Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Back in the U.S.

I just arrived back in the U.S. for the holidays. It is soooo nice to be back home.

A Ready Harvest

Check out this video and come work alongside us at Planting Faith Ministries:

Holiday Parties

I celebrated the Jamhuri independence holiday last week with several friends from Akiba and elsewhere at my apartment:

Lounging on the couch
Laughable Moments

Njoroge after lunch

Later in the week, Lucy’s family held their annual Christmas gathering. Here’s a few pics:

With the family.




Lucy's Parents

Straddling the Equator


In 1849, a German missionary, Dr. Johann Ludwig Krapf, astounded European scientists when he claimed to have discovered snow on the equator. The snow is still there today. . . One of our farming projects is near Mount Kenya and right on the equator. Because of the altitude, it is actually quite cold.


There's a sign on the equator in Nanyuki, and we met a local guide who led us 20 meters north of the equator and showed us water spinning clockwise through a drain. Then we went south and saw a counterclockwise spin. Finally we stood directly on the equator and watched water flow straight down through a hole without spinning. Pretty cool stuff.

Dry Days

The water at my apartment has been absent for nearly a week. This of course makes laundry, cleaning, cooking, bathing, and flushing the toilet virtually impossible. Fortunately, I rarely do any of these things anyway. . .Most housing and apartment complexes in Nairobi have huge storage tanks which help residents deal with the irregular supply of water. Our tanks have all run dry and even the plastic “emergency water jugs” I filled are now empty. The city council has decided not to turn on the water supply until later this month. I buy my drinking water, but it’s a challenge living without water for other things. Fortunately, one of the askaris (guards) has agreed to provide 40 liters of water from an unknown source. I think he may have “borrowed” it from one of the neighbors.

Planting Passion Fruit

Recently I spent a couple days planting passion fruit with farmers in Mangu, Kenya. We worked in partnership with volunteers from Helping Hand Ministries in the U.K. and planted 180 passion fruit seedlings on three different farms. It was hard work, but very rewarding. Most farmers in Kenya have very small plots and are subsistence farmers, growing food only for themselves or yielding small harvests for sale or trade. In our work with Planting Faith, we help farmers escape the poverty and challenges of subsistence farming through sustainable agricultural development. Here’s a shot of some of the volunteers and farmers at one of the shambas in Mangu:



A Kiwi Visit


Recently I hosted two seminarians from New Zealand. Aaron and Jordan visited Kenya as part of a Kiwi Mission Team with Church Army. They ran a week-long camp for young children, helped with some painting projects, and visited a variety of ministries. Wow, it was a lot of fun having western visitors. Here they are hanging out with some of the kids at Light and Power: