Sunday School, handshakes, and Muzungu-ness

Dearest ones,

I hope that this blog entry finds you well. I am doing fine, I have been very tired for the last few days, but mostly because I have decided to stay up really late and watch movies for the last two nights. So it was a bad decision. But otherwise, Kakamega is good. The climate is good, cool in the mornings and evening and hot during the day. My farm is starting to look wow! The corn is tall, the beans are red, the spinach is like spinach, and the cucumbers are many. Soon we will be harvesting peanuts, something that i am very excited about.

Since my last post many things have happened. i have attempted to learn several popular Kenyan dances, all of which have failed horribly. I have been attempting to learn the dance moves of Rose Muhando (a popular Christian artist - youtube it, parts of it are crazy) but they are impossible.

I had the opportunity to travel to the Musudzuu Division two weekends ago in order to lead a Divisional Youth Seminar and Youth Leaders' Workshop for all of the youth of the division. This was a really good weekend, but was very tiring. It started on Friday with about 100 youth leaders coming in order to learn about Sunday School leadership and program. The TYS (my boss) and I have decided that Sunday School is a major need in our Territory. Most Sunday Schools are boring and formal, so we are attempting to revive the Sunday Schools in our Territory, which is proving to be more difficult then expected. These youth leaders were very receptive and said that they learned a lot and are planning to make great changes.

We visited a Salvation Army school and I am quite certain that I have never been stared at more in my life then I did by those children; it made me feel very awkward. The place where we were was very rural, and most of these young children had never seen a muzungu (whitey) face to face before, let alone touch one. So every single child wanted to greet me. They wanted to shake my hand and say "how are you?" which they repeat over and over again. So i created a mass handshaking system where i shook about 40 hands at a time, in order to make it through the 300 students of the school in a relatively short period of time. On Saturday, we were with all of the youth. There were about 600 youth there to worship and learn from us. We sang, danced, and taught them and then went on a huge crusade. We marched for 10 kilometers, 5 miles, each way and then held a very wonderful open air, and then returned. At the end of the 10 mile trek of dancing, i was quite tired, but the youth were all very happy. They even stayed up until midnight singing and dancing. All they need is a Yamaha keyboard that plays drum beats and they go on for hours.

On Saturday, the 4th of July, I marched in two parades. But sadly, neither was for American Independence. One was for a Union Organization and one was for a mass group of police and army personel. Luckily this gave me the chance to learn the difference between the uniforms of police, APs, MPs, Forest Department, Prison Guards, and others, but of course I have forgotten most of them. After the two parades, the band went and played in a memorial service and then did home visitations. It was a very long but very good day, i learned a lot of Kiluhya Traditional songs.
The following day I led Sunday School at my corps and tried to make all of the youth act like lions (simba), but they wouldnt. There was only one boy who tried to act like a scary lion and the face he made literally scared me a little bit. I then went to a soccer game which was the district championship for High School teams. There is a Salvation Army school near my office which I often visit and both the girls team and the boys team made it into the finals. This was an amazing thing for them because they are small and new. The teams that they played were big and old. But our team (called Kakamega Township) did very well, but sadly lost. However, the next day on the National News they interviewed the principal of the team that one and he made a reference to a "Salvation Army Muzungu" who was in Army uniform and was rooting for Township. Then the people on TV made fun of me. I was quite proud to be known as "the white man in all white" (which is our sunday uniform, which is quite schnazy).

We have been planning many things for next year; including the calendar, budget, youth events, trainings, and a Youth Congress.

I have been struggling with certain things and could really use prayer. I have been lonely and have been feeling homesick. Also, many of our programs have been changed by the leadership, which is frustrating and difficult.

Also, I taught the TYS the word "finna" and hopefully he will continue to use it.

Please pray for:

-Territorial Finances

-For me to work well with my leadership

-Patience

-Loneliness
-Rain

Much love y'all,

Justin