May 31, 2009 Stories

Veronica:

Veronica’s story is the “Poster Child” of the tragedy and struggle to survive that we as donors gladly support. She is 38 years old. She lived in Eldoret with her husband, 7 children and two relatives when the post election violence turned her world upside down. One night during the post election violence rioters set their house on fire. Everyone tried to flee. Later she learned that her husband along with her oldest child and the relatives had burned to death in the fire.

I met Veronica in the Lodwar IDP camp. What caught my eye were the five little children that were following her around. I asked to take pictures of her family and then her “hut”. Even though she has been through so much tragedy she presents herself as confident and going forward with her life and doing what she can to provide for her family.

The government of Kenya gave each IDP (Internally Displaced Person) family the equivalent of $125 for food and to start life over. Veronica spent $100 on food and cooking utensils, soap, and other essentials and invested the remaining $25 in a fish retailing business. She bought fish in Lodwar and sent them to a friend in Kitale who sold the fish at a profit. But when the friend wired the money back via a cell-phone wire service the wrong code was entered and the money went into a different account. She had lost her investment.

Those kinds of set backs do not stop her from being helpful in any way that she can be. Even though she is not a paid distribution assistant she helps out voluntarily anyway. She moves 110 lb bags of maize and split peas as good as any man she works with. My heart goes out to people like her and I pray that someday God will bless her and provide her what she and her family need.



Margret Akoru:

Margret is not a displaced person nor is she receiving relief, but her story still needs to be told. Margret grew up and lives in Lokichar. She is the Headmaster of the local Christian School which is part of the RCEA. There are 470 students and 11 teachers. That is an average class size of 43 students per teacher. The boys make up 60% of the students girls 40%. In Turkana girls are a sign of potential wealth that parents might have when the girl marries and the groom pays an expensive dowry to the bride’s parents. A girl with education has no more potential value than a girl without education. There is no advantage for a girl to be educated.

Margret stated that for each person receiving aid there are three people not receiving aid. I asked Margret about people starving in the camps. She estimated that 50 people starved to death in Lokichar in 2008.

A teacher’s salary is about 144,000 Kenyan Schillings per year, $1,800 or $150 per month which is $1.00 per hour. With this money Margret helps meet the needs of her family and also gives money to support her mother.

Margret’s brother is a minister and the General Secretary of the Reformed Church of East Africa (RCEA). Margret is educated with a college degree she is the School Headmaster (Principal), a member of the committee for beneficiary selection and food distribution and a prominent member of the community. There are people who grow up in humble circumstances who go on to make something of their lives and give back to their communities. This is a side of side of Africa that we do not often see in the news or books.


Christin Akoreter:

Christin’s parents are of the Turkana tribe. They migrated from Turkana to Eldoret where the Kalenjin tribe is, for opportunities to work as casual labor; farm workers, security guards, etc. Christin was born and grew up in Eldoret. On January 17, 2008 during the post election violence her uncle paid for bus fare for her to leave Eldoret. Christin was from the wrong tribe to be in Eldoret. Her man was of the local tribe she was not and had to flee for the safety of herself and their six children.

I asked her what the food we were distributing meant to her. She said “It is my life”. In the morning Christin and her children eat porridge for breakfast. It is a common breakfast. The corn is ground into flour. To have the corn ground into flour they exchange 4.4 pounds of the 110 pound bag for the whole bag to be ground.

For breakfast the flour is boiled and served in a very thin soup that is called porridge. They do not normally have a noon meal, at night they eat their main meal of corn flour which looks like potatoes along with some split peas.

The food we provide lasts about two weeks. When they run out of food Christin uses a machete to cut wood and sell the wood to make money to buy food.

The school age children are fed a noon meal of boiled whole corn and beans.




Beneficiary Diets and Eating Habits:

The corn, split peas and oil that we distribute make up only a 50% ration. That sounds very tough and cruel but there is some hard logic behind the decision making. We do not want the beneficiaries to become dependent on the donated food. I’ve talked to numerous beneficiaries patiently standing in line waiting their turn to receive their ration. The answers to questions I asked were very consistent. The food we distribute lasts about two weeks, even when eating only a light breakfast and no noon meal. Two thirds of the people are under age 18 they are children.

