Madaraka Day/ Excursion- Kisumu style

Happy Madaraka Day (celebration of Kenya gaining self-rule)! The day ended up being a big day for the kids!!!

We decided to take advantage of the children having the day off from school. The older kids now have Saturday school, which limits the time we get to spend together as a group. The children were all in desperate need of new school shoes so we decided to load everyone up and make the 40 minute drive to Kisumu (the closest city-- and the third-largest in all of Kenya). It's tough to take a trip with 11 children (we added a friend of one of the kids to the ranks) and 5 adults in one vehicle, so we utilized the hospital ambulance! The children all laughed when the back door opened and they realized it was a "true" ambulance!

Selah and Zed holding hands

 

The children had a blast looking out the window as we headed down to Kisumu! They all would start screaming whenever they saw something they wanted others to see! Needless to say the ride was a loud one but it was a lot of fun.

Jess and Eddah

When we made it to Kisumu we headed to the shoe store to get everyone new school shoes and slippers (sandals). I'm sure the store employees were a little apprehensive about the 11 excited kids in their store-- but they've never met these awesome children!!! It was a realitively ordered process of getting everyone their school shoes plus new slippers! A special shout-out to Sam Russomagno for buying shoes for three of the kids!

We decided to let the children pick what we should have for lunch (samaki-- fish or kuku-- chicken). It was a unanimous decision to go for Kuku and chips! Everyone loved their chicken, chips and a soda! Their eyes got so big when they saw the amount of chicken and French fries but these children know how to eat so nothing went to waste :)

On the ride back from Kisumu, we decided to stop by the Kisumu airport to try to watch a plane landing or taking off. For most of the kids, it would have been their first time getting to see a plane in action. We'd checked the schedules and our timing was right-on. But after unsuccessfully waiting for an hour in the sun, we had wilting children who were ready to go home. Multiple children fell asleep on the ride home including Naomi who drooled all over me multiple times (she would wake up, wipe it off and then fall back to sleep), Selah fell asleep sitting upright and then Arnold fell asleep in Daniel's lap but somehow ended up sleeping on my feet for the last bit of the ride... Not surprisingly it was a much quieter ride home than there.

The children all got new backpacks, filled with special things both for school and also for play!! We would like to thank all those that donated both the backpacks and also the goodies inside. The kids had no idea they were getting new backpacks, so they were all very excited when they saw their very own backpacks next to the new shoes they'd picked out earlier. A special thank you to Fran and Tim Buckley, Daria and Dennis Shumaker, the Russell Family, Sean Whitman, and Debbie and Tommy Whitman. Passing out the new backpacks was a little hectic so we missed a lot of pictures but here is a preview of some of the children with the backpacks and some things inside! More to come!!! :)

An exhausting day for children and adults all around but an extremely fun day full of exciting, new things!

Catherine

 

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