Three guys from California and a couple of Kenyan’s stayed overnight at Brittany’s House a week ago on their way to Congo. I knew one of them and he invited me to tag along so at dawn last Saturday we headed out to the boarder of Kenya and Uganda. It took 2 hours to reach there, 2 ½ hours to cross and 14 hours to drive across Uganda with only one stop for gas and bananas. We reached the boarder of Congo at 2 the following morning and slept for a few hours in a cheap roadside motel before driving to the check point. I can’t begin to describe the crossing but suffice to remember there is no government there, however, by 10a.m. we were in the Congo. The mission was to check out a church and it’s community which has been looted by guerrilla rebels during the war. The people are very warm yet steely faced and very, very poor with guys carrying machine guns everywhere.

Steelfaced friend

Sunday we attended a 3 hour church service and I could have stayed longer so entertained was I by the guy playing drums on an old oil barrel with a goat skin stretched over it and a pan lid for a cymbal which frequently fell from the steel bar on which it was balanced. Somehow the sounds from the makeshift percussion instrument blended with the beautiful harmony of the African voices in the metal roof building producing the most wonderful harmony. After touring the village to observe the destruction and see the needs there was a celebration during the afternoon with Hutu’s and Pigmy’s trying to outdo each other dancing.

Celebration

Our tour guide was named Petit and he rode around on a 50cc motorcycle of pre independence era complete with leather hat and perpetual grin. His brother Benni was our contact guy and he proudly showed us his 74 Chevy truck into which he had just installed a 4 cylinder Perkins diesel engine taken from an old farm tractor. He didn’t bother fitting an exhaust pipe let alone a muffler because he didn’t want it to sound too good in case it attracted rebel thieves. In fact, when we first arrived he suggested we remove the muffler from our van and break the windows because it looked and sounded too good and might attract attention.

Petit personal tour guide

We stayed overnight at the old Helimission house, long since abandoned, with 3 guards packing Chinese made AK47s stationed around the building. Our van got stuck going up the hill to the old mission house but 10 Pigmy’s emerged from the bush to push us out.   Now there is actually electricity in the area generated by a 1923 hydroelectric turbine driven by the nearby river. Several of the coils are burnt out and the armature shaft is bent which causes the lights to flicker on and off like a disco and blue sparks to flash around but hey, it works.

Pigmy’s push out our van

We stayed up late at night listening to one group leader after another pleading for help and presenting their lists of needs but the following morning we were up a 5 ready to go on safari to find silver back gorillas living in the rain forest in the nearby mountains. We drove Benni’s truck since we needed 4 wheel drive and soon had to stop to change a tire. I was actually grateful because by then the boiled turkey and banana I’d eaten the night before was running right through me so the opportunity to make a bush toilet was timely. Two and a half hours driving over lava rock followed by a further two and a half hour hike up the jungle covered mountain brought us to a scene which left us all speechless and will I hope stay indelibly etched in my mind as we came face to face with a 600 pound gorilla and his family. What majestic animals, Gods creation is truly awesome. Our guide allowed us to within about 10 feet of them, the babies were curious and approached us as if they wan ted to play before the adult females reigned them in while the giant male just stared us right in the eyes before he got bored, grunted, then moved away. The others followed and we tracked them for about 45 minutes in awe of those magnificent creatures before we headed back down the mountain. Only around 700 are in existence and only about 1000 people a year get to see them we were told by the rangers.

Gorilla Joe

We scrambled back across the boarder into Uganda, literally the last vehicle before the iron gates swung closed and drove all night until we reached Kampala at 5 a.m. We slept for a few hours at the Sheraton, in such contrast to the rest of the trip that it didn’t seem real, but then that happens often in Africa. We drove on to Kisumu in Kenya, again barely making the boarder. After a night in a hotel there I left the other guys as they were heading south to Nairobi and I headed back north to Kitale. We were a day later than expected so I took a ‘speed’ taxi the whole way. By the time I reached Kitale we had a blown tire, ruptured the petrol tank, had a leaking radiator and the front axel was lose.

I’m off back to west Pokot this coming weekend to begin rebuilding the structure damaged in the wind and on Monday we begin building 4 nurses houses at sister Freda’s Hospital. The roof also is ready to be installed to finish the head teachers house in Kapenguria and I have two pumps to fit on bore holes in Kiminini.

While I was in Nairobi last week I discovered a place which makes custom wheel chairs and I ordered one for Carolyn who you may remember lives at St Vincent’s Disabled Children’s home which was a God sent miracle. I was also in Embu last week and hopefully I can help with a building on a kids project there soon. We also have 20 people staying at the house right now and David is killing and plucking chickens as fast as he can while Anne cooks them for the hungry muzungus. (At least I assume that’s the order they’re doing it in but anything can happen.) The folks staying here at Brittany’s House are building dormitories for the street kids at Challenge Farm.

Africa is a land of contrasts and displays both the sublime and the sobering, it is beautiful but harsh, and sometimes radical and ridiculous. The majestic wild beauty of the landscape, interrupted by scenes of rows of coffins, then back to beautiful countryside in an instant as one passed through small villages in Uganda. Magnificent tea plantations planted by colonials on one side of the road while men struggle with oxen to plough a single furrow and women hack at the ground with jembays on the other side, as if to beat the rich earth into yielding it’s sustenance. Africa will overload the senses and overpower the emotions if you let her. Yet, in all of this, God’s hand is seen to be in control just as He tells the oceans, this far, and no more. I’m grateful I remain in His grasp.