Christmas in Kakuma 1

The Dream and the Team
The music blaring from an old speaker, the ringtone on your friend’s phone, the pair of shoes you wore to work today, the book you are currently reading- everything around us is inspired. It doesn’t matter how upbeat or sleek or boring it is, inspiration is key, Christmas in Kakuma was no exception.
One day on social media, a friend of ours made it known to us that she would be away from her friends and family over Christmas as she still had to work at the Kakuma Refugee Camp. Moved by it all, friends decided it wouldn’t be Christmas if we let her be there alone, so we all wanted to go there and take Christmas with us to her and the Kakuma community.
In a span of six weeks, it grew from a rushed reaction on social media to a planned undertaking. Most parents wouldn’t hear of it though, especially because most assumed Al Shabaab terror alerts were rampant all over the North of Kenya. We consulted with the missionaries from Youth Apart, tried to get letters from the government authorizing us to visit the refugee camp and asked our families and friends to support us in prayer, cash and kind.
From an original nineteen, a solid nine made it to Kakuma. In the next four or five blog posts, I will try to walk you through our experience. We wish to thank God for making this possible and being Omnipresent , everyone who donated food, clothes and money, everyone who kept calling to find out whether we are ok, the guys that prayed with us, Youth Apart, Kenya for hosting us in Kitale and Kakuma and the people of Lokore Village for receiving us with so much love and appreciation
The Team:

Zach: Our friend from Kitale and guide to Kakuma

 Winnie: Youngest in the team. Great story teller, dancer and down-to-earth person. Last of the ‘triplets’.

 Lynn: The Miss with the smiles Brings life, joy and laughter to everything.

Walter: Behind every unique photo was this guy. Super funny, full of stories and witty reactions to every single statement

Brian: Simply put, the guy who would own a bakery and eat everything in it- for the love of cakes! But seriously, perhaps the most quiet and sane person in the team. Android is this man’s best friend

Budgeree: Yes. She is as serious as the photo. Great singer and guitarist and quite the opposite of Liz as regards time. That was the basis of their friendship btw

Liz: The girl with a  British/French accent and deep-rooted Kenyan mannerisms. Time keeper to the core and a very great risk taker. If you know her, ask about Lake Turkana The first of the ‘triplets’

 Ragai: One of the lead organizers behind this noble undertaking. A smart worker and really supportive!

Serah: The Blogger and number two of the ‘triplets’

Dave: One of the lead organizers and the man behind most videos and photos in this venture. The rest is a story for another day.

As diverse as our backgrounds were, we were drawn together by our love for God, people and a common desire to make a difference. It was an amazing and life changing experience for us. In the end, we not only made a difference, but found  family in the friendships we formed and in the village we visited.

PS: All photos were taken during the Kakuma trip Look out for other blog posts detailing our experience

 

The HA! Poem

When i say HA! I am laughing at the enemy,
HA! Laughing at all those lies he said to me,
HA! Booing him for thinking i’d never be,
The girl who for Jesus gets on her knees;
So HAHAHA! Shame on the enemy!

When I say HA! I mean HAlleluya
For i am so blest, my cup is full, yea!
And if hear this i bet you’ll say ‘true that!’
For my life is renewed, made fresh as the new year;
So HAHAHA! HAlleluya!

When i say HA! I mean How Great Thou Art
To the one Savior who’s in my heart,
Same Jesus who gives us all a fresh start
If you know this is true just shout ‘What?!’
As i say HAHAHA, How Great Thou Art!

When i say HA! I mean i am so HAppy,
No longer gloomy, grumpy, even crappy
See my life has been hard, stormy, even bumpy,
But journeying with Jesus is such a fun thing
So HAHAHA, I am so happy!

When i say HA!I mean HAllowed be God’s name,
Since He came, nothing that was has been the same
He came to earth, died for me and carried my shame
Took my misdeeds so lame
So let Him take all the glory and fame
As i say HAHAHA, HAllowed be God’s name!

