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May 29, 2005
May 29, 2005
The Rotary District 9200 Conference is over. Last night we had a blast at the closing awards dinner. The food was good, the speeches interesting and not too long (for the most part), the wine flowed and the dancing afterward was great fun. As the Rotary Club of Maralal’s first interaction with the other Rotary Clubs in our district other than the sponsor club at Nakuru, we were able to get a real appreciation of what Rotary International really stands for. From our club we had five participants in the conference, Reuben and myself included. The others were Samuel, Joseph and Simon. We have made some good contacts and been motivated to get back to Maralal and start planning and implementing community projects. Another highlight of the conference was the first opening night, which was the 100 years of Rotary celebration. It was held at the Carnivore Restaurant, which serves mainly meat, including many wild meats. We really feasted as carnivores, even eating crocodile and ostrich. They were serving camel also as one of the ‘exotic’ meats. Our Maralal team laughed at this as for us camel meat is as common for us in North as beef, goat or chicken. The most fun part of the Carnivore celebration for me was the fireworks. They brought back many good memories of childhood fourth of July fireworks. But for some the other Maralal Rotarians, the bangs and noise of the fireworks exploding made them nervous and only reminded them of the conflicts and fighting we have experienced in the past up in Baragoi in the North. It brought home to me the differences peoples’ past experiences can make when taking in any new event.
Now that the conference is over, I had time to relax and rest today, and meet up with some of my Nairobi friends. An old friend of Reuben’s and mine from our university days in Edinburgh came over with her two kids. Maria is Dutch but married to a Kenyan and has been in Kenya, on and off, for as long as I have (over 10 years now – I can’t believe it!). Even though she lives in Nairobi, we don’t get to meet much, so it was good to have time to talk with her for a while. Tine also came over with Ilhan. Tine and Maria know each other from working together in SNV. I met Tine myself through Reuben’s connection with SNV and my later consultant jobs with them. So it was fun to have all of us meet together for the first time and we had an enjoyable lunch. I taught Maria’s kids, same ages as my own (5 and 7), to jump on the bed. Maria made faces at this so I informed them that there is a rule that one can only jump on beds at other people’s houses, not their own. As I had the Ngurunit baskets strewn all over the room from my marketing efforts and showing them to Leslie before the Rotary conference, Tine and Maria took the time to shop and walked out loaded down with baskets to use in their homes and give away as gifts.
This evening, Reuben and I went over for dinner to Janice and Walter’s house. The food was delicious and conversation stimulating. I needed that relaxing time chatting with good friends as I suspect it will be the calm before the storm. Tomorrow I am meeting the cameraman, Tim, who has been hired to film the BBC special on my basket project. We will be doing a bit of filming with Leslie, the wholesaler from Oregon. In the evening the World Challenge show producer, Robert Lamb, will be arriving in Nairobi from London. Then Tuesday the real push will begin as Tim and Robert follow me around Nairobi during my marketing runs with the baskets. I will also bring them to meet Janice and get some footage on the storage and sorting end of the basket business. Then on Wednesday, the plan is to have all of us drive up to Gilgil to catch a plan to Ngurunit. Reuben will then continue on in our car to Maralal and the kids. After two days of filming in Ngurunit, the pilot will pick us and drop me back in Maralal as he takes Robert and Tim back to their car in Gilgil and they return to Nairobi on Friday. In between all this filming, I am trying to finish up all the shopping and last minute business I have in Nairobi. I also hope to see Maria (Swedish research student Maria – not Dutch Maria – knowing so many people in the world can sometimes be so confusing!) sometime on Tuesday as she has now reached network and was able to call tonight just a little while ago. Then she will be going back to Sweden and I will miss her so. Though, I have found out that the Rotary International Conference will be in Sweden next year and I am determined to attend. Then I will meet her in her home there.
After this busy but relaxing day, I must get to bed. Tomorrow the rush will start and I need to be my best for the filming. A star is born! Of course I am kidding but it is exciting to think that the work I do with the baskets will be featured on BBC World sometime in August. And in Newsweek. Amazing.
May 22, 2005
May 22, 2005
Our Sunday devotions were done walking the dogs this morning. The main purpose of the walk started with the mission of finding the zebras. Yesterday morning when I went walking alone with the dogs, Mara found some zebras to chase just as we were heading home. I had told the kids about it and they were keen on going to see the zebras themselves. So we walked off in the direction I hoped we would find the creatures and had a glorious time. We rambled through the trees and discovered safari ant mounds and weird trees. I taught them about nature and we talked of God. Just as we were starting to get tired and had to think of turning back without meeting our goal of seeing zebras, Mara perked up her ears and suddenly went flying off through the bush. Sure enough we heard the stampeding hooves and saw flashes of black and white through the trees. I was able to get Mara and Breasy to obey (a miracle) in staying near me and I sent the children to get a closer look at the zebras once they were standing still and not running from the dogs. There were two herds with over 20 animals, babies included. The kids gazed at them in wonder, as if they don’t see them almost daily from the car windows looking like pudgy, striped donkeys grazing near the cattle and sheep as we rushed by in a cloud of dust. Somehow, there in the forest without the road and the trappings of man, the wild beasts, only a rock throw away, seemed majestic and beautiful. An amazing creation at one with us in the peaceful setting of vine covered trees and bushy rock formations. As we left the zebras and started our walk back home, the children gathered forest plants to put in the garden to make our home a bit more a part of nature by bringing the forest closer.