Based on the analysis and summary of over 10,000 surveys we have a picture what the beneficiaries are eating.

Before we started providing food the people were eating less than 1.5 meals per day. After distributions people are eating an average of 2.3 meals per day.

In addition to the corn split peas and vegetable oil people are also eating;
- 90% potatoes, yams, or other root vegetables
- 60% other vegetables
- 50% add salt to their food
- 35% sugar or honey
- 30% some form of dairy product, probably from the local goats

These other foods in their diets come from performing casual when they can find it or cutting and selling wood, making and selling charcoal, setting up little shops where they buy food at stores and sell it to their fellow beneficiaries.

To expand their diets people also barter the corn, peas or oil in exchange for the local potatoes, vegetables and other foods when they are in season. An example one pound of corn can be exchanged for three pounds of potatoes or yams.

Those of us who are of Dutch background sometimes take pride in our penny pinching frugal ways. We could learn from the Turkana how to really make a penny go a long way.


Quotable Quote:

Pastor Samuel Meli is the pastor of two churches; Katilu and Kalimorok. He is everywhere helping us during distributions. His monthly salary is $75.00.

I asked what he saw as the main role of IRMs (International Relief Managers, white) at the distributions. His answer was insightful, he said:

“Just being at the distributions. When representatives of the donor are at the distribution, people believe it will be done fairly. When donor representatives are not present people believe there is corruption.”

Often in the news we see trucks from donor organizations going into refugee camps and just throwing bags out to masses of people who are scrambling over each other to fight for a bag of grain. The strongest and toughest run away with the food. This does not happen at distributions from CGFB or CRWRC.

Another example is of aid organizations going into camps with lots of media people with cameras taking pictures while some people receive 5 pounds of food. Then the media circus is over and everyone leaves. Again this is not what happens with our distributions. We can be thankful to God for blessing our work and aligning us with talented local people who provide such necessary guidance and leadership.

Richard Ekai

Richard is 44 years old. I have seen him before at the distribution at the Katilu village. He’s always smiling and helping people with the heavy grain sacks, 50 kilos = 110 pounds. He is not a paid distribution assistant but he helps anyway.

Before the post election violence of January 2008 he lived near Eldoret with his wife and 8 children. He made and sold charcoal for a living. He had a three bedroom house on a ¼ acre of land. He is proud of what he had, he felt prosperous. His family had a TV, radio, 3 bicycles, 3 dense mattresses. He said one truck would not have been able to carry all his possessions.

Richard’s 15 year old son often slept over night with his friends who were from the Kalenjin tribe. Richard is from the Turkana tribe. One morning Richard learned that during the night his son had been beheaded the “friends” he was staying over night by. Richard’s house and all his possessions were burned. Richard fled with his family to Katilu in Turkana which is where his wife grew up.

In Katilu Richard is trying to put his life back together again. He works as a casual labor in the fields where there is an irrigation system that has canals that divert water from a nearby river. The irrigation project includes over 600 acres and is being expanded to provide irrigated land for more people. Richard hopes to get a plot of land of his own.

I went to the irrigation project. It is beautifully peaceful and quiet to view. There are trails with huge trees covering them with shade. It reminds me of a painting I’ve seen of Jesus walking on a path shaded by very high huge trees, Jesus is shown teaching the disciples as He is walking along the path. There is absolute silence. The fields all have people hoeing and weeding the maize and sorghum. There are many hand water pumps. I came past one pump that was surrounded by large trees and bushes. The pump was on a raised cement platform. There was a group of women and girls who were washing cloths, drawing water to take to their homes, they were talking, laughing and bathing. I sensed that this was a regular daily event that they enjoyed.

Before each distribution there are short speeches that the local minister, and we in the Relief Team make to the large gatherings. The ministers lead in singing and prayer and then we each say a few words. Before I had heard Richard’s story I was telling the crowds that after the August distribution there would be no more distributions in Turkana from CRWRC. I encouraged the people to seek God’s guidance in determining where they could best make a living to support their families. That if they could make a living in Turkana, wonderful. But if they couldn’t earn a living in Turkana then they must think of moving some place else where there is more opportunity.

