Going to Tumaini Tomorrow

hiiiieeeeee!



I'm finally traveling to the orphanage tomorrow! Normally, on-field orientation in Nairobi only lasts about 4 days, but mine was longer because everyone came in for Thanksgiving. It's been great, I'm so thankful to have gotten to spend time with the girls in my house. It's a blessing to have instant community here. They cook together all the time, they took me shopping, taught me all about living in Kenya. They work in the slums here as teachers. I want to go visit them! It sounds so neat!



We had a Thanksgiving here, everyone brought different foods. It was wonderful. =) yummmy pumpkin pie. On Saturday, a group was visiting an animal orphanage so I went with them. Ya know, I'm not really into animals. haha! except for dogs. But I was glad I went for sure! I got to pet a baby cheetah. There was no way I was holding it, and I only pet it for about 2 seconds, long enough for a picture. What was more enjoyable to me, actually, was driving on the matatus (taxis) & taking in all my surroundings. I just love geography. I had to come home & take a nap so that all my new images & intakes of Nairobi could sort into their own compartments in my brain...there's so much NEW here! A lot of the buildings downtown reminded me of buildings you'd see in London, probably because Nairobi was founded by the British. It's just like another normal downtown, only there's more dirt than cement. There's big buildings, restaurants & shops, crazy traffic, round-abouts, statues, smog, ya know, typical downtown. It's really a neat city. I like Nairobi. =)



I've been sleeping in a mosquito net, I can't remember if I already mentioned that. The first day, I was super scared of mosquitos & basically any flying bug. Haha, it's silly. I'm over it now. The mosquitos in Nairobi don't generally carry malaria because the elevation is too high. It's rare here. Just in case you wondered. =]



There's a lot for me to process in only 6 days here, and actually in 10 days since leaving Texas. I'm thankful to see the LORD's character in new ways, I prayed that I would. He is my Friend. Nobody here knows me very well yet, they don't know my background or where I've come from, they don't know what I did in college or high school, nor do they know my family and friends. But the LORD does. =) It's not bad that they don't know, it's just one of those things to process. The LORD understands what I'm feeling here, why I'm here, He knows what I'm doing here & He knows my heart...it's so true when Paul says in the book of Ephesians, "For He Himself is our peace." He is so sweet.



Tonight a bunch of the SIMPacters got together to decorate for Christmas, then we watched Elf (one of my favorites!). We listened to Christmas music. The Germans who live here thought it was so strange to decorate for Christmas this early. They wait until a few days before Christmas. It was fun learning about what they do for Christmas. They make a lot of their Christmas tree decorations, and they're not as "shiny" as ours. It sounds nice. I love the Germans, they're so sweet, sort of soft-spoken.

I'm headed to Tumaini tomorrow, I'm looking forward to meeting the kids. Everyone here says it's a really neat place & that I'll just love the kids.

Thanks so much for your prayers, I really can feel them!

kt