On the Road Week One: Karibu!

Karibu (Welcome) to ATS!

Sitting at 6400 feet above sea level, at the base of Mt. Elgon, Kitale is a beautiful city.  The internet says that the population is 250,000, although I am told by residents that no-one actually knows the real population, as the results of the census taken ten years ago has not yet been released; to them the number is much lower.  It has a small town feel to it, with the mixture of nicely developed areas, densely populated sections, and also a rural area, with cows on the road, dirt roads, and room to breathe.  In short, after living in Accra (metropolitan population of 5 million) and close to Monrovia (population of 1.3 million), it feels just perfect for me. 

A portion of the breadbasket

This portion of the country is also known as the breadbasket of Kenya, due to the concentration of agricultural work going on here that provides much of the food for the country.   The weather is cool…at least to me.  It would reach approximately 75 F by noon, but rained every day by about 2 pm, dropping the temperature ten degrees.  The temperature rose again some days in the 70s again by evening, or would stay in the 60s, depending on how long the rains lasted.  They say that these rains are normally over by the beginning of September, so it is unusual to still have rain this late in the year.  [The team found it continually amusing that I was so cold.  I don’t know how long it will take this West African blood in me to adjust to cooler weather!  The good news is that I will be fine if I pack my winter clothes.]  Bob would have absolutely loved this weather. 

The Africa Theological Seminary (ATS) is on the outskirts of Kitale, on approximately ten acres of land, with an additional ten acres adjacent for future development; the land is currently being leased by farmers and used for growing maize and bananas.  ATS hosts approximately 300 students, all of whom are in ministry at the same time as working on their various degrees. 

 

Part of the ATS campus, including the house where I will stay.

The ATS (ICM-Kenya) team, along with Sheryl 
from the ICM-USA team.

The International Christian Ministry team was delightful.  There were actually two teams that I met – the ICM-USA team and the ICM-Kenya team.   I met some very kindred spirits on the ICM-USA team.  This is a very gifted group of leaders, deeply grounded in serving the Lord with their lives.  I know that I will learn a lot from them.

Part of the beautiful campus of ATS

The ICM-Kenya team was very welcoming and affirming of seeing the need to add Business as Mission as a course for their church leaders.  This is a young team of very educated and capable leaders, working with church leaders who are making a difference in the many villages and cities around Kenya and beyond.  While I was there, they hosted a two day alumni conference, focused on teaching Orality and the art of teaching the Bible through story-telling.  I had a chance to meet a number of pastors and church leaders, all of whom acknowledged that they are not doing anything to empower and equip their business members for the Marketplace, all of whom acknowledged that they tend to see their business members only in terms of donors, and all of whom extended an invitation for me to start the pilot project at their church!  There was great excitement about this concept, with many church leaders mentioning that they had never even considered this as a concept. I thank God for this affirmation.

The only disappointment in the whole trip to Kitale was learning that they don’t eat their food very spicy and plantains are not part of the regular diet, even though bananas are grown here.  However, I think I can deal with that!  Hot sauce will remedy the one, and I can definitely learn to live without plantains!

Road in front of the ATS Seminary...look familiar?

I plan to move to Kitale in mid-January and will start teaching at the beginning of February.  By mid-to-late February, I will travel out to start the pilot project.  At this time it looks like it may be to Busia, which is right on the Kenya/Uganda border, although it is very early to tell.  The Bishop of the Church in Busia, who is an alumni of ATS, is the head of sixteen churches, and is recommended highly by the ICM-Kenya team as a church leader who knows how to mobilize and support his people.  

Masai Mara

When I left Kitale, I was informed that our plane was late and that we would have to make a detour, delaying our arrival in Nairobi by about four hours.  I was delighted to then hear that our detour was to the Masai Mara, the large game reserve in south-western Kenya!  We flew in a small ten seat plane, and stopped twice in the Masai Mara, allowing me to see elephant, giraffe, ostrich, zebra, wildebeest (migrating to Tanzania), baboons, and impala!  What a treat!  Being able to fly low over the game reserve allowed me to see so much and I thank God for the free, albeit brief, safari experience!

As you receive this blog, I have left Kenya and am in Ghana.  I hope to report on week two next week. 

Elephants!

The beautiful countryside of Kenya

Update from West Africa

Tonight I am leaving for five weeks in five countries in Africa:  Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria, Côte d'Ivoire, and Liberia. It will be a pretty intense trip but I am very much looking forward to getting back.  Dana Boals, the Director of Global Partnerships from Partners Worldwide, will be joining me for the last three countries.  Here is a brief update of some of what has been going on over the past weeks.

The week before last was filled with Regional Facilitator meetings for Partners Worldwide.  In the picture (back row, left to right), we have Rudy (North America), me (West Africa), Martin (East Africa), Michael (Asia); front row, Tinashe (Southern Africa), Dave (Caribbean), and Bob (Latin America).  This is a very fun, thoughtful, and creative group and it has been fun to work with them!

Ghana:

The late president, John Atta-Mills

On July 24, President John Atta Mills of Ghana suddenly passed away.  The country mourned the loss of his leadership.  This is an election year for Ghana and President Mills was going to run for his second term.  Leadership smoothly passed to his vice-president, John Dramani Mahama who will also run in the election on December 7.  There have been some interesting challenges that have taken place in the country recently:  electricity, which was always unstable - going off usually once per day, sometimes for ten minutes, sometimes for ten hours - has gotten worse.  Additionally, a new policy came out that the banks are no longer to give US dollars, even if you have a US dollar account.  This puts a hardship on business members who travel and need US dollars to do business, forcing them to exchange their money to the Ghana cedi, and then exchange it back at a ForEx Bureau for US dollars, causing them a loss in the exchange. 

