An Overdue Update 2018 03 17

An overdue update

Good morning!  A lot has been happening, much of it behind the scenes, since our trip in January.  I want to share a few photos and update you on some of the goings on.

We had a family who saw the posts about the kitchen at Neema Children’s Home, in Kisumu, Kenya.  They rallied together and have funded the kitchen upgrade that we are working on.  Above is the new rocket stove that was recently installed.  We have another one on the way.  The cooks really love it.  It cuts down on their cooking time, it uses about half the wood, and it produces much less smoke.

EDEN helped connect the dots to get some food delivered to Neema, the Ajigo School and Orphanage, near Kisumu, and the Kiriko Special School, in Thika.  Through our partnership with GAiN USA and their partnership with Feed My Starving Children, nearly 3 tons of manna packs were delivered to these three locations.

EDEN was also able to supply some Uzima water filter kits to Neema and Ajigo.  These can be used to filter water from cisterns to make it drinkable.  At Ajigo School, they have to purchase water as they don’t have a well on site.  Many times the water that was bought was not clean.  These filters will help ensure safe drinking water for the students.

EDEN is working with the Neema Children’s Home board to get a rainwater harvesting system installed at the compound.  This water will be used for irrigation and if needed, for drinking.  A group of the board members are going to Neema in April and will be taking more drip irrigation supplies with them.

EDEN is also working to help Ajigo School and Orphanage with rainwater harvesting.  Their kitchen needs some upgrades as well.

The ladies at the Kiryandongo Refugee Camp in Uganda have been very busy with the Luopad Project.  EDEN supplied them with some new manual sewing machines and some material.  Saturday is their sewing day and they sew all day!  The UN officials at the camp want them to go to other camps to train other ladies how to make the pads.  What a great ministry to other women for these ladies to be a part of!

It is exciting to see things moving forward!  We have more work that needs to be done in so many areas.  And it all takes money to get it done.  If you would like to help support our efforts, we would welcome your donation.  If you would like to adopt a specific project, let us know and we will help with that.  Donations can be sent to:

EDEN

1110 Blakely Court

West Columbia, SC  29170

An Unplanned Meeting 2018 01 18

An unplanned meeting

Well, as I sit in the Atlanta airport, waiting on a delayed flight home (the original one was cancelled), I wanted to use my time to finish up a final blog about my time in Africa. I took this shot on the way from Kisumu to Nairobi on Tuesday. It reminded me of God’s majesty.

In my last days in Kisumu, I was reminded of God’s provision for His people. I had strongly considered trying to change my flights to come home a day early. But God had another meeting for me to attend.

Meet Chris Asawo. He runs the Ajigo School and Orphanage in a small town about 30 minutes outside Kisumu. They have 180 kids, ranging in age from 3 to 13. Ninety percent of them are orphans. The community is largely a fishing village on the shore of Lake Victoria. HIV has taken a huge toll on the population and these orphans are caught up in that.

The kids are put in foster homes in the community because the orphanage doesn’t have housing facilities. They feed the kids one meal a day while at school.

The county has directed them to upgrade their kitchen facilities.

Water is an issue as the school only has one borehole that is unreliable. It goes dry during extremely dry periods. They have some gutters on one of the school buildings, but need help to complete the cisterns. This water can then be treated and used for cooking and drinking, as well as possibly for a garden.

Chris’ wife also works with a group of about 30 widows in the community. They help provide food when they can.
I was sitting on the hotel porch Sunday morning, waiting to be picked up for church. Chris was meeting with a couple who is getting married soon. When he finished with them, he came over and introduced himself. He asked where I was from. When I told him SC, he said he had been through Spartanburg before. Small world.
When I asked him on Monday about what prompted him to speak to me, he said it was the Lord. He was taking a chance to make a connection. How about that? I’m glad that I didn’t change my flights and was available to meet with him. It’s a good feeling being putty in the Master’s hand.