Now I am getting prepared to got to Nairobi for the Rotary Conference, which starts Thursday. I am leaving Tuesday so have only tomorrow to sort and pack everything. I sent half of my latest bunch of baskets with Reuben when he went ahead of me yesterday. I will still have a few to label and pack for taking in my car. I have been in communication with the World Challenge team about the filming schedule for the basket project. They want to get some footage on my selling activities in Nairobi. I am trying to arrange for it to happen just after the Conference but we are still sorting out the details. It is a little overwhelming to think of a BBC film team coming to see my work. But exciting. I am also hoping to meet with Leslie, the wholesaler from Oregon who took the big shipment (almost 200) of baskets in January. I have only ever communicated with her by e-mail and it will be good to meet her in person. She is only around for a week and coming in tomorrow, so I will meet her before the Rotary Conference to show her my latest batch of baskets.
May 14, 2005
May 14, 2005
Boy this last week has gone fast. The Rotary party last Saturday night was wonderful. We were afraid the guests wouldn’t make it because it poured rain all day. The DG came up from Nairobi in a strong 4 x 4 which was fortunate because they were able to tow the van full of Nakuru Rotarians across the worst of the rivers flowing across the road. Our main guests were the DG Mohamed Abdulla and his wife Molly and a past DG Yusef and his wife Maria. President John and past President Edward of Nakuru club were also there with spouses and other Rotarians from Nakuru. It was a wonderful ceremony and a fun time with good speeches and lots of gift exchanges. In the middle of the dinner, the generator went out for a bit and I had to stand in the middle of the room with my head flashlight on, swinging around slowly back and forth so everyone could see what they were doing. I felt like a searchlight. Rotary club of Maralal now feels like a real club with our certificate and all the members having been inducted with a Rotary pin. Just in time to start preparing for the Rotary District conference the end of the month.
Sunday, some friends of mine (old acquaintances that have become new friends) Jason and Giselle arrived in Maralal. They have been traveling the world for the last six months and were now in Kenya for a while. They are one of the reasons this last week has gone so fast. Maria is another as she arrived on Monday from her time in Baragoi. I was happy about that because we hadn’t been sure if we would meet again during her research as after Baragoi, there was a chance she would go straight back to Ngurunit without a trip down to Maralal. But her information gathering in Baragoi brought out some points that she needed clarified in the government offices in Maralal. The event of having Jason, Giselle and Maria in Maralal up until Thursday caused a drastic reduction in my work productivity but a great increase in my total enjoyment of hanging out. I had met Jason and Giselle very briefly in America at my cousin Doug’s wedding in October 2002. Jason was in the wedding and Giselle was with him. Giselle is originally from Trinidad, and Doug’s mother, knowing I had spent six months in Trinidad on a University Exchange program many years before (1988) introduced us. This introduction led to meeting Jason and we quickly realized that we had a lot in common. In fact we had almost parallel lives in some ways with a difference of 5 years. Both Jason and I are from Wisconsin, went to the University of Wisconsin Madison, were on the same Trinidad exchange program, worked as Peace Corps Volunteers in Nepal and eventually married foreigners (Jason a Trinidadian and I a Kenyan). Because of this similarity we ended up keeping in e-mail contact for the last 2 ½ years which led them to eventually showing up in Maralal to visit. I was always the one 5 years ahead on these activities so during their stay in Maralal, there was a running joke about Jason and Giselle watching my life in order to get an idea of what they would be doing in 5 years time. During their visit, we also found out that not only have Jason and I done a lot of the same things, but we also have a lot of the same tastes, hobbies and communication styles. Interesting. It was fun meeting each other again and I was really motivated with new ideas from spending hours talking to the pair, playing scrabble, eating meals together and showing them around the area.
I took the opportunity of having Jason, Giselle and Maria around to take them and the kids up to the Malaso scenic view of the rift valley, about an hour drive from Maralal. I like to get the kids out of town on little excursions whenever I can. The view is so beautiful and dramatic with the clouds overhead and we were able to watch rainstorms sweep over the valley while we sat dry on top of the escarpment ridge. Though I was a bit nervous every time one of the kids tripped or got too close to the edge. Hard to relax when one keeps imagining a child hurtling off into space.
It is Saturday now and all the visitors are gone. Maria got a ride back to Ngurunit. Jason and Giselle have gone off to wander around other parts of Kenya. They plan a train ride from Nairobi to Mombassa and then hope to get up to Lamu. I am hoping to meet all three of them in Nairobi the end of the month when Reuben and I are going down for the Rotary District Conference.
