7^th – 10^th July:

This week I visited a new project I would be working in called the Marian Centre. The Marian Centre is a home for children who are not living in suitable environments or situations. If the child is unhappy with the situation they are living in, they can be taken in by the Marian Centre to live for a certain amount of time depending on their situation. An average child will stay with the centre for around one year but other children who are living in extreme situations might have to remain for two years or more. While the child is staying in the centre the parents or parent are enrolled in a program to help them to build up their parenting skills and there is another program they are shown to which can help them to set up their own small businesses if the parent is suffering from financial troubles. There are 20 beds for children, 5 are for boys and the remaining 15 are for girls. The two genders sleep in different rooms. After the staff members working hours one of the staff members will remain throughout the night to make sure that nothing happens to the children when the other workers have gone home. This is also to ensure that the children don’t get into trouble or try to escape during the night.

           When the child is staying in the Marian Centre they are enrolled in the local school so that they don’t miss out in their education. If the child has not received any education in a long time, which can often by the case, the child can be home schooled for awhile to assess which class the child should be enrolled in. If the child is at a much higher age than that of other children at his level of education he might remain being home schooled during his stay because the centre thinks it is very hard for a child to go into school and to be put into a class with children who are all much younger than him or her. The Marian Centre has a teacher who comes every day to conduct home schooling classes with the children there. The Marian Centre also enrols children in a boarding school if they do not have room in the house for that child.

                                                                     While I was here I helped out in any way that I could. For example I set up an excel sheet which had numbers for all the names down the side and the months of the year across the top so the number of days in each month they stayed in the centre could be recorded. There was a total column at the end and in this I had put in the formula to add up all the days they stayed. This would then be automatically put into a total area for the amount of days beds were occupied for the whole year. Therefore if a new child came to stay all they would have to do is add his name and the days each month he stayed in the centre. It would then automatically add up these days and put them in his total column for the year and this would be automatically added to the total amount of days beds were occupied in the centre.

10^th – 12^th July:

My work was finished in Nairobi so I will be finishing the remainder of my time in Kenya back in Kitale. On my way back there I stopped off in Molo which is on the way because one of my friends from college is doing his work placement in Baraka Agricultural College. Also one of my lecturers from college was there for a visit. So for the weekend we all met up and went up to the highland area to go on a camping trip. My friend had been in contact with the school up there because the people working in Baraka College know them and they said we could camp on their schools land.

                                                                

     So we went to this school and this is where we stayed for the weekend. We met all the people up here who worked in the school and they were all very friendly and it was great that they were so happy to let us use their land. We spent the days hiking area the hills and spent the night in the camps. It turned out to be a great trip over and I am glad that I got to see another part of Kenya. The next day I got a bus up to Kitale to stay with the Good Sheppard Sisters again.

20^th – 25^th July: 

I spent all of this week in Jamanoor slum. Every day I would go with one of the Sisters and a development worker. The Sister and I would work with the children while the development worker would talk with the parents to try and figure out what type of situation they are living in and what are their main challenges or problems. He would then record these findings and we will all examine them at a later stage and try to find a solution.   

                                                                  The Sister and I have been working with the children by educating them in simple things. These include the alphabet, numbers and greetings in English. It is good because we can bring charts from Hekima Day Care and use these with the children. So far we have only brought a chart of the alphabet and have been using this to teach them. We would go through the alphabet getting the whole class to repeat each work after use and we would then ask student to come up on their own and to read out each letter. This has been great and they have all been getting better at it with each day.

                                                              For the numbers we would get the class as a whole to count up to 20 or thirty and then get individual children to do things such as count out load how many children are with us. For the greetings we have just gotten them to be able to answer “Good morning” with “Good morning Mark” or “Good morning Sister” and to answer “How are you?” with “I am fine”. In total there are usually 23 children consisting of both genders and ranging from 7 – 12 years old. I would prefer to divide the children into small and big so we might do that soon however we don’t have a class room and are just teaching them under a tree in the slum so this might pose a problem.

 We would usually teach them for around 40 minutes and then they would start be become bored so we would have break time. For this we bought two footballs and a few skipping ropes. We usually divide them into boys and girls and then divide the boys into big and small. The two groups of boys would play football and the girl would play with the skipping ropes. The development worker, the Sister and I would each take a group and play with them for the break time. However this isn’t always the case and sometimes the big and small children would play football together or the girls might play a bit of football and a few of the boys play with the skipping ropes.

After the break we would teach them for another short time mainly just going over what we did earlier in class to revise them on the topic before leaving them go home. Overall it has been great because it is building up our relationship with the children and they are becoming a lot more open with us. This means that they are more relaxed to speak up in class and they are also becoming better behaved. At the start a few of the children would try and leave the class and go back home but now it is not as often that this happens. They are also getting much better at the alphabet which is great because we can see an improvement with them.   

21st of June:
I got a bus from Nairobi city center and went to a place called Bomas of Kenya. This is a place which you can go to and learn about the different tribes in Kenya. Here I went around the area with a group of people and we had a guide to show us around and tell us about the different areas. In Bomas of Kenya they have replicas of tribal villages the way they were when they were very primitive.

 
As you can see these included things such as the huts they lives in. These had thatched roofs and some of them would have a back door for the animals to use because in some tribes the animals would sleep in the houses as well. They had many huts built for each tribes because there would be separate huts for the husband and there would be different huts for his separate wives, the number would depend on the tribe. Also in some tribes each of these huts would have a granary next to them to store the food in.

