School starts back on Tuesday the fifth after a too-short Christmas break.  I already am dreading the thought of returning to the class room.  Getting up early, studying for tests in every class, stressing out about my future, keeping a tight schedule with no free time... that just isn't my cup of tea, figuratively speaking. 

Guilty for my bitter thoughts, I keep telling myself that there are children all over the world who long to go to school.  And there are children all over the world who get up at three or four in the morning to walk hours in the darkness, through the dangerous streets, to go to a school with no electricity, dirt floors, and a low-standard education.  And yet they are thankful that they have the privilege of going to school. 

When I think of this, I feel guilty that I dislike school.  I try to enjoy it for the sake of the children who don't have the same opportunities that I do.  In a way, I feel like if I make the most of my education, and strive in the best way that I can to make the best of my life, then maybe I can pay it forward and provide a better world for those who never got the same chances as I did.  That's why I started sponsoring a child in Africa with my allowance when I was in my freshman year of high school.  The thought that I could provide another human being, another child, with everything I have that I take for granted (and shouldn't take for granted), was something that I couldn't pass up.  It brought me down to earth just a little bit, and gave me a reality check about how blessed I truly am.  Children are starving to death all over the world, dying of treatable diseases, and not getting even the most meager of educations that could bring them out of their poverty.    

I read somewhere that the United States has the 19th highest literacy rate in the world (which is ridiculous in its own way, because with our resources, we should be at the top of the list) at 99.0 percent, which means that our youth today should not have an issue going to college, furthering our education, and then using our gained skills and knowledge to change our world for the better.  Burkina Faso has a literacy rate of 23.6%.  Mali has a literacy rate of 24.0%.  What are we doing about this?  Obviously, not a whole lot, or this would not be happening by the twenty-first century.

This year, 2010, is a new beginning in many ways.  No matter your age, I challenge you to change the world around you for the better somehow, someway.  Do everything in your available power to make things even remotely better.  Do something that only you could do, or do something that anybody could do, but nobody has ever bothered.  There are so many global issues in the world today, in the United States, in Africa, in Asia, in South America, everywhere.  There is no country on earth without issue.  There are problems.  And yet, wherever you look, in any nation lying under the stars, you will find one common ground.

Apathy. 

As the year of 2010 dawns today on January first, I challenge you to make a difference.  Erase all signs of apathy from your life.  Be that person you thought you could never be. 

In the words of Elvis Presley, "Do something worth remembering."  It sounds so obvious, but how many people have actually done this?

Stand up with me and do your best this year and from now on to make the world a better place.    

-July 14, Tuesday
Kisumu Airport-

I woke up at 4:45 this morning and turned on the shower, shivering in dreaded anticipation of the icy blast that was sure to come. To my great surprise and excitement, steam began to rise from the scalding hot water. I stepped beneath the faucet, smiling from ear to ear. Despite the early hour, this was a wonderful start to my day.

The hotel staff prepared us breakfast and so we ate at the LeSavannah Hotel for the last time. We have only real, American food to eat from now on, I hope. Lunch and dinner hopefully should not consist of a single bite of ugali. No more, no more.

We said goodbye to John and Connie for the last time, only wondering at the thoughts that were passing through their minds. Their team is now gone. Now they only have each other- two missionaries alone in Kenya. Are they excited that we are leaving? Are they terrified? I can only speculate.

We boarded our matatus and rode off into the darkness, watching young children walk alone to their schools, moving quietly through the early morning darkness.

When we arrived at the airport, they told us that they did not open until 7:00, a slightly frightening thought since our plane takes off at 8:00, and we have fifty tons of baggage to load and check. They presented us with a small, peaceful patio outside surrounded by a garden. We all sat together, listening to Audie's devotion and watching the sun rise in pastel strokes of color that painted the sky like a morning rainbow.

We gave our final farewells to Jared, giving him the customary both-side African hug and shaking his hand for one last time. "Asante-sana," he said over and over again, smiling at each of us. "Tell my American friends hello. I will see you next year."

Checking baggage was a hectic mess. It took us forever, but we finally made it through, weary and ready to relax on the plane to Nairobi. We are still in the waiting room, waiting for the plane to show up. Everyone seems excited to finally be on our way home and yet sad to leave. It is a bittersweet moment, impossible to understand unless you have seen what we have seen and met the people we have met.

How can we simply return to our old lives, taking everything for granted, after we have seen these people who are literally drowning in poverty? How can we waste our money on things that don't matter? How can we sleep in a real bed, use warm water in our showers, and complain about our school, however poor it may be? How can we take our families, our health, and our homes for granted? How can we eat a bite of an extensive meal and not feel grateful? How can we complain about the most trivial problems in our lives and not stop to think of the children at Lakeside Orphanage who have lost everything that they have because of AIDS? How can our lives ever be the same again?

I am so blessed, so privileged, to have what I have. It takes me back to the orphanage, to the children proudly showing us what little they had. It takes me back to the children at Ring Road, explaining to me how happy they were because God had blessed them with food and an education. It takes me back to the bush at KipKabus, to the woman giving Barbie and I one of, if not the most, expensive thing she owned. It takes me back to the church in Eldoret, where the church elders stood in the middle of poverty, hands lifted high in adoration for the Lord, singing, "He has done so much for me that I cannot tell it all..."

