Meeting the Grandmother

I took my four God children to see their grandmother. My friend Margaret who is the principle of the boarding school they live and Pastor Abraham of Kitale Prison came with us. I have been sponsoring them for about a year at Purpose Driven Academy in Kitale. I met Augustine (now 5 years old) in prison where he was born. His mother remains in prison today adn God willing will be released in about 10 years. Elizabeth, age 6, is his sister and Brian, age 8, and Calvin, age 5, are cousins.

We drove 1 1/2 hours from Kitale over pothole filled roads through the sugar cane fields through Webuye and on to Matisi in Western Kenya. The towns grew smaller to tiny villages with open air markets every few kilometers. We turned off the main road to a dirt footpath that had likely never seen car. We slowly made our way down the path. The children's excitement was building. After 2-3 kilometers we came to the end of the path to 3 mud huts on a small plot of land. The grandmother was waiting to greet us. She could not contain her excitement to see the children and meet the first mzungu (white person) to ever visit the area. Apparently it was a real honor for her to host me in her home.

She offered us cokes as that was the only soda available in the village. We sat in her mud hut with a few pieces of stick furniture and got to know one another and talked about the children. It's too much to write about in the blog so for the details you will just have to wait for the book that I have been thinking about writing one of these days. I'll just say that Brain (the oldest at 8 years old) was born to her daughter when she was in the 5th grade and prostituted herself for food. There is no way to know who the father is. The grandmother raised him as her son but could not afford to send him to school. Last year when he came to Purpse Driven Academy he started in kindergarten and is now in the first grade. All four of the children have their unique stories.

All the neighbors came to great me and wanted me to take their pictures. Even the adults liked to have their pictures taken and look at them, maybe for the first time. I was a good time of fellowship and a very positive experience for everyone involved.

Please pray for the team that will be leaving LAX at 8 am on Friday morning. Pray for travel mercies and their families as they see them off. Pray for my meetings today at Kitale Prison and then I am taking the children to Eldoret for Augustine and Elizabeth to see their mother for the first time in a year.