A Busy Four Days in Kisumu 2018 01 16

 meeting

A Busy Four Days in Kisumu

I am wrapping things up for this jaunt in Africa. It has been a busy four days in Kisumu. George and I traveled a good bit of Thursday to arrive here. I met with Pastor John Atieno of Neema Children’s Home on Thursday evening to talk about our schedule for next few days. We stayed at the beautiful complex of Le Savannah.

I think someone was checking to see if I was eating chicken nuggets…….

I said goodbye to George as he headed back to Nairobi on Friday. Pastor John and I spent a good bit of time on Friday getting prices on things in Kisumu. This is a shot of the street vendors in the city.

We are working with Neema on several projects. We want to get a sewing center started for the ladies. The home has two machines already, one good one and one not so good. The fancier looking one is a cheap knockoff that isn’t reliable. We were able to find a vendor with good quality treadle machines.

We also found a supplier for the flannel needed to make Luopads. We provided some pads along with a starter kit with material and supplies. We will be setting up the sewing operation soon.
We spent a little time getting some drip irrigation line ready for a couple bucket drip kits. I was able to bring 30 kits with me which will be a start.

We are also supplying Neema with a half-acre drip system for them to use on their farm. A technician will visit when they have the raised beds ready and help them get the system installed. We had a group of about 25 for training on Saturday.


We also spent some time in the garden installing a kit. The bed was not prepared, so it will be taken back out. But it was important for the students to see the water make it to the field.

I was a guest at Pastor John’s church on Sunday. This was the receiving line.

On Sunday night, a few of us went to Kiboko Bay Resort for dinner. It is on the shore of Lake Victoria.

Monday was a day of meeting people. I got to meet with the deputy governor of Kisumu county Dr. Matthew Owili. I also met the governor’s chief of staff, Patrick Ouya. Later, I met with the food and fisheries committee of the county assembly, pictured below. Pastor John chairs this committee.

Later Monday evening, I met the Minister of agriculture for Kisumu county, Gilchrest. He had been in Nairobi and made a special effort to get back to Kisumu and came by the hotel to introduce himself. All of this attention made me feel like a real dignitary. All of these officials are very interested in the drip irrigation and its use in increasing food security in their community.
Lastly, I have to introduce you to Mike, Pastor John’s son. He is a cute boy. When the music starts, he will be moving!

 

Angel House Secondary School and Orphanage 2018 01 14

Angel House Secondary School and Orphanage

Down the road a piece from Nairobi lies Tarime, Tanzania. I think I would be safe to call it an African Mayberry. Maybe a little bigger, but not much. On the outskirts of town is the Angel House Secondary School and Orphanage.
Anna Migera runs the orphanage part of things and I met her almost a year ago at an agricultural conference in Arusha, Tanzania. Anna made an 8 hour bus ride to Nairobi and then flew to Arusha to attend the conference. She had been praying for someone to help her with irrigation at the school farm. We ended up standing beside each other in the lunch line one day. Coincidence? I think not!

Angel House has an amazing compound and a lot of land to use for farming. They also have a bunch of animals, including cows, chickens, pigs, and goats. They have 327 students enrolled at the school, 300 of which live on the school grounds. Angel house also has 77 orphans, with 44 of those living at the compound. The rest of the orphans are older and away at school. Needless to say, it is a lively place!
Anna is an amazing woman. She shared how someone came to visit her and shared the Good News about Jesus with her. She found work and was able to get out of a bad marriage – an arranged one that started when she was 14. She married a great man, Marwa, who also works at the school. She is entering a seminary in a neighboring city soon and wants to become a minister. She seeks to help others in the way that she was helped.
This is a wide shot of the orphanage house.

These are pictures of the school buildings. They do rainwater harvesting on just about every building.
These are the hostels where the boys in the secondary school stay.  The girls’ buildings are inside the fenced compound on the other side of the school.

