Hope Woman's Ministry - Africa 2010

Home again, home again!

2010-03-22T22:43:00.000-07:00

We finally made it home! After 30 hours of traveling we arrived in Memphis at 5 pm. We got to go to Amsterdam and take a tour of Anne Frank's house. It was incredible. The fresh dutch air was a nice break from the yucky air plane stench. I can say for everyone that we are so glad to be back with our families, but we all miss what we experienced over there. It was life changing, and life here can become so mundane. I pray that being there will teach us all to live each day to the full and always take adventures.
Love all,
Hayley and the Team

PS. I will try to put some pictures up when I get them all organized, but it may take a week or so.

Saturday- Spring Valley

2010-03-20T22:07:00.000-07:00

Oh, so hard to believe today (Saturday) was our last full day in Kenya! Today we went to Spring Valley Church and School, located about an hour's drive from the Guest House. Saturday is "market day" in Nairobi and there were many, many buses on the roads. The drive was exciting to say the least! Praise God for Steve and George...two of the best drivers in the world. Eric, Zachary, Steve and George have been our constant companions during our visit in Kenya. We have been very safe and have learned many interesting facts about this country from them.

At Spring Valley, we participated in a mission event with the women and enjoyed helping the children with Bible verses, songs and games. The women and children have much joy in their hearts and all seem to be gifted singers and dancers. The smallest children dance in the aisles as the adults sing. Pastor Nganga and his wife, Alice, are gracious hosts who refreshed us with morning tea, and served us lunch as well.

Tomorrow we visit Parklands Church for worship services. We will then return to the Guest House to pack for our trip home. We will arrive in Memphis, Monday, March 22nd, on Delta Flight #DL0257, with an ETA of 5:20 PM CDST. We don't expect to update the blog again until we are home. So until then...may God bless you, and we love you all.

The past few days!

2010-03-19T10:17:00.000-07:00

Hello all!!!!

I know we have been out of comunication for a few days, but no worries because we were having the time of our lives! There is so much to tell you about, so many experiences that are almost indescribably amazing.

As most of you know, we have been on a safari since Wednesday morning (Tuesday night Memphis time). It took around five hours to get there from our guesthouse in Nairobi, and we arrived at our lodge, Keekorok, on Wednesday around 1. We ate a filling lunch, got our rooms, and then the adventure began.
The lodge is located in the middle of a preserved park, the Masai Mara (covering over 14,000 acres). We climbed in our vans around 4 in the afternoon, safari gear on and camersa in hand, and headed out into the wild, open spaces. Most of us had no idea what to expect, and we all could not believe what we saw. There were more animals than we ever imagined we would see. There were elephants, giraffes, zebras, lions, impalas, gazels, buffalo, ostrich, cheetahs, lepards, wildabeast, hippos, crocodiles, and suprisingly so many more. It was an unreal eperience to say the least. The sun was just setting, and the hills seemed to be singing with beauty. We took billions of pictures, got charged by an elephant, spotted the almost unsightable lepherd, and we were still were eager for more adventure. We could not get enough. We pulled into the lodge two hours later in awe of God's power and might humbled by what we had just seen.

We got great sleep that night and went on three more game drives on Thursday. On the second time out, we went to a Hippo pond right on the boarder of Kenya and Tanzania. There were park rangers waiting for us, and we were pleasantly suprised to find our bus doors open. We got to step on the same ground the wild animals walk on every day! The park ranger/soldier took us on a tour around a large river filled with the crocodile and hippos. It was again an unreal and unexpected experience. The tour took about an hour, and none of us wanted it to end. Not only did we get to step on the same ground as the wild animals do, we got to step into Tanzania! We were such women, squeeling and taking billions of pictures and reluctantly headed back to the lodge for the rest of the afternoon allowing ourselves to process what we had experienced in the past week back in Nairobi. There was so much in each of our minds that is was refreshing to be able to journal and talk about everything God had brough us through in the past week. We got some sun, relaxing with the monkeys and Masai men, and were able to let our bodies have some time off.

This morning (Thursday night Memphis time), we got in our vans to make the bumpy journey back to the guesthouse. We all said that we were so thankful for that break in the week. It is Friday night now, here, and we are all feeling much better and are mentally and physically ready for tomorrow. We miss all of our family and friends back home very much! But please pray we spend these last couple of days focused and fully devoted to the people we meet.

We love you all!
Hayley and the team

PS: Sorry about not being able to put pictures on so far, but the internet is very slow which makes it hard to upload them. We will try again tomorrow night. Lala Salama! (Good Night!)

