Soooo... we're in Nyeri now!
It's a smallish town about 3 hours outside of Nairobi. Our host family is so kind - the parents are Eustase and Margaret - who is an great cook, and they have three amazing kids. We have an amazing view of Mount Kenya from our balcony.. but crummily enough, we can't afford to climb it like we had planned since we spent 24,000 KSh on the safari we're going on on the ninth and we need to save some in case we go rafting or something in Uganda. I'm learning a tonne of Swahili, which is a really fun language that unfortunately is not spoken in Uganda, so when we go there I'll have to learn Luganda.
The weather is soooooooo warm... it's supposed to be the short rain season, but so far it has only rained at night. Uganda is supposed to be even hotter, so that should be interesting!
Yesterday was our first day at the school, and we met a felow Canadian volunteer named James, which was awesome because he was really cool and showed us all the ropes and good spots to eat. We've started teaching at St. Mary's Junior Rescue Center, and the kids are so cool. There are 210 boys in all, aged 5 to 18, but we also visit a smaller class for smaller children called Jubilee. Lots of the kids have been orphaned by or are suffering from HIV but it's amazing how thankful they are for everything... just saying Jambo to them makes them break out in huge smiles :)
And they like to poke us because apparently white skin changes colour when poked.It's a very touchy culture (melissa, you'd hate it!) . People here are even friendlier than in Canada I think...possibly on par with Newfies.
Our room mate Ahad fell in a 7 foot ditch yesterday while walking home at night, while on the phone with me... possibly may have broken a rib.
Other than that everything is pretty normal!
I'll blog again soon, with pictures hopefully!
Kwaherini!!
P.S.: Today in one class, we listened in as the teacher defined igloo to her class as "a small house that very small people called Eskimos live in"
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4 comments:
How did they know you needed poking - shoe on the other foot? The update is muchly apprecitated...YOSM
It's now 9:17pm, Saturday night, in Calgary and the temperature is supposed to go to -3'C tonight. It's currently 0617 Sunday morning and 16'C for you, and 1:17 Sunday pm in Melbourne and 31'C for Stewart. I sure am thankful for the internet, to keep in touch, with you all. Kathryn
Hey Julia
Saw the pics on facebook, looks like you guys are having an awesome time!!! Keep up the good work and let us know how everything is going. Say hi to Megs for me!
Laura
Your pictures on Facebook are amazing. And this blog is so great to read.
Take care over there! I hope your time there so far hasn't been too much of a shock and that you're well.
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