After hearing Richard’s story and others like it I found it hard to tell them to move away from the security of their tribal homelands and move to where there might be more opportunity. They had tried that and had suffered terribly.

Leaving Kenya by Darlene

Today is Wednesday May 13, and I have 3 more days before I head back to Michigan. The Time went really fast, the work was rewarding, the people we met were awesome and God was so good!

I was able to go on two food distributions, one in the first week of March and the second in the first week of April. The food distribution was the number one reason for us to come here and it will be remembered as the number one reason to be here. Unforgettable images include the faces of starving children picking up every last kernel of corn that has fallen on the ground, and putting it in little plastic bags and carrying it home as a prized possession. The children and the elderly are the most-needy. When they come to you and rub their stomach and say “hungry” and you have nothing to give, those are faces you remember.

We have two more distribution to do during our stay here, We were suppose to do a May distribution from May 4-l0 but things got delayed and Dwayne will now do the May distribution from May 25-30. The June distribution will be held the second week of June. Dwayne will have very competent people helping him but I wish I could help also.

I am looking forward to coming home. I’m eager to see my Children and grandchildren, my house, my yard and flower garden. I’m also ready to worship at our church again. I really miss my friends and the communion of the saints which we enjoy at South Olive.

Thank you for thoughts and prayers during the last several months

Dwayne and Darlene

Nothing is wasted

Pictures of hungry people who are not on the beneficiary list and are picking up the corn that was spilled onto the ground, at first it’s hard to watch. When I first saw corn and peas spilled during the distribution process I talked to a person in charge. I discussed how we might do things differently because I didn’t feel right about food going to waste. But by the end of the distribution as I watched every kernel being picked up I was reminded of the Bible story of Boaz and Ruth when Boaz told his workmen to leave extra grain in the field for the gleaners who would follow the harvesters and pick up anything that was left behind. But it was still hard to watch little children and aged women down in the dirt scooping up handfuls of sand and sorting through it to get every kernel.

Measuring at Distribution

The beneficiaries themselves divide up the food and oil after they receive it. They carry the maize and oil to an uncrowded area and divide it according to their family size. The larger the family, the more food they receive. The oil is not given by family size; each family must divide a geri can of oil, which once it is divided is about 6 cups per family. This oil will maybe last them two weeks depending how much they use each day. Oil is very precious for the cooking of their food and is divided very carefully. The pictures show them dividing the oil and maize; we know that if the Kenyans themselves divide the food and oil the measurements will be accurate and fair.

testing

This and that:

This and that:


Gas costs $3.75 per gallon.

An oil change costs $175.00 – we had it done last week on the truck

Driving in Kenya is an altogether different experience. It works in a very different way. Nairobi has an estimated population of 4,000,000 people. There are only a very few traffic lights and no road signs (stop or yield) in all of Nairobi. It is almost unusual to hear people blowing horns. Main roads have right of way over smaller roads and you watch how fast vehicles are coming. Basically the first person to an intersection has the right-of-way. If you want to merge onto a road that has bumper to bumper traffic you just ease the corner of your bumper between cars and go. Everybody assumes that who ever has his vehicle, even just a corner of his vehicle, in front of you then you have the right-of-way. It works surprisingly well. People also let people through when you have to turn across lanes. People are very polite drivers in ways that would never happen in the USA. Space is also very different. Instead of cars being a few feet away from each other the space here is in inches. It can be a little un-nerving when you first start to drive but it all works because everyone understands the un-written “code of the road” when driving.

People are much more patient here. Chris, the Kenyan man that we work with, has a good way of saying things. He said “North Americans may come with the Fruit-of-the-Spirit called Patience but it does not truly mature until they have been in Africa for a while”.