When i say HA! I mean How can i serve you Lord?
You see, i am just a man, a mere dot,
A girl you’ve chosen to love, my life you decided to sort
See my being you bought even before freedom i sought
Oh the thought that you promised to leave me not!
So HAHAHA, How can i serve you lORD?

When i say HA! I mean you can HAve your way
For I have tried my own only to stray
So I will do what you say
This and every other day
Oh help me Lord I pray
As i say HAHAHA, you can HAve your way!

When i say HA! I mean its gong to HAppen
Nay, not all of a sudden
But it will, see it did for Daniel
So will it for us who are heavy laden
One day our shackles will be no more even our burdens
So believe as i say HAHAHA, its going to HAppen!

When i say HA!
I mean exactly that…
HArp in my hand,
Heaven in my Heart,
HA! It is my time to laugh!

Nehemiah 8:10
“…for the joy of the Lord is your Strength…”

 

Why Evil Will Never Stop

…until we all do.

Flashback: Primary school. Late nights finishing up homework, early mornings reading ahead of the teacher; hands raised to ask and answer questions in class, long lines outside the staffroom to seek clarifications at tea or lunch breaks… and when at last we sat those National Examinations, it paid off for each person, one way or the other. High school bore more responsibilities, more opportunities, more freedom of choice. Four years which also played out differently for us all, more like all those instruments at an orchestra, a few featured prominently, but everyone, low or high grades, carried just as much weight. Stars shine when the sky grows dark.

Fast Forward: Present day. I’ve been on (and off) campus for a while now, and like everyone else, I am not blind to all the evil that is. Take for example, a Med student who comes to campus fresh and ready to save the world, just as the script read in his childhood, ‘When I grow up, I want to be…

A few weeks into campus, our friend falls behind in his academic pursuits, he’s been bumming and partying for overly long. So he takes on that habit called dubbing assignments and taking short notes into the exam room. If he is lucky, he gets away with it for all six years or suffers (petty) punishment once or twice over that entire period. Sometimes, sadly, he earns himself first class honors and goes ahead to be your private doctor of choice and mine too…even the president’s!

But this isn’t about the Med Student only, think about the engineer, the accountant, the architect, the computer scientist, think about you. So eventually, people die because someone did not pay attention in class, the buildings collapse, the roads, railways and runways are super faulty, chemical plants kill millions, companies close down, nations fall into debt…you get the picture.

Grades are important, good grades even better, honest grades absolutely perfect. My point is we need to pursue a standard of excellence in all that we set out to do. Degree ni Harambee? Really? See where that has taken us as a nation, as individuals! No offense, but I know we can do better than this. Honesty pays off. Always.

Because campus will be over one day soon and we all will have to prove our worth, long after the Honors are shelved, may honest character back up all that our papers say about us…and public shame befall us otherwise.

 

Show Me The Man

Show me the man. Show him to me; let him make his face and name known. I need to slap him, slap sense into his notions, slap and re-order the things his list prioritizes. Show me the man that declared man’s three basic needs; the one responsible for all this exploitation and limited distribution of resources; the one whose ideas expose the majority of our kind to the brutality and harshness of the rat race- an endless cyclic maneuver around life; a gigantic man-made bridge that rests on hurtful so-called-facts and whose top is not for everyone to walk on- only people that are of a certain class and caliber are deemed worthy. The rest can swim across the filthy river that is life’s tribulations and suffer long for nothing more than being born. So show me that man!

Sometimes I wish a balanced diet, a non-leaking roof over my head and hole-free clothes over my nakedness were all overrated. Then many like I would not suffer stress and sleepless nights working out plans on how to sneak our way out of poverty without the boring glances of inflation staring us in the face, stopping us in our steps as though we were but chicken thieves cornered by the chief in the dead of the night. Too much, I say! It all is too much for one man to bear. Yet still, not one man, but over half of the human race, suffers this same plight:

Every day, a mother and her children are thrown out of their house for lack of rent, thrown out of a place they call home, denied their one basic right. I wish the corridor was as good a home and that a decent house with a latch at the door was too overrated. Then I, and thousands more like myself would have nothing to worry about.

