Monitoring visit, February and March 2016

It's been several months since returning from my latest visit to Kinyambu. It seems to take me that long to process things and get down what the visit meant to me.

Monitoring Team

I had two friends with me this time, new to Kenya, who found the visit quite interesting and inspiring. Roy, my cousin, 10 days younger than me, who had spent much of his work life in northern Manitoba  found the whole trip an eye opener. He is someone who watched every National Geographic Special on Africa but kept saying how different the reality is. A TV show just can't capture the smells, the light, the sounds and the people. Cal, a new friend from Prince Albert, was most intrigued by meeting the local people. He enjoyed the dancing, visiting the schools, getting into the local life and eating the local food.

We met with Simon and the KRECD group on the Saturday afternoon of our visit. They are excited about possible programs we can do to improve agricultural production in the area. Their idea is to get better breeds of chicken and improved fruit trees and give them to the school children who would raise them at their homes. Kind of like our 4H programs. Sounds good to me.

Presenting a laptop

We also visited Kinyambu Primary School where we presented them with 2
computers and a printer and a lot of sports clothing for the teachers and t-shirts that the students can wear while playing so they look more like a team. They're enjoying those and the students are learning to operate the printer too.

Thange School Students

We also went to two nearby schools, Thange where Beth Muendo teaches and Nzavoni. We presented some gifts to the schools and they sang songs for us too.

Nzavoni has some classrooms in very bad condition. The termites have gotten into the rafters and they are almost non-existent. The walls have big cracks and the floors are rough. I came home determined to raise some money to build some new classrooms there which I've started to raise money for.

We left for Tanzania after a few days, driving around Mt. Kilimanjaro  to visit another Rainbow of Hope project.

See you next year, Kinyambu.