In America we know that we have problems, especially now. But people in Kenya have a tendency to think that everything in America is very good. A teenager approached me and said “take me to America”. Kenyans view of America comes from Hollywood. They think we have lots of material things but that we all have broken homes and don’t have close relationships in our families. They say that they are surprised when American talk about their families because they assume that we don’t put much value on families. Families are very important to Kenyans. If a member of your family; parents, siblings, nephews or nieces are having difficult times then it is assumed other family members will help out. It is expected. Brothers and sisters help out other siblings when one of them needs money to go to college. It is expected to be the norm. If God blesses you then it is expected that you are required to be a blessing to others. Parents expect that when they grow old that their children will take care of them if they need it. This is one of the reasons that there are very few rest homes for the elderly in Kenya.

I asked one woman that received grain at a distribution what the grain meant to her. She said “It is life to me”. She meant that with out the grain we were distributing she and her four children would not be able to eat.

I ask what people eat each day. One woman said that in the morning her family eats a thin soup of corn flour in water. She doesn’t eat any lunch. Her children eat lunch at school which we were told comes from the USA for school lunches, it is a whole corn soup with some onions in it. At night she eats a thicker soup of corn flour and water.

There are probably thousands of different perspectives and my impressions will probably change with time.

Part 1 Food Distribution

 

Where ever we traveled in Turkana we had soldiers or policemen ride with us. There have been many rumors of vehicles being stopped and robbed. WE WERE NEVER STOPPED. We do know people who were robbed. The soldiers were always very helpful and friendly. The soldiers wore heavy long sleeved shirts and heavy jackets while we sweated in short sleeves.

 

The Reformed Church of East Africa (RCEA) has many churches in Turkana. We worked very closely with the RCEA, we used their churches for warehouses and distribution points. The grain would arrive the day before distribution. Before the distribution would begin the whole group of people receiving rations would gather under a large tree. There would be prayer, singing, always led by women, and announcements.

 

We were amazed to find how industrious the people in the camps were. They built stick "kiosks" to sell food and other goods, repaired shoes, sewed, butchered goats and sold the meat, made hand made brooms from nearby reeds. They tried to make life as normal as possible.

 

There are numerous stories of tradegies. This women fled with six children after her husband was killed. Two are old enough to attend school where they are fed from grain donated by the USA or Canada.

Part 5 Distribution

 

This picture was taken to show how clean and neat the people try to keep them selves in spite of conditions. I also liked the little boys shirt that says "USA Army".

 

As if standing in the blazing sun in 100 degree temperatues isn't enough, sandstorms blew and made things even more unbearable. No one left the line or complained. Then just endure it.

 

There were a lot of infants on mothers backs, rarely did we hear crying even when they were in the sun all day. We wondered how the mothers could handle the extra heat from the babies.

 

Above the pile of grain bags reads "In God We Trust". I wondered if people questioned whether God truly loved them when they were in these conditions. And yet they sang with enthusiasm and prayed as with as much conviction as any congregation does in their American air-conditioned comfortable cushioned benches.

Part 3 Distribution

 

People hold up their cards as they approach the place where they will get their finger print inked on it.

 

The finger printing on the card indicating that they are receiving their ration of grain.

Note the man in the dark blue shirt. He was elected to be the leader of the camp of about 800 families. I was amazed that the camp had organized it self very democratically with many different committees; sanitation, health, education, security, water,

 

This picture and the next picture are of ladies dragging away their 50kg (110 pounds) bag of grain. Some carry the bag on their head.

 

Part 2 Distribution

 

This is the woman with six children again. I asked to see her shelter. It is about six feet in diameter and six feet high.

 

As I got close to her house I could see that the ceiling had as many things as she could hang from it to make room on the floor to sleep and maybe for security so people passing by wouldn't see the things that she has.

 

Butchering a goat. Note the round disk that she uses for a knife.

 

People patiently standing in a long line waiting for their name to be called to the church for distribution. They had been given cards with their name and number of people in their household. The stand in the order that their names have been called. People helping with the distribution have a sheet with the names in the same order. The lines are very orderly, no complaining. Some people stand in the blazing hot sun, over 100 degrees, from 8:00 in the morning until 6:00 in the evening with nothing to eat or drink. Many ladies have infant children carried on their backs with a cloth.