Kibera

2010-03-16T07:41:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!!
We are all doing really well but have a lot on our hearts. Today we went to Kibera (the second largest slum in the world). It is about half the size of Central Park with 1 million people living in it. We visited two different schools- one was a school that Hope has been walking a long side for muliple years now, and another one that Hope has just recently discovered. The kids were so joyful in the middle of mass chaos. Waste was running through the roads, and the streets were about the width of a van. The smell was hard to miss, but the excitement was unmistakable. The children were being taught just like they would be in the states. They learned songs, the alphabet, numbers. They were so smart and so eager to learn. One little boy pulled me aside and counted to 100 for me with both sides of his mouth reaching to his eyes. The teachers were so sweet and had so much love for the kids. Pastor Amos ran the place with such order. I speak for everyone when I say we loved seeing what God is doing in such a deprived place, but our hearts broke at the same time.
We stayed there all morning then went to Amani Ya Ju (meaning peace from above) for lunch. It is a place that takes in women who have been abused or without a job from all over Africa and given them a safe and Godly envirnment to work in. They do have a website that describes more indepth their mission. It was such a peaceful time for us.
We came back to the guesthouse around 3, and some of the women who sponser Compassion children from around here got to meet their kids! They came to our guesthouse and got to play and talk in the courtyard for a few hours! They were so blessed to meet all of the kids!
We are packing and resting now because tomorrow morning we leave for the Safari! We will not have computer access until friday night (friday around noon Memphis time). We are all really looked forward to that time. So much is in our heads right now, and we really need time to process it. Love you all!! Im going to try to post some pictures here in just a second. I hope it works! Thanks for all your prayers! We are really feeling God's indescribable peace.
Romans 5:1-5
Hayley and the team! :)

Monday- March 15

2010-03-15T11:22:00.001-07:00

Hey everyone!
Sorry but this will probably be very short. Today was a long and tiring but good day. Yesterday evening we went to the orphanage to visit and say hello. Today, we went back there to have a women's confrence and spend time with the children. The women there loved the testimonies that were shared by the team, and the children were a blast! We are all really tired. It is around 9:30 here, and we are about to go to bed. Please pray for a good night sleep for all of is. Joy is not feeling well at all. She has a bad cold and is worried that it is getting worse. Jenny is feeling much better though! I hope you are all doing well. We miss our family and friends a bunch and will try to blog in more detail tomorrow (hopefully with pictures). Love you all!!!
Hayley and the team

We have arrived!

2010-03-14T00:56:00.000-08:00

Jambo Rafikis!
We arrived safe and sound to Nairobi at around 9:30 last night. Thankfully, all of our bags made it (even with some crazy close flight connections). Our flights were very, very long but not terrible. Pam got a little queezy on the last flight coming into Nairobi, but she thinks it was from eating only plane food for 24 hours. Steve, our driver, was waiting with a huge smile when we walked through customs to claim our bags. It was so comforting to see someone there welcoming us and wanting us to be safe and well.
We came to the guesthouse, got into our rooms, and unpacked. It was around midnight before we all went to bed, but we are for the most part settled and comfortable.
Please keep Jenny in your prayers. She has been upset to her stomach this morning. Pam stayed at the guesthouse with her while the rest of us went to church. She is starting to feel better, but she is still really weak.
We went to church at Parklands Baptist, just right around the corner from where we are staying. It was a wonderful service, and Pastor Wachira (sp?) showed us the facilities after the service was over. We just got back to the guesthouse and plan to go to lunch then to an orphanage in Pipeline in about an hour or so. We are all needing sleep but so very excited to be here finally.
This is a much shorter trip than last year, so we are trying to get in as much as possible. Please pray we all get good sleep tonight so we can be ready to go tomorrow.
We miss all our family and friends back home very much! But like I said, this is a pretty short trip and we will be back home before you know it. Love you all! Talk to you soon :)
Hayley and the rest of the team.

ON OUR WAY

2010-03-08T16:30:00.000-08:00

In a few short days our group of 11 women will be leaving on a true adventure. As we get closer to departure many things come into play-fear of leaving our family, fear of forgetting something, work gets crazy, school gets crazy and so on... and we all have to put those fears aside and remember that the thing is this is God's trip! We are representing our church, our women's ministry and our families but God is in charge and knows each and every detail of this trip. We are blessed to have an awesome prayer team behind us and they have sent their prayers in front of us as well. Thank you to Hope Church and our families for allowing us this privlege to serve Christ in this beautiful country. Follow us as we go on this journey-we will try to keep you posted as much as possible. I fell so grateful and blessed to serve alongside these women in this mission endeavor.