Tales of Teacher Bethany and Other Short Stories.

I realised i havn't really written much about just what I'm up to and after all it's the little ins and outs of life here that make it what it is... so i thought i'd tell you a few short tales!

So i've been teaching/helping out at this pre-school called LCC-K (Limuru Children Centre Kamirithu branch i think it stands for, i guess anyway seeing as it's in Kamirithu. Thats been great fun. The idea of teaching freaked me out at first but it's actually really fun! One day i taught the kids colours with balloons which they loved. At the end after they'd done the colour by numbers i'd made for them the teacher decided i had to choose the best four pictures and those kids would get the four balloons as a prize (2 had already popped). It was so funny, the first kid, Kelvin i think it was, had full choice out of these 4 balloons. he comes up almost bursting with excitment and looks at the balloons and chooses not one of the 3 bright red, yellow or blue, fully blown up balloons but instead the tiny scrawny white one that the teacher had rather unsucsefully blown up! But he was so proud of himself! The kids all call me 'teacher Bethany' but they say Bethany with a soft 'th' like in there or that. I arrive in the morning in the car and they all run to the fence and peer through the gaps, beaming faces, waving hands chanting 'Gari gari!' (car). As soon as i get through the gate i'm greated with handshakes from all sides and cries of 'how are you!' 'How are you' seems to be programmed into every kid here from the moment they can speak. You just drive down the road and any children who see you shout it at you, that and 'mzungo' (white person). There was another funny time, this time at the other pre-school, Twinkle Twinkle Nursery school. I was just sat there with some of the girls and one starts to say every word she can think of in english with a few you's and me's and and's added in here and there. She just sat there for a good 5 or 10 minutes chatting complete nonsense very conversationally as if she was telling me about her weekend or something, she just talked like it was a real conversation but just like 'tap, water, me house and cup and you, you dog, car, hand. Me hand yes. Yes you dog me hand.' I don't know if that sounds as funny as it was at the time!

Another thing i have recently started doing is going on home visits with Care for Aids. Care for Aids is a really great project out here, i won't go into how it works but i go with the 2 workers to visit their clients in their homes. This is a pretty cool experience, you get to see the real kenyans, how they really live. Each home is different and each person has a different story but generally running throughout is a joy and peace and in many cases a trust in God in circumstances that in England would give you amble excuse to completely break down and give up on life. The same thing is evident in the women down in Kibera slum, they come to the biblestudies and sing and smile and tell you things that are happening to them that blow your mind. And the people at Jikaze, the Internally Displaced People, people who lost their homes and jobs and family and friends and everything in the post election violence in 2008. They have such joy still, and such satisfaction though they live in mud huts with no water, no electricity, barely enough food. We were talking today with Carmen about poverty and I thought about it in a different way to how i ever have before. Poverty is not necessarily the lack of decent material things but can be the lack of decent relationships and things. And so though many of these people are in poverty in a material way, they have so much more than many westerners in other ways. They have a joy and peace and satisfaction that i think many westerners will never have.... i hope that makes sense, its got me musing anyway.

Another place i have speant a lot of time is In His Image, the babies home. I've loved this place, you can't help it the babies are so delicious! It's been so great to see how the kids have developed in the past 3 months (I've been here that long already!). There are ones that can now push them around in their walkers, and the two older toddlers (the other 2 are gone now) are beginning to speak more. They are so much fun those two big boys! I miss Mark and Becky who have gone, Mark to be adopted and Becky to a great Uncle. But Stephen and Daniel, both 2, are still fun. The other day i arrived around 10.30am and went into their room where they'd just had a nap and they went crazy. Stephen was doing sumorsaults in his cot, i've never seen him so excited! So i took them outside to run off some steam! Daniels favorite game is to stand on the other side of this little hedge and we throw a ball back and forth to each other. Stephen preferes picking up the gravel and throwing it, sometimes at the car, a habbit i'm forever having to try and stop! The younger babies are all so cute too, except when they throw up on me. One once was sitting on the edge of my lap and was sick straight into my flip flop and i'd very literally put my foot in it before i realised! But for the most part it's an absolute joy being there!

I think i shall stop there... for now! But being here has been so great, i've loved every moment of it (except the times i was in bed feeling awful) and it's certainly given me a lot to think about and taught me much and gotten me out of the little bubble that was my life before! I can't believe i've only got three weeks left now! It's flown by so quickly but feels like i've been here forever at the same time! I know i will be back sometime though, back somewhere doing something and i can't wait!