March 12, 2009

Dear Family and friends:
Dwayne and I have been here about three weeks and I finally have time to sit and write a letter. Pol-e- sana (sorry in Swahili) it has taken so long. We have been very busy and when we had time to write we had no email service.
Where do I start? We had a safe flight and were so happy to see 5 smiling faces from the CRWRC office in Nairobi greeting us at the airport. We were delighted to learn that joy-of-all-joys all of the luggage arrived with our flight!
After resting for one day, we met with Ron and Lauris Fuller who have been in charge of this food distribution project since Oct 2008. They had so many things to teach us by the end of the day our heads were swimming. We met with them from February 23-26, it was so great to have someone teach us the details of the project which to us was very overwhelming but to them it was so clear in their heads, it was easier to learn from them. It is quite daunting to think of relieving people who are so obviously doing a great job.
On Feb 27 we drove with Chris to Eldoret, Chris is the National Relief Manager for CRWRC and also very helpful in teaching us. Chris is a Kenyan, his wife’s name is Terri and they have two small children. Tomorrow night we are going to their house for dinner and will meet the children, we are very excited to get to enjoy the Kenyan culture.
We have a nice home in Eldoret, three bedrooms, living area and small kitchen. This house in Eldoret also serves as an office for any meetings that need to be held with other project managers. Two of the bedrooms are used by area managers when they come to Eldoret for a meeting and sleep in our house. Dwayne and I have a big bedroom with a bathroom directly off the bedroom, so we have privacy when other people are sleeping in the house.
We worshiped at the Reformed Church of East Africa (RCEA) on Sunday morning and enjoyed it very much.
On Monday March 2, Dwayne, Darlene, Chris, and Abram, who is the RCEA CARE COORDINATOR and lives in Eldoret, started driving to our first distribution. We left Eldoret at 7 a.m. and drove to Northern Kenya to the town of Lodwar. This trip is very difficult. The roads (really paths) are terrible and your body gets thrown around for 12 hours. At two villages on the way we had to pick up armed guards carrying guns to drive in the car with us because of bandits along the way who like to rob and shoot people. So in the back seat sits Dwayne, Darlene, and a guard with an AK47 in one hand and a hand grenade in the other. In the front seat is a guard with a gun, but no hand grenade (Darlene felt special to have a hand grenade next to her) Abram in the middle and Chris driving. We prayed a lot along that route and God was gracious and spared us from any incidents along the way. This whole procedure happened again on the way home.
When we arrive in Lodwar we meet Musa who is the Project Officer for the Turkana Relief Project. What a neat man! Musa and Abram work very well together and are wonderful Christian men whose hearts and soul are for the Kenyan people. Musa lives in Turkana so he knows the language, it is a different language than Chris and Abram speak, there were many times when we needed a translator from Turkana to Swahili to English.
When we arrived in Lodwar the temperature was about 100 to 105, and it COOLED off to about 90 during the night. No air conditioning or a fan, just hot dry air.
On Tuesday morning we started our distribution in Lodwar. It was an experience Dwayne and I will never forget. I realize I have been throwing out lots of names and places and it’s hard to keep up but these people and places will be a vital part of our lives for the next four months so I will introduce them to you today so you know what and whom I’m talking about in the future.
So we went to Lodwar, the place where our first distribution took place. This is the fourth month of food distribution so things ran very smoothly and were well organized. We have been told that wasn’t always the case in the first months of distribution. The system for who receives food is a very fair and very thought out process. When the elections of 2008 happened many Kenyans were forced from their homes because of the violence. There was also ethnic fighting between tribes and this caused many people to flee to the North. These people are called IDP (internal displaced person) because they fled in such a hurry they didn’t have time to take any belongings with them. Many of them lost children and spouses, especially men) so have many heartbreaking stories.
So of the people who receive food, most of them are IDP’s, they get food according to their family size. We start distribution to small families and go up to large families. They receive corn, split peas and a small amount of cooking oil. The food they receive is less than what their family needs for the month. We want them to still try and find ways to feed their families without always relying on food from other sources. We have interviewed people who are waiting for food and many of them have not eaten for a day or more because they have run out of food. When your mother or grandmother tells you to eat all the food on your plate, (because there at people in Kenya who are starving) this is a very true statement.
We did this same procedure for four days, some villages took all day and some were small enough we could travel and do two in one day. Needless to say by the end of the week were exhausted because of the heat, traveling, and the stress of doing a good job for these very needy people. We always took some food along for ourselves for lunch but never ate it in front of others, and even feeling guilty that we had plenty to eat and they had nothing.
We came back to Nairobi on Saturday March 7 to do book work and to rest. We have seen Ryan and Dawn and grandchildren. We got to spend time Wednesday March 11, with their family to celebrate Dawn’s 40th birthday. This was a treat because we never are here for any birthday parties for Ryan or Dawn or the grandchildren.
The people in the CRWRC office are so helpful and very welcoming to Dwayne and me. We have spent most of the week in this office because of excess to email and internet.
Please continue to pray for us to stay healthy and safe. Also pray for us to be able to do the huge task God has sent us here to do. We both have been healthy and are thankful for that blessing.
We hope this gives you a little idea of our work here and I promise to not wait so long to share with you again.
You have our permission to send and forward this email to whomever you please
Thank you for your prayers and support, we can definitely feel them every day.

