Christmas in Kenya, certainly one I'll never forget! Christmas eve we had an overdul house, people sleeping in the living room on sofas and the floor. There are usually only a few people at the house this time of year apparently. Some people arrived back from safari that day, and were keen to join us on the feeding programme Christmas day so stayed the night. Usually there would be maybe 5 or 6 programme on the tour, yesterday, 15 volunteers, plus Jack and Dan from Kibera and the pastor who had left the church service to his wife to be with us and the families. A fantastic turn out, thank you to everyone who came!
Christmas eve we got some drinks in to celebrate, and listened to Christmas songs in the house whilst I wore my recently purchased Santa outfit. The following morning, a couple of the girls cooked pancakes for us all, before heading into Kibera with the food, my Santa outfit, and lots of sweets for the kids.
Reactions throughout Kibera were mixed, the kids were excited just to be given a couple of sweets, some people expected us to have something to give to every single person, asking what we are doing to help them specifically, and some said they don't celebrate Christmas. It was positive reactions for the most part though.
We did our usual route, stopping at a viewpoint over a large area of Kibera for photos and a brief talk about what Kibera is (I left the speeches mostly to Jenny this time, a volunteer who started last week who is helping me on the programme for a couple of weeks). Then off to the disability school, although closed for Christmas, just to show people what else the money goes towards on the programme. Then the four families on Tuesday's visit.
Quinta, who I took to apply for university last week, had her computer course results, passed! And, has been accepted on her university course, starting 7th January! We also have the money now to help her mother start up a business. With Quinta moving to the university campus, this means the family can be removed from the programme as soon as the business is set up! Before leaving, we had to get a few photos of me in my outfit with her (as usual I forgot my camera, so will have to post those at a later time when I steal them from others), then headed off to the other families.
Nothing too exciting to report on the others, everyone was doing well and so happy to see us on Christmas. Got photos with some of the others too, and we also visited the pastors family. Finally, at the end of the tour, Dan took us back to his place where his wife had cooked us chapati and lentils for lunch. It was a bit tight with all of us sitting in his living room eating (as it had been in every other house too), but we managed and were very thankful to he and his wife. Finally, we headed off too the bar for a drink in Kibera, before heading back to the house for Christmas dinner, pasta, chicken, and vegetables, the hosts must have been cooking all morning to prepare that!
The rest of the day we just chilled out at the house, more music and some snacks. Overall a fantastic day, a Christmas I'll never forget and will probably never experience anything like it again!
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