Hopeline Institute was approved for a Global Fund loan from Partners Worldwide in the amount of $150,000 USD for their high-impact entrepreneurs.  This is very exciting!  As the truly efficient team that they are, they received the funds on August 24 and had them all disbursed by August 31!  We thank God for this opportunity for business people in Accra to have a loan at a much more affordable rate and pray that God will bless these business owners.   Hopeline has also recently completed an intensive training for mushroom farmers and hopes to invest in those farmers who are baggers (seed developers), growers, and retailers.  As a lover of mushrooms, I'm very happy about this!  Both of the interns have left Ghana.  Emily Daher finished her year of service and returned to the States last week.  We thank God for her hard work and excellent service, and wish her God's blessings on her next endeavor!  Kim VandenAkker also returned to be with her boyfriend, Patrick, as it was recently discovered that he has bone cancer.  She hopes to return to Ghana to finish her internship, but we ask for your prayers for healing for Patrick.

LEAD, Liberia:  LEAD continues to do well and make progress on their goals.  The research farm has now been able to give out pig loans to farmers - nineteen piglets to nine farmers.  I will be traveling to Liberia at the end of October with Malcolm DeKryger, a pig farmer from Indiana, who will be advising and training LEAD farmers on best practices in pig raising.  Todd DeKryger, the integrated pest management expert who traveled with us last year to Liberia, will be joining us as well, and will be addressing crop farmers on raising feed for the pigs.  We are producing a high quality maize, moringa, and are starting to process palm nuts for pig feed.  In June, LEAD was able to give out $45,000 US in loans to about 150 farmers, who are in 15 cooperatives.  This is really exciting as we begin to see Liberia produce more and more of its own food!  We are still looking to build a training center on the research farm to be able to research new crops for Liberia and train farmers in best practices.  [If you missed the summer mailing that we did for that and still want to help out, please go to www.leadinliberia.net, and click on the link for the Farmer Field School.  We still have a long way to go to satisfy that need and keep farmers moving forward!]

ACLCP, Côte d'Ivoire:  The last time I wrote, I shared that Dea Lieu, the Director of ACLCP was able to return home after a successful kidney transplant in the US.  He has been hard at work, reconnecting with family, church, and friends, and is re-establishing the work of ACLCP after his nearly two year absence.  I will be joining them in mid-October to do some board training and address some organizational development issues.  However, as there have been conflicts between border towns of Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire, the border is currently closed to people (goods can pass through).  Since I usually drive from Monrovia to Danané, this presents a problem.  Please pray with me for favor from the embassy and those at the border to let us through!

PCEN, Nigeria:  I will also be spending several days in Nigeria, doing a training of trainers on our business training material. We will be going to the East Kambari Area (EKA) in order to see the work of Water Wins, one of our partners involved in well drilling, business development, and community development.  We are thankful that Jos reports quiet for the past couple of weeks and pray that the peace continues. We learned that the largest Nigerian airline (on which we booked our tickets) was grounded this past week, so we pray that we can make it in!

The blog may be quiet for a bit but I will update when I can!

Bliss

Last week was a stressful week.  The announcement that I was leaving Partners Worldwide and going to a new organization and a new part of Africa became very real for me, as well as for people who know and care about me.  I spent three days in regional planning meetings following the announcement, which felt surreal at best.

Bob's tree

By the time Sunday came, I had reached my limit of stress and needed to get away.  So, I decided to go spend some time with a loved one who is so very missed at this time.  I drove up to Bliss, MI (near Mackinaw City - right by Wilderness State Park) to be with Bob - or at least his remains.  We planted a red maple tree where we buried his ashes, so I spread out my blanket and lay beside that tree for a couple of hours.  (At this point, it is still "beside" the tree instead of "under" as it's not that big yet!)

And we talked.  Well, I talked.  And talked.  He did what he is good at - he listened.  At least, the wind listened.  I miss his wisdom.  I miss his discernment.  I miss his decisiveness.  I miss his intensity.  I miss his faith.  I miss his faith in me.  I miss his intense brown eyes looking into mine - checking in with how I'm really doing.  I miss holding his hand while we drive.  I miss being in that part of the world with him.  I miss the proximity of having someone nearby to talk about the mundane and the important.  And there have been some pretty important things going on in my life lately.

My view from beside the tree.

Some people have asked me what Bob would think of the house....or about my decision to move to Kenya...or to go to a whole new organization.  I wish I knew.  I can guess.  I can only guess.  I think he would think that the house is plain and like a box...but that it has good potential.  He would have hated all the work that has to be done on the house.  He would have loved to live in Kenya.  He believed in me and my ability to make things happen so I think he would have been okay with the change, but I don't know what he would think about International Christian Ministries or the concept of working with a seminary.

One thing about Bob is that he believed in me and what God is doing in and through me.  And he also reminded me often that there was very few things in his life that he felt called by God to do - God just didn't speak to him that clearly.  But, once he decided to do something, he was to do it as if called by God. 

Sturgeon Bay - one of our favorite beaches.

And that is what I now need to do.  Time has moved on.  This week it will be 2.5 years since Bob's death.  Both kids are in college and on their own.  I decided to buy this house.  I decided to move to a new ministry with a new position.  And now I must trust that God will work out for good the decisions that this child made, following prayer and consultation.