Yesterday was another long but fantastic day in Kenya. We spent the morning in worship. It was Holy Communion Sunday so we had the special communion service and then the regular service followed. The service began at 8:25 and ended at 1:10. We were definitely well churched. It was an unusually long service because Sukari commissioned three different ministry groups to their respective ministries.
Here’s the phenomenal praise team doing their thing.
This is when one of the former members had his membership restored and was welcomed back into the church after an extended absence.
Here’s a photo Evangelist Steven took of me receiving Holy Communion.
And here’s me right before I started doing the Children’s Address. We talked about loving our neighbors and the object lesson I used was a big hit. As you can see, there’s a large age range of youngins represented. Parents come up holding infants and children up through class 8 (8th grade) come up to listen. Since we had only one regular service (instead of an English and a Swahili service) we had a massive group of kids which was super fun.
After church I joined some of the youth for a walk in Karura Forest. The walk ended up being more like a hike but I didn’t mind. I was so happy to be outside and spending time with people who are around my age.
Most of the walk was Ngatha, me, Njoki (pictured below) as well as their brother Victor (in the next picture). We saw a beautiful waterfall, lots of gorgeous trees, and we conquered a massive staircase (also pictured below).
Here’s Victor doing his thing. Being a construction manager is his day job, but on the weekends he is a photographer.
And here’s that staircase. What you can see is a very small portion of it.
On our way back, we ran into the rest of the group and returned to the entrance to have a picnic. We were supposed to play card games but we a little later than we had planned. Instead we had snacks and visited until the park closed. We swapped stories and debated music tastes until we left. It was refreshing to act my age for an afternoon.
After that Ngatha, Njoki, and Victor took me to Komothai to have dinner with their cucu (grandmother). They let her know that they were bringing a friend with them. When we arrived she was mad at them for not telling her I was a mzungu. I was actually glad they didn’t tell her. She would have made a feast (which was totally unnecessary) but since she thought I was Kenyan, she made githeri which is a popular dish in rural areas. It is made with maize (corn), beans, kale, onions, and tomato. I’m not usually a big fan, but cucu definitely has the best recipe I’ve tasted.
Unlike most Kikuyu grandmas I’ve met, she was able to understand me clearly and spoke very good English. She was loads of fun and had a hilarious sense of humor. Every time Ngatha gave her a hard time, she gave it right back to him. We finished off the meal with sweet bananas and porridge before heading back to the estate. She sent me home with fresh milk she had gotten from her cows that morning.
~ Nell in Nairobi