It’s been cabbages, cabbages, cabbages since you heard from me last (yes, I have realised that I mention them every time). The staff did a prolonged disappearing act when they went to Mombassa for 3 days last week. So yours truly was tied to the kitchen along with a load of the boys who had finished school (that’s Patrick and Mark from Class 8, Lewis and another Patrick in secondary). They are now very pleased with themselves as they have well and truly proved that boys can cook. I don’t quite get the girls’ logic when they started this slander campaign, as both the cooks here are men. I quite enjoyed myself though as, thankfully, it was a goat free kitchen. We also have a peeler courtesy of Kate, which is by far my favorite utensil, it makes things sooo much quicker.

However after 3 days of boiling beans and crying over onions it was a relief to get to Naomi’s for Bible study. Naomi, Jeana and I have started making a regular thing of meeting for Bible study and it’s been really good to sit and talk about God. I’ve not done very much of it since I arrived. At the moment we’re looking at Romans. Well, Naomi and me are as Jeana has now run to the coast for 2 months.

On Friday I attended yet another carol service, this time at KEMU (Kenya Methodist University, the E is just so it makes a word). The kids weren’t allowed to go because of the fiasco before the Teacher’s College where they didn’t practice their dance and were about an hour late. Instead I went with Naomi and we almost embarrassed ourselves by wearing very similar clothes. One of her friends thought we were coming in some kind of uniform. It was good, we even got to watch some salsa dancing which is something of a rarity in this neck of the woods. I think most people there thought it was a bit too risqué for a Methodist carol service but I’m finding it hard to see what all the fuss is about, by British standards it was very tame. We left before the end so I avoided drinking tea! Hurrah! We walked out at 11 because we were both going to sleep.

I also escaped MCH on Saturday to have a movie night with Naomi. We watched ‘How to loose a guy in 10 days’ complete with popcorn then decided to go to bed at 10 because we were both dropping off!

I then went to church with Naomi (or Miami as James thought I called her). She goes to a church plant of the Nairobi Chapel called Meru Community Chapel. It’s quite a young church (as in how long it’s been there, not the age of the congregation) but it’s certainly the most lively of the 3 I’ve been to. I really liked it there. It actually felt like people were worshipping rather than falling asleep and I can still remember what the sermon was about! This week they had a visiting preacher from South Africa who’s a traveling evangelist and came all the way to Kenya in the most clapped out car I’ve ever set eyes on. It really was evidence that miracles still happen. He was also white. I’m beginning to have a certain amount of sympathy for all the people who stare at me when I walk around town as I’ve also started staring at other white people on the rare occasions that I come across them. A white nun in a pick-up truck waved at me the other day and it was really weird to see someone with proper white hair.

It’s not only the staff and myself who’ve been perfecting the art of invisibility. Four of the boys went to be circumcised on Saturday and still haven’t come back, no-one seems to know when they’ll turn up again. It brought about an ‘interesting’ conversation with Sammy (the cook) who was absolutely incredulous (like, he actually didn’t believe me) that it’s not part of British culture. He’s decided that all the blokes must just keep it secret from the women!

My Granma has been asking about the kids here and it occurred to me that it’s pretty stupid of me not to tell you all. Therefore you are in for a lecture on MCH. Ahem.

In 1999 MCH opened with 12 children (10 boys, 2 girls) from the feeding project they had been running for the previous year or two. It has since grown. There are now a load more buildings (with 2 more on the way) and some swings (yes Fiona, our very own swings!), a roundabout and a slide (the most important features obviously). There are now 32 kids (21 boys and 11 girls) aged between 7 and 18ish. The youngest is called Mwendwa like me, there are 3 Patricks and even in Kenya you can’t escape from Dave’s and Chris’s! They still confuse me with who’s related to who but there’s a fair few brothers, sisters and cousins. I think you could probably link everyone up if you were patient enough. I’m going to try and get photos so you can see who everyone is and what the place looks like but it might take me a while to find a way of putting them on the computer. Don’t hold your breath!

Siobhan