Some selected photos from past trips to Kenya

Here's a small selection from the thousands of photos I have from prior trips.  You can see why I'm excited to leave on Sunday - Kenya is a wonderful place, and I love teaching there!

teaching a women's group in the Kakamega rainforest (2008)

a boda boda driver group (bicycle taxi drivers) Joyce and I taught (2008)

Florence in the February 2009 training

we walk to many of our "gigs" (Rosemary, Joyce, Beatrice, Eunice - 2008)

teaching a Baptist group after church (2008)

Suzy on a boda boda

with a focus group in 2007

Rose and Josephine in the old library

Linda, who arrived at Vumilia with kwashiorkor (big belly form of malnutrition)

the girls! (orphans at Vumilia)

Florence teaching at Bukhaywa Secondary

the kids at Shamberere Secondary reading the sex ed materials

Shamberere kids doing a role play they wrote

teaching reproductive anatomy

no, you CAN'T get HIV from touching someone!

sugarcane, and sugarcane workers

the dirt road to the West Kenya sugarcane factory that runs past Vumilia

the Ember group, which Joyce and I trained in November 2009

Planning progress

Great forward progress on the Kenya planning front.  My farmer friend, Magdaline Wangeci, will be able to attend the sanitary towel training in Nyeri before I get there, and Rose will meet me at my hotel the morning of the 3rd for a visit, and has arranged a driver take me to Nyeri.

This is Magdaline showing me how to make a woven basket, starting with sisal leaves which she is turning into "thread" by splitting the fibers and rolling them along her leg.

This video was made by Jessy at the now-closed Lavenda Springs Academy, about a 10 minute walk from Magdaline's farm.  It's how I got involved in Kenya in 2004.



Some of the students still live in the area and I'm hoping to reconnect with a few, along with some local teachers.

Connections!

Great news from the doctor - lungs are completely clear, and the fatigue and lightheadedness from the antibiotic should wear off in the next couple of days.  Just in time!

Made some terrific connections today.  A friend, Ed Sulzberger from African Children's Haven, is introducing me to a woman who runs a primary school in the Mathare slum in Nairobi - we may be able to do some work together.  And a friend of a friend is introducing me to a Kenyan entrepreneur in Kisumu who works with disadvantaged youth, does HIV education and distributes sanitary pads.  I'll be able to connect him with the woman who is running the sanitary pad project I'll be learning about while I'm there.

A good day's work on the phone.  Tomorrow I'll have the energy to tackle my training manual edits.

Baby steps.  Blogging is evidently not for the faint of heart.  Or the lazy and complacent.  Or something.

Beginning in the Middle

Well, I'm recovering from pneumonia and leaving for Kenya in 11 days.  I've wanted to blog for a while, and am finally getting started.  How I came to train Kenyan farmers to teach sex ed will unfold, I guess, as I figure all of this out.  In the meantime, here's the organization I train for:

Vumilia CBO

Here's my boss, Rose Ayuma Moon: (yes, she is TOO with Ewan McGregor, who funded 6 motorbikes for Vumilia!!)



Here's Rose's country place, where I stay when I work in Kabras:

Okay, I've figured out photos and links.  Enough for my first foray.  Stay tuned!