"If You Accomplish EverythingYou Set Out To Do You Didn't Set Out To Do Enough!"

Last Sunday I made a trip to see the kids that we built the home for last year.  It was great to see them kids after a year. The visit was shorter then I would have liked, because it took much longer to get to the home then I thought. The half hour to forty five minuet trip ended up taking over two hours  because  matatus do not run as often on Sundays. The one that I finally got on took a long time to fill up.

This week was mainly spent getting the metal bent and wired together for reinforcing the foundation. This took so much more time then I ever imagined it would with just four Kenyans and myself working. Then there were the things that slowed down the progress that I had not expected. Deliveries of bricks that we had to off load from the tractor, and once that was done I chose to have them stacked in piles five high and in ten rows of ten so that there would have piles of 500 bricks. This makes them easy to count, and easier to keep track of. Plus this way we only pay for the quality bricks that are actually received. This week we stacked a total of 3205 bricks so you can imagine how much time was lost to that activity.

 This week has moved slower then I had expected not in the respect of time but in accomplishments at the construction site. Throughout my life I have often heard my grandfather say “If you accomplish everything that you set out to do then you didn't set out to do enough!” The goal I had for this week was to have the entire foundation poured with concrete so that next week we could get started with the brick and be moving ahead. It seemed like a reasonable goal at the time when I had set it last week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday we did start working on the concrete but we were stopped by a very severe rain storm, we continued working through it until marble size hail started falling with such velocity that it hurt. So we took shelter for about and hour till it was over. By that time the concrete that had been poured had been covered by the mud that washed in and some of the footers were toward the lower end had a bit of water in them. I remember the same thing had happened last year, guess its the baptism of the foundation. If its in Gods will the concrete will be finished Monday, He obviously didn't want us to finish Friday. 

Other reflections of the week

Tuesday on my way to work I met a man standing by the road, he introduced himself as James. We talked for a while and then he told me he was looking for work. I asked him a few questions and he wanted a to be paid double the rate then what is in the budget. So after refusing to accept the rate that everyone else is getting, he just wanted me to give him some money. “Because Kenya is so corrupt you know” which he says with a smile on his face. So as I waited for a matatu that was going in my direction I continued to talk to James. I told him that the problem isnt just that fact that Kenya is corrupt, but that the people of Kenya have accepted it as a fact of life. One that they can not change, and instead of saying no to the corruption they themselves become corrupt too. Then a matatu came that was going in my direction and I got on and headed for work. The conversation that I had with James was stuck in my head

Corruption is not just a local problem here in Kenya, nor is it something new. Its a global problem and it has been for a long time a very long time. The more I thought about it I remember that the children of Israel wanted to be ruled by a king instead of by God. I couldn't remember where it was till I looked it up, 1 Samuel 8:5. This is where I believe corruption began. We wanted to be ruled by man instead of by God. So one corrupt person is exchanged or voted out for another corrupt person, but the end result is still the same more corruption. We can blame one political group or the other, the economy and the bankers; we can protest and riot, but it will not change a thing unless we give the reign back to God as a society, nation and world. Unfortunately, I don't see people coming together to give up their faith government to turn back to God. I could go into more detail but I am getting way off topic. Anyway this is where my conversation with James brought me and the fact that thousands of people are protesting governments all over the world, and that change in government wont make things better because no man made system is perfect and power does corrupt man.

On Wednesday as I got to the place where I catch rides in the morning a taxi pulled over and wanted to carry Jon and I to where we were going. I told him thats fine but I was waiting on one more person because Mark was going to work on the shamba (garden) at the veronica home and then help out with construction a bit. The driver said he would wait and then said that I should pay 50 bob for the ride. Now this ride on a matatu is 30 shillings and in a town service car or taxi its 40 bob or shillings. So I asked him why I would want to pay 50 when I could get a ride for 30? His response was because his car is more comfortable and that we are friends. I couldn't understand his logic that because I was his friend I should pay more, but told him with friends like these who would need enemies? After a little while he agreed to take the three of us for 40 a piece. In the car we got to talking more and he said that whenever he sees a white person he thinks he should get more money from them because we colonized Kenya. I had to tell him that I wasn't British I am an American, and that we had been colonized by the British also, and that we really weren't all that different. This seemed to change his opinion on things even if it was only a temporary change.

Also on Wednesday the shilling dropped to its lowest value ever being from 80 per dollar to 90. A lot of the imports will be effected by this change. As I learned Thursday when I went to get materials from the hardware store, the price for anything with metal had gone up. I had came on the right day because I had gotten the price that was quoted to me the week before, but if I needed anything else in the future the price would be noticeably higher. While at the hardware I was advised that I should purchase anything with metal soon because the price would most likely be going up each day. I know that its not the price going up, its really the currency value going in down, that thought will get me back off topic again so, that will be all for now until next time. May the grace and peace from God be with you and glory to God in all things through His son Jesus Christ.