Mudslides and More

It has been an eventful past few days here at Kijabe. The biggest occurrence was that of an enormous mudslide that damaged or destroyed many homes and roads, and killed at least three people. The locals say they have never seen anything like this before. It is the end of the rainy season and Friday night was an especially long and hard storm. When we awoke Saturday morning, Jason went to the hospital to round on his patients and his co-workers told him that the upper road to get to the main highway was blocked. Although we could not venture up there for safety reasons, a few people did and got some amazing pictures. The tunnel that has a railroad on top of it was filled with huge trees and mud. When Jason and I walked around Rift Valley Academy (a huge school for missionary kids from all over the world that is located here at Kijabe) yesterday, we could see where huge trees were uprooted and had come barreling down the side of the mountain. In some areas, the mud and debris had created huge craters, and then there were some precarious looking areas that were dammed up – at least for now… Some parts looked like they could break loose pretty easily. One of the missionaries told us that she had to help pull a little girl out of the mud who had sunk down to her torso while playing. We were also told that three teenage girls died when their house collapsed on top of them. It rained again Saturday night and although the upper road had been cleared during the day, it had to be re-cleared on Sunday from more mud and debris. The primary effects at this point are road repair, water shortage in places (including the hospital) due to busted pipes, home repairs, and grieving family members and friends. Please pray for all of the above, and that things would settle out and not be re-agitated with further rain.

Another sadness over the weekend was the death of a missionary woman who was working in Mombassa (the coast of Kenya). The word is that she was only in her 40s and that she died from sepsis after acquiring dengue fever. We have been told that this is uncommon and that it happened very quickly. She was running a guest house on the coast, but had spend many years at Kijabe in the past I think. Her sister lives here, so they decided to have her funeral here yesterday. We were told that her elderly mother was flying in from the States for the funeral. Please pray for her family and friends.

Not all the news from Kijabe is sad however. We are really enjoying getting to know many of the people here – locals, long-term missionaries, and people just passing through for a few weeks or months. A missionary doctor and his wife invited us over for dinner Monday night, and then took us to a dessert gathering for short-term people to get to know each other here at Kijabe. They were such a blessing to meet and were gracious hosts. They also connected me with a new friend. Wednesday morning I had the joy of getting to know a young doctor’s wife that has two boys (age 3 and 1). They have been here for a few months and are planning to stay long term so we had a lot to talk about. Nathaniel loved her boys as well. We ended up spending three hours talking the first day we met. She invited me to a moms’ get-together that happens every Tuesday morning so I am supposed to go tomorrow for the first time, which should be fun.

We also had the opportunity to host a Kenyan surgeon and his physician wife and three year old daughter for dinner at our apartment on Thursday night. Jason had the chance to get to know this surgeon when the man was still in training a couple years ago. This was my first time to meet him and his family though, and we had a great time getting to know them. On Friday, we got to meet up with a friend from Nashville who has been living in Kenya for over two years, and has just a few months left before she heads home. We got to know her the last time we were in Kenya and it was so wonderful to catch up on the past year. We rode with her to Nairobi on Saturday morning and spent the day walking around one of the parks and then having a fantastic lunch at a small restaurant called “Le Rustique”. It was one of Jason’s favorite restaurants when we lived in Nairobi and it definitely held true to our memory. After a lot of great conversation, we said goodbye in the afternoon and headed back to Kijabe by taxi.

Another answer to prayer is that we now have Nathaniel’s car seat! After many phone calls (and help from our friend who has lived here a while!), I finally got ahold of a British Airways number that connected me to the correct number at the airport in Nairobi. The kicker is that the correct phone number was just one number off from the one I had been given at the airport. Anyway, when I told the man who I was over the phone, he responded rudely with “Finally you call, this car seat has been sitting here since April 19^th!”. I held my tongue and told him that I was very aware of that fact and had been trying to get ahold of him but no one would answer the number I was given. He responded by saying that the numbers I gave him to contact me were also wrong and that they had called some guesthouse in Nairobi looking for us that said, “we did not exist”. Oh my… The crazy part was that they were apparently so tired of looking at our car seat that they sent someone out to Kijabe to hand-deliver it to us the very same night! The poor driver got here after 9pm on the night of the mudslide. We are hoping he made it back to Nairobi ok. Jason tried to text him the next day but never got a response. We are thankful to him and to the Lord for Nathaniel to be able to ride a little more safely.

The past two days have been a little bit tough as I have been fighting some sort of cold / virus. Thankfully I’m not having fevers but have been exhausted, blowing my nose endlessly, and now fighting a sore throat and drainage that leaves me nauseated. Nathaniel has had a little bit of a runny nose but nothing else. Jason seems to be feeling fine at the moment. :) Jason took Nathaniel to church Sunday and I stayed home and rested. I “slept in” this morning, which really means taking a morning nap with Nathaniel, and was then able to get a few things done today. We were able to go to the weekly gathering again tonight for short-term visitors and had some more great conversations.

Jason has been enjoying his work at the hospital. He had clinic today and has been able to do quite a bit of operating this past week. I still might have the opportunity to do a little bit of teaching with the nurses if I can recover some powerpoints. Right now I am just playing things by ear. I appreciate continued prayers for wisdom in how to use my time. So far we are all enjoying ourselves and staying busy enough while getting some rest.

A few thoughts to leave you with…

I’ve been doing some studying in Matthew the past few days and have been thinking a lot about the verses that say “He who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.” (Matt. 11:38-39).

I’ve been asking God to reveal to me what it really means for me to lose my life in His. What does that practically look like in my every day? I know that it can only be accomplished with His power. I am too self-absorbed so much of the time. We listened to a great sermon by our pastor back at home and he was talking about becoming less self-conscious by being more and more aware of Christ and His love. I long for this! I struggle so much with self-consciousness and I want so much to be completely consumed by Christ instead. I don’t want to spend my life trying to find myself, and in the process actually lose who I am altogether. The only way to truly find who we are is to find Jesus Christ. In Him alone we find our life.