Mid-term break

Because I was not well I was not able to go and collect my girls from school - I arrived in Nairobi on Thursday evening and spent the night with Jane and her husband (as usual Jane came to the rescue when I needed somewhere to spend the night...). I spoke to Juliet that evening and we agreed to meet in town the following morning. As we were coming from opposite sides of Nairobi and Juliet didn't have a phone, it was quite a challenge to meet up but my girl is getting more and more responsible and when she was stuck in traffic, she borrowed someone's phone to call me and let me know :)

When we finally met on Friday it was already midday. I needed to extend my visa so we headed to immigration office first. When we got there we were told that the office is shut for 2 hrs for lunch and we must come back at 2pm... We decided to do some of the shopping for school in the meantime and drop it at Jane's office so we wouldn't have to carry it around town with us.
This time there was no problems with my visa and after almost 2 hrs of queuing at various counters, having my fingerprints taken, etc... I had my passport stamped for another 3 months :)

I wanted to pay girls school fees that day but by the time we got to the bank it was already shut...

We headed back to Jane's office to pick up our shopping and also my bag which her husband was bringing for me in the car when he was to collect Jane from work... We were unlucky again as there was a lot of traffic and we waited for a very long time for him to arrive... By time it was already getting dark and I was quite worried about getting the bus... At least this time we were in luck and another friend offered to take us in his car as it was on his way back home.

We arrived at the children's home very late - it was after 8pm, but the kids were very happy to see us and I brought them some sweets. It was good to see Evelyne too. You must wonder why I only take Juliet to town and not both of my girls but Evelyne doesn't like to go all that way and she prefers to stay at home... We didn't really talk much that evening as we were all really tired... The next day I had to go to town again to pay the fees, meet with someone and do some shopping - for me this time :)

We set off quite early with Juliet - again Evelyne wanted to stay home. I went to the bank and paid the fees which made me feel much better (even though the queue was really long), I was really worried about the money before and having to make excuses at the school again if we couldn't pay the fees before girls went back to school... I don't even know what it was that made us so tired but when we got home we just bought some things to cook the supper with and some eggs for children and straight after that we were in bed already. Juliet and I share the bed and we were bickering about who should turn off the lights ;) it is never an issue but this time we were so tired we couldn't keep our eyes open...

With Easterlina, June, Zack and Zanaya :)

On Sunday the girls had a lazy day as I was going to visit my host family - I was staying with them when I came to Kenya the first time. It has been absolute ages since I went to their house and spent some time with them - this time everyone was at home, even Easterlina was home for few weeks from Mongolia so it was a great opportunity to catch up with everyone. On the way back to the children's home I got some cake and juice for the kids - it was Sunday after all and I wanted to treat them at least a little bit :)

Juice and cake - sthg so little to get such big smiles :)

Finally in the evening I got a chance to speak to the girls properly and ask a lot of questions about their school. It seems like they are really liking it there, they told me it is very quiet there and good environment for studying. Juliet has joined various clubs for after-school activities, i.e. book club, wildlife club, drama, net ball, etc... Evelyne was only involved in wildlife club but she promised me she would also join the book club and basketball team. The school timetable seems to be pretty busy and they study a lot but at the same time at weekends they get some time for themselves also and they get to watch TV for 2 hrs on Saturday ;) They are quite popular at school as everyone knows they were brought there by a white person ;) As I expected, Juliet is already complaining how hard maths is for her... I knew it would be the case as it was her weakest subject in primary school. I saw their papers for the midterm exams and although there is still plenty they can improve on, I think the results are quite good after all they have been through in recent months... I think once they have settled in properly, the results for end of the term will be much better - and this is what I asked them to work towards. Their best results were in history - they both got 29 points out of 30.

Before travelling to school

Monday came too soon for me and it was already time to take girls back to school. I had to attend a mtg first and then we had to go and collect Hamza so he could travel with me the following day. In the meantime we also needed to buy some snacks for the girls to last them till the end of the term. The journey to school was an experience of its own... the first matatu we took from Nairobi kept breaking down, then we needed to take another one to collect Hamza, then we needed to get back to where the 1st matatu dropped us as it was impossible to get space on a vehicle where we collected Hamza from, and then we were on another one squeezed like chickens...



Girls with their friends from school

 We were really late getting to school - instead of arriving by 4pm we got there at 6.30pm...Which also meant it was already getting dark when we were waiting for transport back home. We waited for over an hour and still didn't manage to get a matatu. Luckily, someone else came to drop off their daughter and they offered to take us back to Kiambu where we could get another matatu to Nairobi. They came with the lorry so all of us had to fit somehow - the driver, his wife, me, Hamza and John... It was a terrible ride - the road was very bumpy, we were very squashed, Hamza was sitting on my lap... When we got a matatu in Kiambu it was just as bad - already very late, matatu full of people - I counted 22 in a vehicle designed to carry 14... I finally got back to Jane's house after 10pm... It was an absolutely exhausting day, I didn't even have time to eat anything until now... All I wanted to do was to shower and go to bed.

Time to say bye to my girls... until beginning of April...