Amosu friends!
Sorry it has taken me so long to put up another post! My
computer is broken and the internet has been VERY slow. This entry below is
from about 2 or 3 weeks ago, ha!
This past week has been loooong but great. Matt and I took a
trip to Kisumu, which, between all the boat rides, bus rides and matatu rides,
it take all day to get there. We needed to go to the immigration office in
Kisumu so Matt could sign some papers regarding his work visa he is trying to
get so we can postpone leaving the country at the 6 month mark to renew it. We
also stopped in to a large “wal-mart” type supermarket to get a few things for
the house as well as some fabric and sofa cushions for our friends Tielen and
Elijah (they are making us two sofas!!!). J We were hoping to come
back the next day but it took so long to get all of the supplies on our list
that we had to stay a night in Mbita on our way back.
On Wednesday morning two women from EK (Pamela and Joyce),
who are also our friends as well as community health workers on Mfangano, came
with us to Rusinga island (right next to Mbita) for a meeting with the Kawala
women’s group to discuss starting a group on Mfangano focused on bringing safe
drinking water to the community. Kawala women’s group is connected with an
organization called SWAP Kenya, which provides education around safe water
practices and its effects on HIV and other illnesses along with safe drinking
containers that the groups can sell to members of the community to provide
local capital. It is a wonderful organization and we hope to build a
partnership with Kawala women so we can soon start some groups on
Mfangano. For more information on
SWAP Kenya visit their website! http://www.swapkenya.org/
It is such a great organization!
We arrived on Mfangano late Wednesday night after having
been gone since Monday and Thursday we jumped right back into routine. I went
to visit my friend Olambo at the EK Farm to discuss aquaponics maintenance and
then we met at his personal farm later in the day to discuss agriculture and
how to get my farm up and running! The previous weekend Olambo came to our
place at Chwera Chwera and helped me build some beds to start planting seeds
when I returned from Kisumu. We also finished the chicken coop!!! See pictures
of these events below. We now have 5 baby chicks and 7 hens with 1 rooster. We
are planning to have more chicks soon so we can continue to eat chicken at
least a few times a month.
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| Baby Chicks! |
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| Evans next claiming his handy work on our new chicken coop! |
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| Welcome to the new Hen Hotel |
Today, Friday Sept 7th, Olambo and my friend
Moses came over to help plant some bell peppers, hot chiles, coriander,
cucumber, carrots, peanuts and sweet potatoes in my small chamba (Luo for
garden). I can’t wait for these veggies to grow
so we can eat right out of the backyard. Watering is tricky because we cant
just turn a hose on like at home. We have to walk to the lake and hop on the
water pump (which is called “the money maker” – no joke) and step up and down
like a stair-master to pump water through a hose pipe. Unless you have a
sprinkler system hooked up to the money maker, which we don’t, someone has to
hold the hose up to the plants while another person is working the money maker.
I am thankful Chas and Jenna have a money maker or else I would have to carry
the water up from the lake in buckets and water the plants. Most people in the
community water their chambas with buckets because they money maker is
expensive – it is defiantly a luxury item that I am grateful to have.
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| Olambo and me raisin' some beds! |
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| Moses preparing the plot for our sweet potatoes and ground nuts |
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| The final product |
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| The animals were just as tired as we were. (All 5 dogs and our cat were pooped out. See if you can spot them all!) |
This weekend we are having our family over for a chicken
dinner Saturday night. Elida, George, Sharon, Tielen, Evelyn, Steve, Michelle
and baby Mackey are all coming to Chwera Chwera to cook, eat and tell stories.
Really looking forward to seeing the family J
I will take pictures of the family reunion and post this
weekend.
Until then…
Love, peace and chicken grease!
Caroline
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