After our morning breakfast, we met up with Steven and Alfred (the contractor fundi we've been working with quite often the past few weeks) and hopped in the back of the truck, bound for a remote home near the Kenyan border. However, we first needed to g to Obwere (where the Shirati market is) for materials, so we headed there first. We were making very punctual time, a surprise to many of us, but this did not last long. We ended up spending about an hour waiting in the truck at the market, as Terry, Justin and Steven went to try to barter for the materials we needed. Near the end of this hour, as the 3 were returning, a huge Pepsi truck (a rarity here, with most stores only selling coke) drove alongside us and parked just a few feet ahead of us. Terry, upon seeing this when he returned to the truck with the materials, suggested that we buy a case of 24 directly from the back of the truck, with the idea of sharing with the family we were to help. After some negotiating through Steven, the truck drivers agreed to a very reasonable price and we were on our way with the case of Pepsi bottles.
About an hour later, we arrived at the small village, and began walking towards the home of the man we were planning to help (The truck could not fit through the tight walkway). Upon our arrival there, we met Ramadan, a man who has been paralyzed from the waist down since about grade 4. He spends his days laying in a blanket on the ground of his compound, with his elderly mother carrying him out of his small brick "house" each morning for the day. Her biggest worry is the sun beating down on him as well as the rain, if she happens to be away from the village for food or water and cannot bring him back inside. So, our plan to reduce these worries was to build a sort of awning over his house, so that he would be protected from the direct sunlight in the hottest portion of the day, as well as offering him protection from the rain.
After having a quick lunch of take-out pizza (on pita bread, with very minimal tomato sauce) from Musoma, purchased by Fred (our first time having cheese here, or so we assume...) and Pepsi (which we then shared with Ramadan and his family, as well as the local children who had shown up), we began to work on the awning. As most of our worksites have become, the presence of "mzungus" (us, direct translation: white people) turned the property into a sort of community gathering for the duration of our stay.
As Terry, Justin and Dylan helped Steven and Alfred position the support poles for the awning, Terry had an idea. When he saw the 24 empty Pepsi bottles and the caps of said bottles laying about in the sand, he realized that the caps could be used as pieces for a game of checkers. So, upon telling the team this, Nathan, Jane and I asked permission to use one of the family's tables to make a checker board. Through Steven's translation, they agreed, and we began outlining the board and different squares using our green marker and black pens. Within 30 minutes, the board was just about done, just as Terry, Justin and Dylan were finishing the support beams of the awning. With the board complete, it naturally needed to be tested, so Nathan and our driver, Kennedy (who speaks very little English) proceeded to engage in a hearty of game of checkers.The game ended up being quite one sided, as it became clear that Kennedy knew exactly what he was doing when it comes to "Draft" (their name for checkers). However, the test worked beautifully, and soon, all the children who had gathered to watch began playing the game as well.
Nathan and I then rejoined the others to help with implementing the beams, while the 5 of us also started a side project. Ramadan's doorframe from his hut was very loose and close to breaking, literally hanging by two sets of rope attached to the roof beams. So, while Alfred and Steven continued to work on the roof, the 5 of us cut some small pieces from the extra remains of the beams and did our best to nail them into place between the doorframe and the opening above the door (similar to a window, which happened to have a piece of wood above it for us to hammer nails through). By the time we had completed this, the final piece of roof was just being hammered into place by Alfred.
Around this time, Steven came up to Jane with news that Ramadan's relative-like neighbour (from his clan) had prepared a very simple meal to thank us for our work. It would have been impolite to say no of course, though we didn't feel very comfortable accepting it, as we knew how little the family had. However, we were very gracious, and had a small portion of the dried fish "Dagga" and ugali.
This meal was followed by a short walk down to the waters of Lake Victoria (as their home overlooked the beautiful lake, and the shores of Kenya a few miles away) where we enjoyed the beautiful view of the water and the splashing of the waves against the shore for a short period of time. Finally, we returned to the house, took a picture with the family and received a huge thank you from Ramadan's mother individually, consisting of holding both your hands, raising them in the air and waving them, while saying "Asante, asante, asante!" (Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you).
We then got back in the truck, and as we began to drive away, children from the clan who had followed us began running behind it, saying "Bye! Bye! Bye!" and "Ariti, ariti, ariti" (which we can only assume means bye in Luo) repeatedly as we slowly drove away through the rocky path. However, they too stopped after a few minutes, and we were on our way. We took a brief detour before heading home to visit the Tanzanian/Kenyan border, which was basically a rope and slightly farther on, a wall with barbed wire. We enjoyed the view of lake and the distant Kenyan mountains on the horizon, before turning back around and heading home to the diocese.
Soon after getting back, Fred arrived at the diocese, wanting to hear what we had done that day (as he could not join us today, due to other commitments). Soon Leisha and Wesley joined him just before supper, and on behalf of the bishop (who is presently at Mennonite World Conference) and the diocese presented all of us with thank-you gifts for the work we've done here, and to remind us to think of them and keep them in our prayers upon our return home. They gift also wished to express an open-ended welcome here for others and ourselves. We graciously accepted, and thanked them just the same for all the organisational work they've done to keep us busy here (which they certainly did well!).
Following the blog tonight, we plan to watch "Transcend", a documentary on the life story of a Kenyan marathon runner with connections to Waterloo Region (thanks Jen Ostic-Baer for the suggestions) before hopefully heading to bed early-ish.
Today was our last official "work day", but tomorrow will be spent touring the water pumps at Lake Victoria with Samwel, visiting Rorya FM (the local radio station I went to last year) and travelling to and meeting David (our cook)'s family at his request.