Hello Everyone!
Well, WE DID IT!! We completed the walk to the best of our
ability and I think we’re halfway there money-wise!! It was an adventure of all
sorts. I’d co-planned it and yet I still went in unsure of a lot of things but
they all worked themselves out in the end. It was quite a week. The people: 10
learners (2 from class 7 & and 8 from class 8), Wairia & Thairo
(teachers), Gishoki (our cook), our driver and me. The week: 26-30th
May 2014. The what? Our ‘Walk for a Bus’. The How? Read on…
The craziness began last Saturday. We still hadn’t
decided if we were going to leave on Saturday or Sunday and there was a lot
that I was stressing out about. On Friday afternoon, Wairia, my co-teacher, was
in Nyahururu, and he was supposed to be confirming our vehicle for the week. I
was here in Sipili and was supposed to be talking to someone to confirm our
place to stay on Sunday and see if we could extend the invitation to Saturday. Neither
of us had the conversations we wanted nor neither could get in contact with the
people we were trying to reach. It was rough. Saturday rolls around and by the
afternoon I’d assumed we would leave Sunday because as far as I knew we didn’t
have a vehicle or place to sleep. Nope, that wasn’t in the cards. Wairia called
me at 3:15pm and said to pack everything because a matatu was coming to pick us
up from the school. The kids were scattered everywhere because they were off
collecting funds from the market in town but we got them all in one place,
packed and ready to go. We pulled out of Sipili around 4:30 with 10 learners, Thairo,
another teacher and myself as well as Gishoki our cook. We had our book bags, 6
mattresses, some buckets and our banner and that was it. We met Wairia in
Nyahururu where we hopped onto another matatu and rode off into the sunset to
Nanyuki although it didn’t feel like a fairytale. I still wasn’t sure what we’d
gotten ourselves into but I was glad we were on our way and it was actually
happening! We pulled up to the Likii Special School for the Mentally Challenged
around 9:30pm where Wairia had called and they said it was fine to come. Our
school had stayed there for a week during Games a few months ago and so our
kids and their kids knew each other and it was fine. The special schools here
really look out for one another and are always willing to lend a helping hand
to other special schools, it’s really neat. We got fed ugali and kales and
slept in 2 separate classrooms. Side note about the classrooms, they were
recently built and had a lot of new devices like a trampoline, toy shelf and
were painted with tons of visual aids however, the classes had no lights or
electricity.
Sunday came bright and early and after drinking
our porridge we left for the same Catholic Church that the students had
attended during Games last term. We attended the first service and were allowed
to say a little blurb about ourselves but not pass the donation plate around.
We stood outside the gate afterwards and got quite a few donations though. Then
we went back for round 2 and the second service was much better. Waria talked
for a bit longer and then had two of the students come and say their thanks.
And then the kids signed a song while the church sang along and it was such a
cool experience!! Next they had the donation baskets in front so people could
come and give and we were so blessed by donations in that service! It was
incredible! Other things about church I noticed was that there was a music conductor,
which I don’t think, I’ve seen since arriving here. The church was humungous
and had a small choir in front with the conductor and she was really enthusiastic.
The artwork at this church was also probably the coolest I’ve ever seen in a
church. In the front the wall was extremely tall and they had this crazy
awesome painting. There was a pale yellow sun swirling around on the top and
the earth on the bottom in a semi-circle. The earth was textured and colored
with the prefect mix of green, blue and white. And then in the middle was a
copper (maybe?) statue of Jesus elongated so that his feet were in Africa and
his arms outstretched overhead to the sky. I took a picture which I’ll post on
Facebook next week, but basically, really cool. The last thing was something I
learned during the sermon. Now the whole service-both services-were in
Kiswahili-2.5hours times 2 services-a long time-but the priest said a handful
of sentences in English and this was one of them, my take-home: “Don’t kill
your brother, that doesn’t make sense. If you feel the need to kill, come here
and we’ll take you to Somalia and you can kill Al-Shabaab”. Yep, that was all I
got out of the sermon. Hahahaha oh man. After church we relaxed all afternoon
getting ready to begin the walk the next morning.