Darlene

It is Saturday night March 7

We spent 13 hours on the road today but finally arrived in Nairobi at 7:00 PM. For the next week we will be working out of the Nairobi office. This week we did our first distribution of grain to the suffering Turkana people. We've seen suffering and misery this week like we've never seen before. It has been a good week and we have much that we will be talking about on future blogs, but for right now we feel great after taking wonderful showers and are now going to bed.

Babu

Two days of Orientation at CRWRC, Feb 17 & 18

Thursday 19 Feb 09

Dar and I spent two days this week in Burlington, Ontario, Canada. Our heads are swimming from all the instructions, directions and meetings we had. But we left with the good feeling that there is a whole staff of people rooting for us and praying for us and we know that they are available and willing to help any time that we have questions. Now we are packed and eager to get there, although we don't look forward to the long flights. As Caleb, our grand son in Nairobi, put it so well "Come and visit us. It is only three airplane rides away" ----- Grand Rapids to Detroit, Detroit to Amsterdam, and Amsterdam to Nairobi. It sounds easier that way but it's still a long trip.

Today we packed and weighed over and over to get the maximum amount in each piece of luggage. Tonight we went to Fricano's Pizza one last time because it will be a few months before we get to go there again. Dawn, our daughter in Nairobi, misses Friocano's pizza so much that she once asked us to take a pizza over with us. I wonder how that would have gone through customs.

The cold windy weather today makes us more eager to get to the warmer climate in Kenya, although we'd both take zero degree temperatures with wind and snow over the daily 100 degree temperatures of Turkana. We actually do look foward to seeing Turkana again. I have a very vivid picture in my mind from the last time we were there. We went over a bridge which was over a dry river bed. Only a few feet from the bridge was a group of Turkana herdsmen scooping up pails of water from a hole that had been dug in the river bed. The pails full of water were being handed up to herdsmen who were pouring the water into troughs for a herd of camels to drink from. About 100 yards away was a herd of cows with herdsmen waiting for their turn and behind them was a herd of goats. It instantly reminded me of the bibical scenes described where herds were being watered the same way thousands of years ago. It was if time has stood still in that part of the world. This time I hope to get pictures of that scene. It was just south of Lodwar where we will be going.

Prayer Request

Darlene and I request your prayer support for our upcoming CRWRC assignment to Kenya, Africa. We will be traveling to the CRC office in Burlington, Ontario in Canada this coming week to receive three days of orientation. We expect to fly to Kenya on February 20. The assignment continues until June 20. The primary responsibility of this assignment is to distribute food to the Turkana people in Northern Kenya who have been suffering from draught and famine. Our daughter Dawn lived in the Turkana area in 1998 and 1999. We traveled with Dawn to the two cities that we will be working in.