By request...

By request. That's why I'm resurrecting this blog.

I love writing. That doesn't mean I'm good at it or that it's easy. Honesty, although the best policy, is rarely the easiest thing. Writing about what God's teaching me, although usually joyous and always beneficial, also brings it's difficulties, not least of which is the fear of what all 5 or 6 of my readers will think.

So I'm easing myself back in to this, with a quick reflection on the past 12 months...

Needless to say 2012 was a year of change. I finished college, got in to medical school and moved to London. I met a load of new friends and found a new church. I've gained new piercings and let old ones heal, learnt some things and forgot some too. I was blessed with the opportunity to go on my African adventures, filled with amazing volunteers, astounding children and some 'interesting' food (as well as a tropical disease or two).

As scintillating as all that sounds, the greatest part is that I'm finishing 2012 almost a completely different person to how I've started it. God has used each and every day this year to bless me, shape me and to continue to transform me in to the person He created me to be. I've learnt some hard lessons, made a few big mistakes and had innumerable amount of encouragements. It's not always been easy, but God's plan for me this past year has always been right, and I've been kept and sustained through every moment of it.

My favourite reminder this year is, 'Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever.' (Hebrews 13 v 8)
The God I praise at home in Wales is the same God who kept me in Kenya, guided me to London and who will continue to be with me this coming year.

So it's with great anticipation I look forward to the rest of 2013. Not just for whichever country I manage to visit in the summer, but for the new things God will reveal, teach and remind me of.

Home at last

Found the blog post I wrote on my way home... Probably should have published this a couple weeks ago!

After 1 fantastic summer, 3 flights, 1 special needs school, 152 children, 4 marriage proposals and all the other things that have happened in Kenya, I'm home. I'm tired, freckly, slightly tanned, covered in travelling dust and my hair is a mess. It's been amazing. I've cooked goat, taught maths, been on safari, fed giraffes, killed a spider bigger than my head, held a snake, ridden a camel, been attacked by monkeys, had malaria and met dozens of great people.

I've been completely humbled by the generosity of the local people who have so little. I've been encouraged by the unwavering faith the local Christians I've met here have in the face of such adversity and poverty. I've been touched by the love the children pour out to all they meet and I've been left constantly in awe of God's beautiful creation.

It's safe to say I've been bitten by the travelling bug (along with dozens of mosquitoes) and I'm already planning my next trip (to somewhere that doesn't have malaria!). I think there's an obvious reason why hundreds of thousands of families get hooked on programmes like Frozen Planet and Planet Earth. The things they show are magnificent right? Things that showcase the awe-inspiring, beautiful, glorious creation. Things that are appreciated by every age group, every type of person. They make things we can't normally see or experience completely accessible. They're things that shout of God's power, showcase His beauty, and sing of His love. I want to see as many of them for myself as possible, so God-willing I'll be away again soon.

Goodbyes

I've always been pretty pants at goodbyes. Leaving Gede Special School was emotional, leaving Kenya is borderline heartbreaking. Perhaps I'm being a typical girl, but I can't help but get incredibly emotionally attached to the children I've worked with and the places I've been. Think about how entangled Christmas lights magically manage to get during the year. No matter how tidily they're put away it's inevitable that when it comes to putting up the decorations, the first hour could easily be spent wrestling with the knots that hold the strings of lights to each other. Call me melodramatic, but that's pretty much where I'm at now. I'm emotionally entangled with Kenya. Fortunately I have a 9 hour flight to Heathrow tonight to get myself into a relatively unknotted state.

Hopefully.

The end of a (small) era

I kind of wish I could finish my Kenyan story at the end of the last post, mainly due to laziness, but a lot has happened since then. I had malaria, some random chest and stomach infections and had my first run-in with Kenyan police (don't worry, I was innocent). Eventually my placement at Gede Special School came to a reluctant and teary end and I trekked (flew) to Nairobi.


My last Friday at the coast (just over a week ago) was hectic. My backpack got packed and re-packed (and STILL I forgot things as per), teary goodbyes were said to the children, last-minute photos taken and I venured into Malindi to go shopping with money sent from my home church for the special school. It was an eventful matatu ride to say the least. After being up all night vomiting and still recovering from whatever random illnesses I had, I was not in the mood to be messed around by the locals. Unfortunately being a white girl alone, it was inevitable, but eventually I got to Malindi and began doing what I do best - shopping.


With the gift given by my church I was able to buy shoes and underwear for the children, toothbrushes, toothpaste and soap for them all, uniforms for the younger children who previously hadn't had and a bunch of other necessities. It was great to be able to drop them all off in big fat cardboard boxes on the way back to Watamu, and help the kids set up for their movie night (that week it was Harry Potter, classic choice!). It's humbling and challenging to see how grateful the children are here for things that kids elsewhere in the world just expect to get without question, and I feel privileged that I was able to be on the receiving end of their gratitude. I even got a few love letters during my placement there! (Winner.)


It was a great end to an overall amazing stay in a completely beautiful village. On the Saturday I went to Malindi airport (a slightly bigger shack) and boarded a teeny tin-can (almost) plane to Nairobi. That was 8 action-packed days ago, and I will eventually tell everyone what I've been doing here but for now my bed is most definitely calling me.

Filling in the gaps - Kenya 2012

Today I've realised the majority of my friends probably don't know exactly what I've been doing in Kenya. For all you know I could have been fundraising for a really long holiday! Well I can assure you I haven't and, as I enter the last leg of my journey, I figure it's about time I explain what's been going on.

