Hellooooo every body!

Here's a few stories for you from Kenya.

On Saturday we helped Gloria throw a party for the dispensary staff and their families. Early that morning we saw a man bringing three goats past our house. We found out that was lunch! Sara and Melissa are not big goat fans...but Dieta thinks goat tastes great. Melissa just didn't want to hear the poor goats dying. Traditionally, the Samburu suffocate their animals to kill them, and talk to them the whole time, something like "I'm sorry that I have to kill you but I'm really hungry..." But there were going to be a few Muslims at the party, so the goats were killed the Muslim way, with a knife.
We had all sorts of fun at the party: water balloon toss, musical chairs, potato sack races, three legged races, tug-o-war. All of these took place on the gravel driveway, and all the kids were barefoot! Kids here are tough. We brought some long balloons with us, so Dieta made very silly balloon hats for all the little kids. When we put hats on the first few kids everyone couldn't stop laughing at how funny it was.
The party was great because it broke the ice with all the kids, and it was great having a chance just to hang out with the people. Community! Manyera! (Thats how you would say it in Samburu. Ke supati el manyera? = how's your community doing?)
Later on Saturday evening we ate the hugest sweet potato we have ever seen for supper, and Dieta made lefse. In Africa! Hooray!

We brought three soccer balls along with us because we heard that everyone loves playing soccer in Africa. A few days ago Amin, our faithful tour guide/teacher/translator/friend told us that he had just been elected coach for the town's soccer team. We told him we brought some soccer balls that he could use, so he invited us to a game on Sunday afternoon.
It turns out this was a bigger deal than we thought. No one in town had a soccer ball, and Amin was wondering how he was going to teach soccer with out balls to practice with. The soccer game started out with a meeting to introduce the new soccer team, and to thank us for blessing them with the balls. They were so greatful! They had been praying about the soccer team and then we showed up with what they needed. Pretty cool. God's pretty awesome. Then they played soccer, we watched and played with the kids, and tried to be sneaky and get a good picture of a warrior (they're so cool...) but we failed. Thats our goal for this week. Picture of a warrior.

Last week we went for a hike. Sara forgot sunscreen and Dieta used expired sunscreen, so they both burned pretty bad. Their burns have just started peeling...which is something you don't see very often in Africa. Everyone is shocked when they see our peeling skin, and we have to assure them that we're fine and it doesn't hurt...and some of the kids help pick off the dead skin. Hehe. Funny kids.

We're still trying to learn the language...but its so hard. Melissa and Dieta are teaching piano lessons. Thats pretty funny, but they seem to be getting it. Tomorrow we get help with a mobile clinic...weighing babies and things like that. Woohoo!
There's just a few more days left in Arsim...and we're squishing quite a bit into those days. The best times are when we're just hanging out drinking tea with one of the families in town.

Please pray for...strength and patience. Energy. Pray that discomfort won't distract us from fully enjoying our time here. And continue praying for health.
Ashe Oleng (thankyou!)