You know you are in Kenya when...

...there are Maasai guarding your gate

...you can buy 18 quail eggs for £2 in the supermarket

...there is no power in the office two mornings in a row

...you come back to find traditional medicine drying on the driveway

...there is no internet connection in the office

...you spend 9 hours a week learning Swahili

...the songs you sing in church sound different

...the matatu (a minibus which transports people) behind you gets fed up waiting in the queue and goes head on into the oncoming traffic

...the pavements are made of earth

...you are sitting out in the garden in 30 degrees heat at lunchtime on Saturday!

Been here 2 weeks - rapidly getting into the swing of things - making lots of friends.  Learning to read and speak Swahili.  Getting to know colleagues at Philemon (more in next post).  Feel very privileged to be here and being able to work with prison and throughcare ministry.

March of Hope

What are you doing on September 24th?  That's the day I will be Walking/Cycling between Saughton Prison in Edinburgh to Polmont Young Offenders Institute near Falkirk.  A 20+mile journey along the Union Canal.  Its to raise money for the work of the Philemon Foundation in Kenya. Philemon UK supporters will be doing a March of Hope in London on the same day. Philemon works with prisoners and ex-offenders in a variety of practical and supportive ways which helps to transform lives.  It also helps people to reintegrate into their communities.  This is the organisation I spent time with when I was out in August and will return to work with them in November this year.  Please support the great ministry they do by clicking on the button below!

Introducing Kahawa Farmers

Rev Alfred Kanga, Rev Douglas Njoka, Sheena Orr, Peter Maura, Rev Donald Scott.

Kahawa Farmers is the name of the congregation that I have been given as my home congregation by Nairobi North Presbytery. During the last 3 weeks I have been worshipping with them and getting to know some of the elders including Peter Maura, the Session Clerk. Rev Douglas Njoka is the minister - a lovely, gracious man. He knows Edinburgh having studied at New College for a year in the 1980's. The Presbytery Clerk, Rev Kanga has been very helpful in releasing me to work with in prison ministry. And Rev Donald Scott from my home Presbytery of Falkirk came out to check I would be in good hands!

The church is situated 15 kms to the north of the city and is in a coffee (kahawa) growing area and just 1 km away from Kamiti Maximum security prison. Three services are held on Sunday - An English service 8.30-10.00; a Swahili Service - although most of it is actually in Kikuyu - from 10-12.30 ish...... there is also a youth service going on concurrently with 100+ young people in addition to the very well attended Sunday School. I have been impressed by the involvement of people in all aspects of the service particularly young people who get up and lead worship as well as extempore prayers. I have been very warmly welcomed and look forward with great anticipation to making this my spiritual home for the next few years.

Mombasa to Mara

Angus, Euan, Niall and Aidan 
relaxing
 in the Indian Ocean

Arrived in Kenya in early July for 3 weeks holiday with the whole family plus Angus, a friend of Aidan's, who was coming out to see where Aidan is going to be living and going to school.  After a few days in Nairobi we headed down to the coast.  What we thought was going to be a 6 hour journey ended up being 10.5 hours on a very busy road.  All the containers arriving at the port in Mombasa are put on lorries which then c...r...a...w...l along the road between Mombasa and Nairobi and back.  The whole journey is stop-start as cars try to overtake on a single carriageway.  It is not uncommon to be forced off the road as a 'matatu' - mad minibus - comes tearing towards you with lights flashing.  The road drops from 6,000ft in Nairobi to sea level at Mombasa with lots of changes of scenery as you go down the escarpment.  The temperature also heats up - rather welcome as being the middle of winter in the southern hemisphere it can be very chilly in Nairobi. In fact we have rarely had a sunny day since arriving. One is not surprised to learn that  Nairobi was originally chosen as a place to settle because its weather is like Britain's!

Zebra in sight

A week later we went to the Masai Mara where we had an amazing time seeing animals.  Herds of buffalo, zebra, giraffe, elephant, antelope, zebra.  Warthog with their funny little tails in the air, hyenas, leopard, thousands of vultures circling over the Mara as they prepared to gorge on yet another carcass of wildebeest or zebra that didn't make it across the river.  And the most amazing thing - a lion kill just 4 metres away.  We all watched with bated breath as a lion crouched behind a bush - we then realised it was eyeing up a young zebra that was walking past with its mother totally unaware of the lions presence. We watched with horror and awe as the female lion sprung out grabbing the young zebra around the neck and dragging it to the ground.  The mother zebra was absolutely distraught standing for a good 5 minutes staring and braying loudly as she watched the lion drag her baby away.  I wasn't dry eyed either. I know its nature but to see something so powerful happen in front of your eyes is rather overwhelming. No photo of the kill I'm afraid as I was too stunned to take pictures!  

 At night we returned to the 'bush camp' - luxury tents complete with beds and solar lighting.  The camp was on the edge of the escarpment above the Mara with amazing view over the plains below.  A trip of a lifetime.

Bag packing

Packing suitcases is always a big challenge - what do you put in?  what do you leave behind?  what is indispensable?  what isn't really needed?  I am always intrigued when I return from a trip to see what never got used. I suppose I am one of those people who puts things in 'just in case'.  But as I leave for Kenya on this trip I am having to think about three different types of journey - and I am not sure whether the task is made any easier by the fact that I have just discovered that we can take two 23kg suitcases per person. O the choice of what to take and what to leave! Most immediately there is the family holiday to consider.  That part is easy - swimsuit, mask and snorkel, cotton clothes, sandals, bird book, binoculars (yes I am a birdwatcher!) .  But then there is my 4 week secondment to the Presbyterian Church of East Africa and to Philemon Kenya.  Will I need any books to help prepare sermons?  Better take Common Order me thinks.  It's a funny feeling leaving my library behind. I have been so immersed in books over the past few years and now I will be standing in a foreign country, miles from Scotland with nothing but the Bible and all I have ingested through years of study and placements.  Then there is the actual move out to Kenya which I will be making later in the year.  What can I take out now that I might need later?  My youngest son, Aidan, will be starting school in Nairobi in August and he is packing all his worldly goods into 2 suitcases.  What baggage we accrue as we go through life.  In fact one of the good things about moving is that you get a chance to throw out all the junk that you never use or wear.  Preparing for moving to Kenya is also an opportunity to look at what I will find most useful in all the training I have undertaken and what bits I may end up leaving aside.  As circumstances change different skills and attitudes are needed at different times.  This can be unsettling but the lure of a new place, new people, new situations always outweighs any reservations I might have.  I have found it is the same with my faith as well.  As new questions arise, as I face new situations, as I meet others and listen to their point of view I have a chance to reflect on what baggage I have been carrying around from the past, what is useful and what needs thrown out. So my cases are packed - but only for the journey. Its not good to pack things away for too long.

Wot? No guidebook?

When I started training for the ministry I knew that it had to be a step at a time.  I had no big vision of where God was calling me.  I had no certain answers as to what God was calling me to.  All I knew was that God had called me to follow a certain path and that my task was to follow obediently.  I had vague notions about being on the edge - and working in team.  But that was about it.  Now as I look back over the past few years I see how what seemed disparate strands have all come together in a rich tapestry of experience infused with a passion for ministry to people affected by imprisonment - inside and out, themselves and their families.  There is no guidebook for this sort of work.  It is something that  grows organically - through relationship, through opportunities - making them and responding to them, through praying and listening to that still small voice which suggests ridiculous things.

So here I am with whole new vistas opening up in front as I stand amazed at the way, without any orchestration on my part, so many things, people, situations, events ...  are falling into place as I move towards ordination.  And there may be no guidebook on what lies ahead but I know a good guide...