Monday. Fun day. Walk Day!! We woke up early,
ate, packed our bags and waited for the a-ok from Gikunda, our headmaster, to
head over to the Education Offices to get officially flagged off. We walked
over around 10 and by 11 we were starting with a few speeches and a prayer.
There was maybe 5-6 high up Education people there as well as someone from KBC
News. It was pretty exciting! We walked out of the Education offices with our
banners held high, ready to make some money towards our bus! Our system was receipt
tickets. Our students each carried a bunch of cards that said ‘I supported
Sipili School for the Deaf to buy a school bus’ and then we had for 50Ksh,
100Ksh, 200Ksh, 500Ksh and 1,000Ksh. The students would take their cards and
show people them and then if they wanted to donate they could choose how much.
Soon after walking around together in a large group, we split into smaller
groups to cover more ground. I had 3 students with me and I would walk around
holding one of the smaller posters while the students went up to everyone and
then if the person had a question, the students could call me over. I will say
that system only worked if they knew English and could understand me with my
scratchy voice but it worked well enough. That was the other thing of Monday, I
woke up with a pretty sore throat and walked around all day with a fever,
splendid way to start the week. So while walking around I met an older Italian
man who studied US History in university and loves America. He has lived in
Kenya for 3 years but it planning to go back to Italy soon because business is
tough. He says he hopes to visit the US soon too because he really misses it.
We reminisced. He told me he has crossed the continental US 4 total times using
Greyhound twice, a car and a train and I found out that not only had he heard
of Lancaster PA-he’s visited there because he finds Amish culture fascinating.
I did not expect to find someone who has been to Lancaster while I was in
Nanyuki that’s for sure! The other interesting person of the day was meeting a
lady at a coffee shop who knew Sign Language because she learned it in college
and now hopes to come and visit our school at some point! Cool beans! Lunchtime
rolled around and we got a free lunch from the high up Education people and
realized we’d made a good amount just in the morning from Nanyuki town! We sold
tickets from 11-4:30 before hopping into the matatu to head to our next school
to sleep. We’d planned to walk on the road a bit on that first day but we
walked around town so long and knew we were going to have to cook dinner at the
next school so our time was limited. We arrived at Talent Academy, a hearing
primary school for Classes 1-5, about 5km off the main road. It felt very
remote. We slept in the classrooms with us girls sharing 2 mattresses between
the 5 of us. The students cooked dinner of ugali, cabbage and meat and it
turned out very well. This was the only place we had to cook because it wasn’t
a boarding school and it all worked out. That night was the worst of my
fever/cold but I knew that if I could make it through a night sharing a 3in
thick mattress with 2 other girls in the cold higher elevation of Nanyuki, I
could make it through the walk while feeling sick.
Tuesday morning we had an assembly with all of
our students combined. We talked about our students and how they were just as
capable as the hearing students at this school, just that they communicated
differently and we sang some songs for each other as well as prayed together.
They walked us to their gate, wished us well and we were off. We went to Naro
Moru town first and then we walked on the road for about 2 hours before
reaching our next town, Chaka. In Chaka town it was cool because we met a Deaf
carpenter there. He even remembered one of our girls when she was a Class 1-2
girl at her old school. The kids loved being able to talk to him and story with
him about things happening in town and his carpentry work. That night we went
to Mary Immaculate All Girls Primary School to sleep. It’s a primary school for
classes 4-8 only and it was a big school. They had 276 girls, all-boarding and
it was so different. Their compound was beautiful and everything was so nice.
The girls also were so excited to meet our 4 girls and show them everything.
They were all very eager to learn sign language and were so helpful in showing
them where to eat, bathe, hang out and sleep. I slept with our girls in one of
the dorms. It was a dorm for all of the class 4 & 5 girls-had about 40-and
was the smaller dorm. The other 2 held around 150 I think. I did get a warm
water bucket bath that night in my own room, which was the highlight of my
evening. Twas a bit funny because I was given these 2 small beach pails with
warm water and had to kneel on the ground at an awkward angle to get all of my
hair wet (something they don’t have to worry about) to wash it but it worked
out and the warm water was so wonderful. I found out I had a 101.12 temperature
that night and so after eating more ugali and kales for dinner, I went to sleep
before all of the girls had gotten back from their nightly study session. Such
a night owl I am J
