Oloiktoktok

Well, another fun, adventurous day we had! We woke up in disappointment to find Mt. Kilimanjaro was all covered in clouds. Typically, mornings show the full mountain but it has been "June gloom" here in Kenya quite a bit.

We spend the past day in Oloiktoktok right on the border of Tanzania. Homeless Children's International (HCI) was the program I visited in 2001 and 2003 and volunteered with along with my husband for several weeks. We fell in love there and soon after were married. It was so fun to see some of the girls who are living there still all grown up after all these years. They took us into town to give us a mini tour. We started to get hollared at by some locals who thought we were taking photos of them saying "we are not animals" and such-so we left quickly. I don't want to mess with mentally ill or intoxicated, angry locals :)

The drive home gave us views of many gazelle, giraffe and ostrich. I also have a hilarious story to share about one of our team members scouring the Maasai grounds for lava rock from Mt. Kilimanjaro erruption from looong ago, but it needs to wait until I can post pictures to go along with it. It will be worth the wait. I promise.

We got into Nairobi today about noonish and cleaned up and went to Java House for lunch. Boy, that chocolate shake never tasted so good. YUMMO!

We went to an amazing beadshop afterwards called Kazuri. You can check it out online at www.kazuri.com. It's a program that employs around 340 single Kenyan moms-some who have been employed for 20-30 yrs there. Beautiful jewelry and yes, I did bring some home for you!

Later tonight we ate at Carnivore and feasted on wild game meat. I'm not a huge fan of meat, but I was a trooper and tried ostrich meatballs, and other meat anyways. I had a gag a time or two. Eck!

Tomorrow morning I will be going to see Daniel in Kibera with a team member, Ryan. We will take a matatu and go into the slum to see where he is living with Priscillah's sister. I decided not to take Daniel along to Kitale for a variety of reasons and I feel like I made the right decision. We will hit the market for some fun finds in the afternoon and then fly out of Nairobi at about 10:30 tomorrow night. If all goes well, we will be in Minneapolis at 4:30pm Saturday. Pray we have no delays!

Back to the real world I go. It's tough to think I'll be at work Monday morning. Really tough. I thought coming back from Kenya would be easier each time, but it's not. As a team we are looking forward to sharing our experiences and I know everyone will have a different perspective and have learned different things. I don't think anyone has come back the same person as when they left.

Pictures and stories will be coming very soon! Promise! See you when I get to Minnesota!!!