Here are a couple shots of part of the farm.  The top one is maize (corn) and the bottom is tomatoes.
A river borders the farm property. It flows year-round.
One of their supporting organizations gave them a diesel pump about 5 years ago. It has been dormant for 3 years. You can see some of the tomatoes from the farm being stored here. We tried the pump, but could not get it to work. They had to call in a repair person and get a part from the neighboring city. They would like to get the river water up to the school compound, but it is too far and too much of a difference in elevation for the pump to get it there.
We chose a site closer to the pump to put in the half-acre drip irrigation system. They will install a water line from the pump and put in an elevated tank to feed the irrigation setup.  EDEN is helping with the cost of the tank and stand.

They also have 2 fish ponds that they can use to raise fish for the school to use for food. It will take additional funds for piping and possibly a secondary pump to get the water from the river to the ponds.

There was a group coming from Texas that is going to install a greenhouse for the school. It will go in the area in the first photo. Tthe school can use some of the bucket drip irrigation kits to water it. You can see the manual well on the right in the bottom picture. Unfortunately, it goes dry on them during very dry times. There is another manual well that always has water in another area of the compound.
There is also a solar powered electric well, but it also goes dry during really dry times. That is why rainwater harvesting is so important.
These are filter systems that are used to filter their drinking water.

I was excited to see that they are using rocket stoves to cook with. This is the style of stove that I am looking to supply for the Neema Children’s Home in Kenya. Anna says that the stoves reduce their wood requirement by half and that they really cut down on the smoke. The smoke can contribute to health problems, especially with the children. That is Anna and her daughter Grace in the photo.

The school has 12 sewing machines. The black ones are new treadle machines, from China, and the white ones are used ones from the US that have been swapped to manual drive. They don’t have a permanent place to leave them up, so they are usually in storage. They can set up and sew when school is not in session.
I showed 2 of the girls the instructional video on how to make Luopads. We supplied a kit with some material, templates, snaps and sewing supplies. The girls made a couple pads within a couple hours. They were so excited.
This is Rhobi showing off their handiwork. Great job!
On Tuesday afternoon, I did part of the irrigation training. I showed the videos from SAWBO on the drip system, raised planting beds, and composting. I brought in 30 bucket drip kits for them to use and I showed them the details on these kits. They will use some of the kits in the new greenhouse and the rest will be distributed in the community to needy families. Anna’s husband Marwa is on the left in this picture. It was nice to have the videos in Swahili, so they could watch without interpretation.
It makes a teacher feel good when students take notes! This is Deo and he works on the farm at the school.

This is the school poultry operation. It is further up the hill from the river. The chickens provide eggs and meat for the kids. Note the guttering on the big coop.
This building is for storing the grain and other products that are produced on the farm. That is William in front of it. He oversees this area for the school and is also a driver.

The school has a lot of diversification on the farm. The first picture is banana trees with beans growing between them. The second is an orange tree. They have a 7 acre maize field here surrounded by orange trees.
On Wednesday afternoon, we cut some of the drip irrigation line in lengths to use with the bucket kits. The tile floor was much easier to roll the line up on than what we experienced at Kiryandongo!
No, I am not impersonating an elephant! I am showing the men how to connect the lines from the elevated tank for the half-acre drip system.  We pray the tank and system will be a blessing to provide much needed vegetables during the dry season for many years to come.
The guys got some practice installing the valves for the half-acre system.
Just as I was preparing to leave, the mechanic came with the part for the pump. It was really great to see the pump operate. Marwa was very excited and tried to make a fountain!
There was a sprinkler head in the pump house, but no one knew much about it. I am going to research it and they may possibly be able to use it as well to irrigate with.

It was a very busy visit!  But I said my goodbyes, knowing that the irrigation supplies are in good hands.  I look forward to seeing how God blesses the school’s efforts.

My apologies for the misalignment of some of the pictures.  WordPress and I aren’t getting along to well right now.  I also have some great video to share, but uploading right now is kind of out of the question.  Stay tuned!