woman, leaning over me, her bloodshot eyes very close to mine, sold me a bracelet for my daughter, while another woman, wearing a brightly stripped jacket lit up with pleasure as I bought a scarf for my other daughter. Every now and then I came across a small group of people praying and singing together for the victims that had died. Sometimes they paused as I passed and smiled at me. It was a terrible time for the country, but at no time did I feel un-welcome or unsafe.
I think, the best way I can describe my feelings of volunteering with Village Volunteers is to liken it to reading a good book, where you find yourself trusting the author’s skill in transporting you to a new and wonderful adventure.
Far from the comfort of my living room I was honored to be invited into the village lives of the local people of Kitale, my first destination. It was there I was introduced to the work of a heroic woman everyone knows as Sister Freda (they call nurses Sister). From her first hug and hello I was taken in by the magic of her smile and her eyes shining with mischief. Sister Freda is a Kenyan nurse who works tirelessly for the people she saw crawling on their hands and knees, too sick to walk to a faraway hospital, knowing many would die at a very young age, would be born dead, or die from a simple appendicitis. She decided to call on her living God’s help to build a village hospital out of hard won donations, where poor people could enter regardless of their ability to pay.
Yet, all work and no play is not what she’s up to. She still makes time for fun and loves to fill her life with humor. One night, at dinner, as we sat around the table discussing a dilemma, she asked that we stop the discussion to think about it. Well, I tried, but I kept coming up with ideas and we kept going around and around in circles over the same material. After a pause in the discussion, she looked over at Kevin, a young and charming missionary man with those mischievous eyes of hers, and asked him to sing the part of Eliza’s husband in the song about the bucket with a leak. (By the way, Kevin has a wonderful voice and listening to their singing was quite a treat.) When they sang the ending of the song which takes them back to the beginning of the leaky bucket, she looked at me kindly and I got the message that I had a leaky bucket. I laughed and laughed and will forever be reminded when I become obsessed with something to remember the leaky bucket.
My next destination was Kilgoris, a Masai mountainous village where the purple and green and red landscape spills out of the valley below and stars appear close enough to touch. It was here I would meet Emmanuel, his wife Lillian and their three- year- old son Larousi. I felt so privileged to be welcomed into their home, to live intimately with them and experience the essential richness of their lives and how they were able to face the difficulties of their circumstances with such courage, and learn how they started a school for village children.
My first night, I had waited so long for the sunrise, and in the end it happened so quickly that I scarcely noticed it. One moment it was the darkest night, with no city lights, no cars, only the mooing of cows and growl of a dog or two and then it was a rooster crowing and light when I woke in a small, Masai hut. I was truly in Kenya and happiness flooded through me as I thanked Village Volunteers for this opportunity.
Again, I was captivated by the first hug of hello and beautiful smile from Emmanuel, a charming Masai man who believed education was the way out for his people whose way of life was changing. The history of colonization caused a loss of land for the Masai to graze their cows, changing their nomadic life style, while tribal political forces left a large literacy gap that needed to be filled if his people were to survive. It was his own childhood experience with a school system that tested children out and left them behind that made him determined to build a school for village children that would not leave poor children behind, not even those with special needs. He built it through generous donations of missionaries and it sits on the top of a mountain, overlooking the pastoral landscape of his childhood. It was here I met some of the most enthusiastic students and teachers, working tirelessly together, in difficult circumstances, inspired by Emmanuel and Lillian, offering poor, often orphaned children a chance at a new life and a way to help their community.
Now that I’m home and try to imagine everything I experienced, I have dream –like-flashes, as I remember my visit to villages where the systems of interrelationship and interdependence between people will forever be fixed in my memories. My feet are on US ground, but my mind and heart linger with the people I met and will always call my friends.
I will be putting more writings about my journey to Kenya on my website and will also add the wonderful stories I have collected from the students of Sirua Aulo Academy, Emmanuel’s school and Dr. Ken Gerdes Girls Highs cool, Sister. Freda’s school. As I told the students, I’m now not just Italian American; I’m Italian, Kenyan American.
Ciao and thanks again.
Betty