So at some point in February, after a really rubbish couple of weeks and a particularly bad day, I started to focus more and more on my love of visiting new countries. I planned a hypothetical gap year, looked up places to volunteer and somewhere along the way fell in love with the idea of visiting Afirca. After much prayer, deliberation and thought (all of which took about 48 hours) I signed up with Outreach International to spend my summer volunteering at their coastal orphanage in Kenya. It looked idyllic to say the least. Living in a house on a white sandy beach, a bunch of cute black kids and an opportunity to help teach maths and english. Great!


Convinced this was where God wanted me to go, I booked my flights, paid my deposit and organised my vaccinations.

Unfortunately, as always, things didn't run as smoothly as I had hoped. I arrived in Watamu, Kenya, to the news that I couldn't actually go to the orphanage I had signed up to. I was left without a volunteer project and somewhat disappointed that the very thing I had been so excited to do wasn't actually possible. However, as always, God was simply working out His plan. The next day another volunteer took me to Gede Special School, home to 150 children, all of whom are either hearing impaired or have cerebral palsy, or a mixture.

My mornings were spent in the class of children with cerebral palsy, helping the OT and focusing on stimulating them, helping them move around etc. The 30 or so children in the class all had CP to different extents, and all had very different background stories. Some of the children had very loving, supportive families who came to visit them, whilst others had families who believed them to be possessed, who beat them and had merely dumped them in the Special School and not returned for years. It was obvious which children belonged to which category, unfortunately.

My afternoons were spent in classes with the hearing impaired (HI) children. This was difficult at first - I barely had any BSL let alone KSL! But the children were patient and loved trying to teach us new signs, though I soon realised they often called me stupid when I couldn't copy their hand movements exactly! I was given a sign name (related to my ear piercings - no surprises there!) and genuinely loved helping them. Their attitude to learning was immense. Even when teachers hadn't bothered to come into school groups of children would ask for help with their maths. Trying to teach fractions and ratio theorem with limited KSL proved entertaining!

So that has been the last month or so. I've been challenged and humbled beyond belief by the kids I've worked with. They are potentially the kindest, most loving and most generous children I've met, and, despite having so little are infinitely happier than the majority of people in the UK.

I do this way too often, but I apologise for the essay length of this post. I should have made more of an effort to blog while I've been away!

A tangawizi in Kenya

I've been in Kenya (aka paradise) for 2 weeks now and figured it was about time I did something productive with my evenings and write something... I'm not going to lie, the first few days were rough. Culture shock doesn't even describe!! But now, I feel at home. The locals are friendly, kenyan time (constant lateness) is agreeable and the scenary beautiful. Somehow everything looks good when sun drenched and surrounded by palm trees. Even the slums, derelict buildings and poverty stricken villages have an eery beauty when bathed in golden rays. I'm currently working in the Gede Special School with children with Cerebral Palsy and hearing impairments. Kenyan sign language is so fun! It's frustrating that I'm picking it up so quickly yet won't have a use for it back home. The HI children have the best sense of humour, and are all so amazing and bright and beautiful. It's devastating to think that they don't know this to be true. As for the cerebral palsy children, they've most definitely stolen my heart. They're kind, generous and way more patient than I can ever dream of being! When I can I'll post pictures so you can see them for yourselves. All the CP children look so much younger than their true age. When we arrive many are just slumped in their wheelchairs and covered in their own drool/waste. It's a sorry sight to say the least, but the school are doing the best they can with their exceedingly limited supplies. To say I'm being humbled through my time with these children is a gross understatement. I've already been challenged about so many things, and am being taught to see the world as they do - truely unique. The way the deaf kids care for the CP ones, and seeng the CP children clumsily signing speaks volumes. They are all so desperate to learn. When i arrived on Friday all the teachers were gone and the children left to play, yet a group of the deaf boys had me teaching them maths - definitely would not happen in the UK! I find it hard that despite the children's big dreams and hard-working attitudes many of their situations will remain the same. Despite the inital shock and how hard some situations are, I do love it here and love seeing God at work.

Updates

Updates always seem to take forever - I know they do on my blackberry anyway, so I'll try to keep this (relatively) brief.

My last 3 exams were very mixed. 1 good, 1 average, 1 absolutely awful! However it's been a blessing and a comfort to know that God's already got it planned out and it's in His hands, that if I miss my grades for med school He has something even better planned! (Not sure what that would be - but it's an exciting thought!) As usual exam season reduced me to a stressy, emotional wreck, living off caffeine and Lucozade Glucose Energy Tablets due to the numerous sleepless nights spent cramming. As usual, I've half-heartedly promised myself that next time my revision will be more organised. I say half-heartedly because I know the likelihood of this is similar to the likelihood of me NOT getting sunburnt in Kenya this summer.

Speaking of Kenya, in just a couple days I'll be boarding a flight to Nairobi before travelling to work in the God Our Father's Children Home near Watamu (nowhere near Nairobi!) and living locally. To say I'm excited would be a massive understatement, but I'm not expecting (or wanting) an easy ride. Actually, I'm not sure what I'm expecting. I want a challenge, an experience, something eye-opening. We'll see...

I've loved seeing God's hand in my plans for this summer (in hindsight at least). He's turned something I originally used to cheer myself up after a bad day into something I think I want to do for the rest of my life. Every pot-hole in the road to Kenya has been filled in (metaphorically of course). Although in the past 12 hours, with just days until I leave, my plans have been changed dramatically and still some of it isn't set in stone.

Over the past few months God has really taught me to trust completely in His plans, and proven over and over again how He ultimately knows best. From guys and universities to celebrating Father's day and volunteering in Kenya, God has been constantly reminding me that my plans are pants at best. So I'm excited to discover where/what I'll end up doing.

On a final note, apologies for the ever changing appearance of my blog. I haven't yet found a background/font/style I'm happy with... Proof of my indecisiveness!