Most of these villages would also have things such as a place built outside to keep the animals inside if the animals didn't sleep in the house. This would be a sort of circular pen which would be built out of stick and grass. Each of these villages changed a lot depending on the different tribe that it was representing. For example in one tribe the doors to their houses were very low so intruders couldnt run into the house at speed, they would need to slow down to enter the door giving the owner the advantage. Some of these huts differentiated a lot in the materials used for building them as well.

After this we went to a large indoor area and people there did traditional dances for us in the different ways the different tribes danced. This was a very good show and went on for around an hour and a half showing many different styles of dance.

27th of June:
Today I headed down to Tanzania because for my one week holiday I am going to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. To get down to Tanzania I booked a shuttle bus with Riverside bus company. To get over the border I had to buy a Tanzanian VISA which cost me 50 US dollars but for people from the United States it costs 100 USD. The process of getting across the border took quite a while because you have to get the VISA, a person has to check your vaccination card for yellow fever and a person has to check your passport to make sure everything is in order. All of these steps have separate lines which you must line up in so the entire process can take around half an hour or so.
                                                                                                                                    I made it to the area I am staying in which is called Moshi and is right at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro. The company I booked the climb with, called Holly Adventures, booked me into a hotel in Moshi called Keys Hotel and when I got off the bus they met me and took me to this hotel. I spent one night here and went to bed early to start my climb the following morning. The accommodation price was included in my overall price for climbing the mountain.  

28th of June:
I got up early and was picked up by the people from Holly Adventure. They took me to a place where I could rent the gear I didn't have for climbing the mountain. These included a sleeping bag, walking sticks and two metal bottles of water, because they don't allow you to bring plastic bottles with you up the mountain in case you through them away. After this we picked up the members of the team I had which consisted of three porters, one cook and my guide. After meeting these people we got the rest of the things I would be needing such as food, but all this was already included in my price. We then went to the gate of the mountain to get started.

 After getting everybody ready for example weighing all the different loads the porters would carry, because each porter can only carry 20 kilograms we started the climb.

This climb up to the first hut was through a forest area and was filled with many plants and animals. The plants mainly consisted of huge trees which hung across the path and blocked out a lot of the sun light. The animals consisted of mongoose, dik dik and monkeys.

 This hike took around 4 hours and at the end we were at 2720 meters above sea level. This was called Mandara hut. The picture below is from this site and the building is where we ate our meals. This is a typical example of the areas where we would eat. All the food was included in the prices and I got three meals a day. They gave you a lot of food and it is important is try and eat as much as you can because you need all the energy you can get.

Next is a picture of the room you stay in. They consist of four beds but these beds only have a pillow and a sheet so it is important to bring a sleeping bag because it gets very cold at night.

29th of June:

I made my way up to the next hut which is called Horombo hut and is 3720 meters above sea level. This was a long climb and took me around 6 hours. This area of the mountain is called the hillside moon area because the trees thin out so a lot of light is allowed through and the area is very hilly.

When we got to the place where all the huts are the clouds and fog had settled in a lot. People say this happens almost every day after 2 o clock at this time of year. We spent one night here before moving on but some people spend an extra night here to clematis. 

30th of June:
I made my way up to the next hut which is called Kibo hut and is 4720 meters above sea level. This hike took around 4 hours and way through the alpine area. This area started out like the previous area but as you went higher up it changed a lot.

It then became full of rocks and there was very little grass or plant life because the elevation was too high up for many of them to grow. This resembled a desert like area to me.

In this area we went to bed very early because we had to get up at midnight that night to start the hike up to the summit.

1st of July:

We got up at around midnight and had a quick breakfast before starting the climb. It was night time outside but it was good because it was the night of a full moon which gave us a lot of light Therefore I didn't need my torch. The first part was the hardest because it was up a very steep zig zagging path of stones and before the end these turned into big boulders which you had to climb on top of and by this time I was very exhausted. However we reached the top of this which is called Gillmans Peak and I had heard that getting here is the hardest part and that it is a lot easier from here on which is true. There was also snow up here which was very different to see in Africa.

We then walked to the summit and got there at around 6;15 so it took us about 6 hours to reach the top. We were just in time for the sunrise which was very good.

It was very cold up here because of the height and the heavy winds so after taking a few pictures we left and started making out way down the mountain. This took us around another 2 hours.

When we got back to Kibo hut they only allow you to stay for one hour to rest because they want you to get down to lower altitude so you don't suffer from altitude sickness. Therefore after one hour we went down to Horombo hut and spent the night there.

2nd of July:

Today was also a tiring day because we had to make our way down to the gate of the mountain which took us around 6 hours. Luckily when we stopped for our lunch, which we stopped for every day as a break, there was a waterfall nearby which we visited and it was very nice. 

 When we got back to the entrance the car picked us up again and took me back to the Keys Hotel, a second night stay here was also included in the price. I said goodbye to everyone in my team and thanked them all. I also gave them a tip for their hard work. I booked a bus back to Nairobi from the hotel and went to bed early because I was very tired after the hike.

3rd of July:
I got my bus back to Nairobi. Getting back into Kenya was a lot easier because I didn't have to get a VISA again. When I was back here to went back to the same bed and breakfast I stayed in last time and I will be here for another week before going back to Kitale. Overall it was an amazing trip and it was a great way to spend my week holiday. I would advise everyone to lcimb Kilimanjaro but the day of the summit was very hard. Possible the most physically demanding thing I have ever done.