I finally have the time to look at the problem of the Seren water project. I had sent the technician the beginning of March to do a survey but due do all the trips in March and April, I wasn’t able to actually get my hands on the report until the middle of April. And it didn’t look good. We have already secured the funding from the US Embassy but it has a limit. And according to the technician’s report, the limit has been exceeded by a million shillings. Yikes. Though I took it to Ngurunit with me planning to try to work on it, I haven’t had time to really look at it until today. So now I have to sort out what to do about it. The main problem is the pipes. The community decided that the well that we had originally identified together was not good enough as it had dried up during this last dry season. With the water technician, they selected another well further up the mountain. This more than doubled the number of pipes that we had originally asked for. Pipes are expensive. The money is now not enough. These water projects always end up with lots of headaches for me, but as water is so essential, I keep at it and eventually it all works out. So now I start to sort out this headache. I will take it one step at a time and eventually the way will be clear. So the first step is to meet the community. Reuben is going up North tomorrow so I will send the problem with him. The only way I can see working it out is to throw out the pipeline completely and concentrate on enhancing the other parts of the project like the roof rainwater harvesting, hand pump wells and a rock catchment. I just need community approval and I will get started on the paperwork. In the end, I am confident we will have a good project completed. I need to hold on to that thought.
May 05, 2005
May 5, 2005
Excitement! Excitement! My basket project has been chosen as one of 12 finalists in the World Challenge!!!! Wow! I can barely sit writing this. This incredible opportunity came from a very last minute happening and action on my part the beginning of April. We had come to Maralal from Ngurunit on April 2nd. I found an old issue of Newsweek on Sunday the 3rd and was reading it over a bedtime snack. I had read most of the articles before so was perusing the adverts. It is a habit I picked up from not having easy access to abundant reading material at times. An advertisement for the World Challenge popped out at me. It was about finding a business that had a social and community benefit as well as an economic one. The prize was $20,000.00 and anyone was eligible to enter a nomination. It was being sponsored by Shell and was through BBC World and Newsweek magazine. The deadline was April 4th at 5:00 PM GMT. I remembered thinking that I must enter my basket project the next day. The next day, April 4th came and some life crisis or other came up. Car trouble, sick kid, busy at the office, preparing to go to Nairobi, can’t remember exactly what. But I do remember that it drove the World Challenge contest out of my mind until about 3:00 in the afternoon Kenyan time. Then I remembered and picked up the magazine again. A definite urge from inside, almost a voice, told me I must enter it. So I dropped everything and went to the office to do a write up on the basket enterprise. As I logged on to the web site to send in the nomination, it was less than an hour before the deadline. I was horrified to see that they wanted a description of 500 words or less and my beautiful summary was over 1600 words. Being afraid to break the internet connection in case I couldn’t get on again, as is often the case when connecting to the web from Maralal, I did a ruthless editing job online in less than 15 minutes. I got to 650 words and out of frustration of getting down to less and still actually saying anything about the project, I just pasted it in and hit the button to send it. Moments later I realized I had forgotten to try to upload a picture. Too late. I was a little depressed from the franticness of the whole thing and sending off an entry I wasn’t completely satisfied with but what was done was done. I went to tell Reuben about it and he also had some criticisms about how I had done it. I countered that if it was meant to be, it was meant to be. The next day (the 5th) we went to Nairobi and while we were sitting watching the kids go around and around and around in the electric cars, I got a phone call. They only introduced themselves as from the World Challenge and were trying to authenticate entries. The man’s voice on the phone asked me questions for about 10 minutes and I tried to tell him I could send him pictures, information, anything. He just assured me that they would get everything needed and mentioned he had even been to the Rendille area where the baskets came from. No name, no we will contact you, no further information about the contest. He suddenly said goodbye and hung up. That phone call put me on a high for the next several hours wondering what it was all about and what, if anything, I should do. Reuben tried to calm me down and said all I could do was wait. So I waited. And waited. In Ngurunit I fretted that I might be missing some communication about the world challenge. I even thought of driving 120 miles to the nearest phone lines just to check my e-mail. Instead I just immersed myself into the peace of Ngurunit and told myself if it is meant to be it is meant to be and I will get the news in good time. One month later I have gotten the news!!!! A message came today on my e-mail saying “After an excellent response for nominations to The World Challenge we are pleased to inform you that your project, Basket Weaving Project, has been chosen as one of the 12 finalists”. So now, the message tells me just to wait and further communication will be forth coming. The way the contest runs is that all 12 finalists will be filmed and a feature will be run on BBC World and in Newsweek starting from August. Then people will vote on which project they feel deserves the $20,000.00. Wow. Even without winning the prize, the publicity will be wonderful for the basket weavers. Now I will have to be patient and wait to see what the future brings.
With all this excitement, I will have to calm down and continue trying to prepare for our Charter Rotary Party which happens in only two days’ time. The Rotary District Governor (DG) is coming up with his wife and several other people. A car load of Rotarians from our sponsor club in Nakuru is also coming. Lots to do, so I better get busy.
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