Every day, I read of a dying generation to the North of my country and I meet with many that are famished and frail, tired of life and all its twists and turns and still I do nothing, or too little to even count. Still the needy suit up to hide their flattened stomachs, wear a smile everyday and resign themselves to fate- no one likes to hang around the needy fellow, right? But what is right to do? To live weary or die trying? Too many words describing a dying world, where is the love? Who knows how to get us all out of this?

See me dragging my feet in the city streets every day, watch me slide that crispy note out of my pocket and pay for a meal I cannot afford, tag along as I parade myself in social circles, wearing the last of my borrowed show-off attires… laugh and smile with me, complement and enjoy my company. For later today, I might as well die, commit suicide, for I did not find the man that made the rules, the same ones that hurt the very least of us, the ones that raise the mighty higher and break the arms and muscle of the poor majority that hold them up.

But what good will it do me to kill myself over policies that are not my mistake, let alone my formulation? If that man was well able to ruin my life and many others by showing what need humans have and giving a few people the right to exploit us and force us on our knees, begging for the things we need, then I have as much power to counter that man, who is in fact, nothing short of a figment of my imagination. I am my worst enemy, you know; thinking myself too little to curb this mountain and of muscles too feeble to swim my way to the shores I can only dream of.

No, neither food, nor clothing and shelter are overrated. Only my fear of the unknown is. The day I storm out of my own pity party is the day change will begin. Because in essence, the only man i need to meet with, see face to face, slap and give sense to, is myself.  Then the dream will begin to take form.

 

Prayer

** Every passionate soul goes through the desert of no inspiration at some point or another in their journey. Some give up, some compromise…and some pray.

Give me a word,
A real word- nothing absurd;
Let me toss it in the air,
Turn it over, notice its flare;
Let me roll it in context,
Put it in my mouth,
Chew it like cud;
Let me feel it in my stomach,
Curving it up in an arc;
Let me fathom it in my mind,
Wrap it in thoughts that bind;
Let me feel it up my spine,
As a shiver, finitely, finely defined;

Give me a word,
Have me take it up,
Stretch it out
and make it my own;
One word,
Just one word,
and i’ll make poetry of it.

 

…

TICK. TOCK. TICK. TOCK. TICK.

And then time stops
And hope halts
And the tears can only drop.

And my strongest point
Becomes my weakest joint
And this heart grows faint
Painted and tainted by pain
Hated on and rated in disdain

 

Thank God for Love

To what then, shall I compare love?

Shall I sit quietly at my window,

Look outside and compare it to

The flowers that blossom and grow,

And lay strewn in colorful hues in my garden?

Or the trees that start as seedlings,

Then tower far above my head,

Giving shade to my tiny self?

Shall I see it as the sun,

A shiny rising in the east,

 

After November

AFTER NOVEMBER
This is an account, told creatively, of the year love came to earth in its totality.
0600hours,
September 1,
Year of Our Lord
He found a letter on His Holy desk. Unlike many letters He had received from earth before, this envelope had only one thing written on it: Heaven Bound. Whiter than snow the envelope showcased itself on His glorious desk. It begged to be read.

 

So Long, Friend

**At some point in time in our lives, we realize that we have become, without our knowledge, burnt bridges in the lives of people we cared for deeply and esteemed highly in our lives. It happened to me. Just yesterday. In view of all this, i choose to not judge, to look beyond the hurt and listen to the lesson(s). So long, friend.**

If I am a bridge you burnt,

Then you are a lesson I’ve learnt

One that I will take with me,

Forever, long after the hurt does cease.

 

Street Child

If I could find justice, then I would scream at the top of my voice. Speak I can, converse I do, give speeches, I have…yet still I am unable to scream for help. I long for a helping hand, I crave justice, and my heart pleads for mercy… but scream? I cannot. If I could, I would, but since I can’t, then I won’t. Pen in hand, paper underneath, let these words scream for me.

Street Child