Friday, May 22, 2015
We left for the office at 9:30 AM. We had a meeting with the men in the office
to discuss all the problems of projects that were broken and what to do about
them. Probably the most useful thing we
discussed was that in future these men all ought to be involved in any future
water projects, to get their input, to get better prices for services, and to
serve on a committee with the humanitarian couple and when we are there, with
us. We need local input; we always have.
Because our meeting was too long,
I had to leave it to meet with the Mission President, Brother Hicken. I was really impressed with him and some of
the things that he is doing. One of them
is to make sure that the couples had adequate vehicles because of the
conditions here. You need a vehicle that
can ‘get out of its own way quickly’ because the highway is treacherous because
of all the slow trucks and everyone is always passing. You need one that has a good safety crash record
as we see accidents daily. You need one
that has 4-wheel drive if you drive out of Nairobi. When we left the mission years ago we were
appalled that couples who drove every week into the bush didn’t even get trucks
with 4-wheel drive. There are many dicey
situations that require it. He also said
that the extra price will be made up with the fact that they don’t need fixing
very often, and that the resale value will be much higher.
President told me his program of
how he handles welfare requests. He
requires a contribution from the person requiring assistance, even if it is 10
cents; he requires backup paperwork; he makes sure that no one is given money
but instead bills are paid directly such as medical bills. Because of the paperwork many don’t bother
and the requests have gone down. He also
said that many who joined the church just to eat, are being retaught the Gospel
so that they understand it and perhaps then can learn to live it if they are
truly converted. In the Chyulu Hills
area they have enough members to make a Stake instead of being a District,
which is under the Mission President.
The reason they can’t progress is because there are not enough faithful
men who hold the Priesthood and could serve in leadership positions. Many of them drink; many don’t pay
tithing. He focuses on temple blessings,
which in turn helps give them the desire to live the commandments. When they do, they will become a Stake.
Not only was it exciting to see
all our friends from the office like James, Jadmire, Paul, and President Usi (who
used to be a 70 but has now been released), but Owens Obaro came to the office
looking for me. He is the young man that
used to give me Swahili lessons 10 years ago.
We had since connected on Facebook but it was so much nicer to see him
in person. When he taught me he was so
skinny and now he has filled out and looks great. Even better, he has married and has 3
children! I thought he would never get
married. He is going to visit us next
week before we travel about again.
After we were finished in the
office we went to lunch at the Java House with the Shakespeare’s. I felt like I was home in California. All the food was American and it was
reasonable and I ate a salad, something I would not do in West Africa. The food
is safer in Nairobi. And to top it all
off, it was reasonable!
We went back into the traffic
(there is always traffic now, and I think it has doubled in 10 years) and
headed for another spoiled project that was done at a slum school in
Nairobi. It is a borehole and pump that
was to deliver water to the school and to a few other places. It worked for several months. When it stopped working, both contractors
involved said it was not their problem, it was the other guy…sound familiar? We don’t know if we will fix this or not.
Afterwards we headed for a place
we were told 10 years ago not to enter—the Kibera Slum. It was then off limits to all the
missionaries, young and old. We did go
in there a few times but with an African escort. E/S Shakespeare introduced to a school. They helped them by building simple latrines
and are soon adding another section. He
showed us the desks they had built for the school and they got a few sewing
machines to be used for the older school children. They plastered their floors.
The nice desks provided
by LDSC at this school in Kibera. They
also plastered their floors and gave them sewing machines for their older
students to learn a trade.
We could not believe it, but the
government is fixing up Kibera. It is
the largest and worst slum in all of Nairobi.
There are well over 1 million people living there. They used to have 7 toilets for all those people. Some large NGO came in and is building
housing for the people. They are
removing some of the kiosks and living quarters (which are primarily made out
of mud and sticks or iron sheets) and widening the streets. They are paving them! They are building toilets where they charge a
little bit of money to use so that they can be maintained. Elder Shakespeare thought that it was because
the large world NGO is forcing the government to do something while they are
building the housing; he’d also heard it was the Kenyan President’s wife—who
knows. All we know is that there are
wonderful improvements happening in Kenya.
It is a nice surprise to us.
We went to see some other project
that Elder Shakespeare saw one day and said was an ‘Asian toilet’. They pay to use it. It smelled, just like most latrines do. They have a bucket underneath where they
collect the waste. They have a process
that they use to turn it into fertilizer in 6 months, after which they use it
to fertilize their garden, which is in a greenhouse. Interesting.
We learn something new every day,
and most times, many new things.
Love, from Nairobi
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