We had a great time last weekend at a place called Naro Moru River Lodge. It was about 2 1/2 hours drive north of Nairobi and we had decided to get away for the weekend. The place we stayed had a pool, tennis courts, and we ate breakfasts and supper's there as part of the package. It was a very peaceful and beautiful place as you can see by the pictures. In the mornings there were lots of interesting birds that came to the trees just outside of our room. We had a really good peaceful break. The lodge was also just a couple of miles from the equator which we had to stop and get a picture of. :-)

We were also very near Mt. Kenya National Park and there are a couple of pictures of that included here as well. It was some beautiful scenery and also a couple of trails of army ants crossing the road. We parked on the road that leads up to the top of the mountian and walked a mile or so up the road. There were lots of cape buffalo tracks in the road and we kept hearing some baboons in the trees, but didn't see them anywhere. Angie thought it was kind of like hiking in a Jurassic Park movie.

Also this week we had to take our cat Twix back to the vet. He initially was bitten on the neck by a stray cat and it became infected so a couple of weeks ago we had to take him for surgery for a few days. Well after a week or two home it showed up again so this time he stayed there for thre or four days and he has a big shaved area with a scar and stitches. We hope this will be the last time we'll have to take care of this and it'll heal without getting more infections.

Kurt flew up in South Sudan this week and this picture is of Pierre which is a place that they keep some of their fuel in drums. They had about 15 passengers and were just dropping off 4 drums of jet fuel. It was kind of muddy, but difficult to see on the airplane because it's kind of a white sand/mud. It is the beginning of the rainy season in South Sudan so mud is going to be a part of his life now for the next few months.

This past week;

We'd like to try and keep you updated on our last week or so. I have done a fair amount of traveling. I took a group of Boy Scouts down to the coast for a weekend of camping on the beach, took a group of Christian donors up to southwestern Sudan to dedicate a new hospital, and flew back up to South Sudan to bring a team of missionaries back from a conference in Yei.

Micah and I also had a chance to go and see the US National Rugby team play the Kenya National team in a Jr. World Championships. The US ended up loosing in the last couple of minutes, but it was a pretty exciting match to watch.

Here are the people that come and bring items to house:

Here is Wycliffe - he comes and cuts our grass and trims things if needed. Can you believe that he came one week with this shirt on!! :) I said, "Wycliffe, I love your shirt - that is our favorite team in Ohio!" He said he loved that shirt too....cause it is a tank top! :) Isn't it funny that it is even #23!! Who would even give that shirt away?!

This is the vegetable lady - Monica. She comes once a week with any vegetables that we text her the night before with! Isn't that a hoot! Everyone has cell phones here!

Here is Elizabeth our beloved Fish Lady! She doesn't enough for us! Actually, she comes about every three weeks. She brings the fish whole - Tilapia (m-m-m...) and filets it right here. We usually let her keep the head and tail as that is a treat for them to make fish stew with.

All these people are faithful christians and have such amazing stories of how they found the Lord and their family struggles. Sometimes we have time to sit and chat - sometimes not. They are quite inspiring to me.

Here is Micah with his friend Ruben. He stayed over night and then we went to get Kurt after his trip. They boys enjoyed looking in the airplanes. :)

Micah

We thought you might enjoy seeing pictures of what Micah likes to do when not in school. :)

Right: Micah and his pet Twix go everywhere together at home.

Left: enjoying a friends pet.

Micah and Twix....

Above: enjoying miniature golf.

Right: Stuck in traffic - a bit too close to the Matatu driver.

Right: Waterslide park.

Above and below: enjoying the pool with friends at the game park and Mt.Kenya.

Right: Micah & I talking to Brandon on skype - Brandon has his web cam on.

Cleft Lip Surgery

Last week I took a team of Surgeon’s and crew up to a town whose sole purpose was to do cleft lips on mostly children. I’m not able to disclose the location, but suffice it to say that it’s an area that’s very closed to most outsider’s. We arrived there on Sunday and that evening yet were doing evaluations of the candidates for the surgeries. Since I was to stay with the group for the week I made myself useful and became the person doing the registrations and paperwork along with taking pictures for their records.

The funding is through a program called Bethany Kids and in order to secure the funding there is a lot of documentation that needs to happen along with pictures of the before and after for the records.

Some of the small children were difficult to see with such deformed faces, lips, and teeth. It was really an amazing site to see. But the most interesting was probably the teen girls. They came very beautifully dressed, but very hesitant as to what to expect. You could tell that they were really not sure if this was the thing that could change their lives. People told us that it does. It was really heart wrenching. Fixing a cleft lip is such a visible thing which you can tell by some of the pictures below. In the end we did 69 surgeries.

It was quite a dangerous area to be in for us, but the town really protected us well. We were there on their invite and they had armed guards with us everywhere we went. Even if we walked off to one side someone was there with an AK 47 to follow us.

It ended up being a very interesting week. The Dr’s have started a relationship with this town that is such a positive thing that I think there will be quite a bit more opportunities for these kinds of trips which is very good news. It’s an area that has been relatively abandoned and forgotten by the outside world. An area with a definite need for us to continue praying about. I felt privileged to be a part of the week and look forward to being able to return on another trip.

Khartoum trip with Samaritan's Purse

A few weeks ago I had an interesting week. I ended up in Khartoum, Sudan for much of the week flying around visiting the Samaritan’s Purse projects. Unfortunately it’s very difficult to take pictures as security has a major presence and in general it’s not legal to take pictures, especially at the airports. I didn’t feel like getting my camera taken away so decided that I’d just have to write more this time around.

Khartoum was quite different than when we used to live there in 1994-95! Back then it was much more primitive with few restaurants and hotels around. Today it is a bustling city with many restaurants, more than twice the vehicles so traffic is sometimes pretty bad, and some very nice hotels and businesses. There is even a pretty nice “shopping mall” with a grocery store in it. How fun to go back and see those changes. I was also able to renew some acquaintances from back then which was good.
From Khartoum we flew out to the Darfur area (Nyala) to do a visit there. Even with all of the political upheaval of the ICC and the indictment of President Bashir we were still able to obtain permissions to get around which was amazing. We also visited Kauda which is where SP has had some long term projects.

Here are the two airplanes we were flying on our trip. We spent a few hours there and then returned back to Khartoum. The next day we departed Khartoum for Juba. Spent a few hours there and then flew over to a small village called Yei for the night. Here are a few pictures to show what Yei is like. It’s another SP base where they have a workshop for the church building program. So far we have built more than 250 churches. It’s an amazing program!

The next day I had the privilege of being part of an Operation Christmas Child distribution. (The shoebox gifts) It was at an orphanage way out in the bush and all I can say is it was really a moving experience. The excitement in the kids was amazing. It’s so cool that the gospel is handed out with these gifts. Here are a few more pictures of that.

We returned then to Nairobi on Thursday. It was a good trip.