How can our lives not be changed in every possible aspect?


-Nairobi, Kenya-

At this exact moment, I am sitting on the curb outside of the Nairobi airport, waiting. I have been waiting for forty minutes now, and I have another twenty minutes left to go before the Seattle team arrives and we leave for the safari.

-Later-

We went ahead and checked our baggage, and we are again out on the curb, waiting for our matatus to show up. Everyone is hungry and passing out what little snacks we have.

This reminds me of when one of the church elders told us gravely that Americans say that they are starving when they are only a little bit hungry. Africans know what it is like to truly be hungry." Together we discussed this memory, and we all lost a little bit of our appetites. Here we are, stuffing our faces with Sour Patch Kids and beef jerky and pistachios because we're a little overdue on lunch, and there are people living a mile away who are literally starving to death. It makes you think.


-Nairobi, Kenya-

We went to the wildlife park to walk around and view the animals in their pens. Our guide was a young man named Alex. He had a great passion for the animals and took us all around the park, off of the paths and up close to view the wild animals. We saw the rhinos, wildebeests, buffalo, leopards, lions...

Alex paid little mind to the park laws and instead took us behind the tourist fences and into the wild, face to face with the animals with only a chain link fence between us. The leopard lunged at the measly fence, snarling ferociously at us. It was a little frightening.

Alex carried this little baby songbird in his hand. At one point, he handed me the bird and walked away, leaving me standing helplessly, holding the trembling songbird. Finally, after a while, I walked up to Alex and said, "Here, take her back now," and he laughed and amiably complied.

"Have you ever touched a cheetah, the fastest of all animals?" Alex asked us in a hushed whisper. "These great cats can be tamed, but shh... this is a secret. Follow me." With a wide grin lighting up his face, Alex led us past the boundaries and out into the actual park, where another park ranger was waiting. A cheetah sat calmly a few yards away, unleashed, watching us intently with golden eyes. "Go on, touch him," Alex murmured, and one by one, we knelt to stroke the large cat, listening to its loud purr and caressing its head and back in awe while we posed for a photo. The experience was both frightening and wonderful at the same time. The fact that a full-grown cheetah was sitting inches away from me, purring, was a surreal feeling.

Alex obviously enjoyed leading us around the park, introducing us to woman-despising monkeys and letting us hold leopard carcasses and put our feet in scale models of elephant feet. He eagerly pointed out birds and herbs and the tree branches in which Africans use to brush their teeth. "This is the biggest secret in Africa. This is why our teeth are so white and beautiful."

At the end, when Alex gave us our ticket stubs so that we could pass the guards and leave the park, he wrote his email address on the back of mine. He motioned towards the written address with his finger so that I would see it, and gave me a wink before ushering me out the door with the others.

For lunch, we went to a place that looked fairly nice and cost twelve hundred shillings per meal, which is probably fifteen or sixteen dollars. The meal consisted of rice, lamb, chicken, fish, cooked banana, potato, and green beans. This was one of the first meals that I did not care for at all. My stomach began to hurt about ten minutes into the meal, so I stopped eating completely.

After lunch, we went to the safari headquarters. Some people did not want to spend the money to go on the safari, and so they stayed behind. The rest of us were eager to see the wildlife of Africa in their natural habitats.

The first animal we saw was a warthog, trotting through the tall savannah grass, its tail in the air like a flag. After this, we saw gazelle, antelope, buffalo, and a rhino. There were herds upon herds of dramatically-striped zebra, and even a few babies. We saw the zebra up close, watching eagerly as they crossed the road directly in front of our matatus, stopping for a moment to look at us with wary eyes.

We drove around and around looking for giraffes, but we couldn't see any. We were all sorely disappointed and praying silently, "Lord, let us see one giraffe... just one." At the tail end of the safari, literally to the point where we could almost see the entrance from which we came, we all gasped in unison. A single young giraffe was striding calmly down the road in front of us, ambling along without a care, ignoring our very presence. It felt like a blessing straight from God, a small gift that He gave us us to see His children smile with delight. We were all so excited and happy to see that simple giraffe.

We arrived back at the building too late to go to the restaurant, Carnivore, and so the people who didn't go on the safari were a little upset with us. However, they had no idea about how amazing the safari was.

We went straight to the airport, which was a good thing, because the traffic was terrible. It took forever for us to merely arrive, check in, exchange our currency back to American dollars, eat dinner, go through security, and sit down. We had perfect timing, really.

I think that we are all feeling concerned about fitting back into our former lives. We have all been changed by this trip, and it will be hard to live out our extravagant lifestyles when the faces of hungry children are swimming hauntingly before our eyes wherever we go. How can we ever again truly adapt to the hectic, apathetic culture that we were all once so used to? How can we simply move on from this journey when there is so much poverty, so much need, so much hunger in the world?

I don't think that any of us will ever again say, "I'm starving."