A great week in Kenya

Hello everybody,

How are all of you. I have received some emails from some of you and am so happy to get them so thank you very much for the support and filling me in on your lives. For some of you this is my first email to you so please feel free to write back and let me know how life is treating you. It was a good week to be in my shoes. Actually they are all pretty good now that I really start to think about it.

By the end of the last day that I wrote to you had killed and eaten a chicken. It was really very tasty and a lot easier to kill then the goat. It’s very easy to clean up as well. I was told that it would be a lot chewier than it really is. Don’t get me wrong it’s not some fosters farms boneless skinless chicken breast but it sure is good. It’s odd when you really see people look at food purely as survival and fuel for the body so that they can just get through another day. Yesterday I was privileged enough to help out in feeding 210 local children while at the Naibor Orphanage. The orphans were amazing!!! They made sure that the community kids ate first and did the whole thing. They prepared the food and then served it. It was a giant pot of beans and rice that two of us could barely lift up onto the table to serve from. These orphans were such amazing servants!!! I feel so honored to be able to be with them so often. What a blessing it is.

I got a little ahead of myself there so please let me go back a bit. I spent most of the week in Nanyuki working on the foundation and footings for the house. It is coming along slowly due to the tedious work of laying these blocks perfectly with a mortar course between the two rows and between each course of block but it is coming along. There was a lot of dirt work that had to happen as well. Labor is cheap and they do a great job with a little supervision. I have noticed that even if you can barely communicate with them they gain a lot of respect when they see you pick up the shovel as well. At first they don’t know how to take it because apparently it is odd for white people to do work like that. I enjoy it though. I also enjoy going over to the kitchen to chop wood. The workers here at the school and the church found that amusing at first as well. They were surprised that I knew how to chop wood. This makes me sad that this is something that they don’t see. There isn’t very much social mixing between the whites and blacks. This has been another area that I’ve had to struggle with as well.

So that took and working out kinks in the block making process have taken up most of my week. I’ve been putting in about 12 hour days this week but it feels good and I enjoy it. My back has been getting more and more sore so please pray for it. I’ve been taking a lot of Ibuprofen and trying to baby it but it’s just not the best environment with the bumpy roads and hard work.

This weekend I rented a little Chinese motorcycle and went to Naibor to stay with the orphans. I miss my bike badly!!! I hope that I never have to buy a Chinese bike because they are horrible!!! It did feel good to be on two wheels again. The orphans never knew that you could a wheelie on a motorcycle and were amazed even though I could only get the front tire a few inches of the ground. On Saturday we took off for a preserve and spent the day with Rhino’s, big cats including a black leopard, hippos, tons of birds, gazelle, Impala, élan, and tons of other animals. I rode an elephant that was 10 feet 8 inches tall and it was amazing!!! I chased away three white rhinos. This is one of the scariest things that I have ever done, probably not the wisest. It’s okay Mom I had a rock and a stick ;o). One of them had a horn that was at least three feet long!!! I saw giraffe run and let me tell you it is so graceful and beautiful. We hid while a herd of water buffalo came and drank from a watering trough. All in all it was incredible. I will post pictures on my face book so check them out there.

That night we played some more baseball at the orphanage and they are getting better. After that we loaded up the pundas (donkeys) and went to the muddy creek to get some more water. Everybody crammed into Johns and Mary’s sitting room to hang out and talk. The girls made jewelry out of beads so I am now wearing a very girly looking baby blue and pearl ring that has a matching bracelet. That’s okay, I’m secure enough in my masculinity to wear it. While we were all hanging around Mariamo (my little Masai orphan friend) climbed into my lap and fell asleep. It just flat out turned me into putty. After someone grabbed her and put her to bed I went outside to do something that I still can’t remember when something amazing happened. I looked up!!! That’s right I looked up…and the stars were amazing. I’ve been in the middle of the dessert in the US and those stars had nothing on these stars. The milky way was so clear and beautiful. There were more stars than I could ever imagine!!! So I decided to sleep in the tent. This was a completely foreign idea to anybody there. They thought that it was great. I was surrounded by 30 orphans trying to figure out what I was doing. I don’t know how anybody could think that we were and accident or that the stars are just some random thing. How could anybody deny that what I saw that night in the heavens and in those kids is just evolution and an accident. It was incredible to say the very very least.

The nest morning I woke up a little before 4:30 am to a rooster that I named breakfast. I need to remember to buy them a new rooster. Just kidding, I didn’t kill it but I am thinking that it would taste great if I ever decided to stay there again. It was a slow morning. We went to Johns church and I understood nothing that was said. After the sermon everybody starts singing and moving out of the church in single file moving past each other in such a way that you shake hands with everybody that is there and ending in a full circle in front of the church singing. I really liked that. I’ve never seen a church service end that way and it was the best that I have ever seen. There is so much community in it and such a great feeling of unity. It was beautiful.

John asked me to speak to the high school kids after the service. Mist of them speak enough English to get most of what was said. It was hard to really get them engaged and interacting because of the poor understanding of each other. We talked about Love though. It really is one of my favorite subjects in the world. It went well all things considered.

So there is my week. Thank you to all of you who have been gathering clothes for the kids and donating financially. Thank you for all of your prayers!!! It really works!!! Thank you so much for just showing so much love for these people and myself. I love you all and miss you.

Love Peace and Blessings
Caleb Oshier