It rained and rained all night long! At first we were happy, with the thought of so many locals getting relief finally as they went to sleep…but then 5 hours into the rain we were just wanting some piece and quiet to sleep! Living in a Manyatta (House) with one layer of corrugated iron, between us and the rain pelting down, meant that the rain storms were VERY loud as we tried to sleep! How anyone slept that night amazes us! All we know is that we were relieved and tired when at about 3am the rain turned into a slight pitter patter…we finally got some sleep!
The need for water became more apparent to us the nest morning as we spoke to our ‘Mpapa’, Joshua over a hot cup of Chai tea. Joshua is a powerful man, with very few words to say. He owns lots of the land around us including the land for the school and the two local churches. During this conversation, he pointed out why his family needs rain so much. In the wet season his family would be considered rich, with many cows, goats and calves, and a large shamba to grow maize and potatoes (even though the shamba attracts Baboons who eat the produce, then Leopards come and eat the Baboons, making the area VERY dangerous….yet so close to our house!) But right now our family is just as poverty stricken as the other families in our village. Joshua has now had to take 2 kids out of school – as he cant afford the fees anymore and needs that money for food. But it struck us – since we have been in Africa people treat you as a walking ATM machine, everyone seems to have ideas for your money! But Joshua was honest to us, saying that he wouldn’t want our money, he wants rain! Rain gives him and his family the chance to earn money and grow food, and collect water. This cemented why the communities struggle in such a hot dry country – and made us realise why something so simple as water is just so important to these families.
We completed some more work at the school this afternoon, making more desks and completing more work in the office. More and more kids would come to us wanting workbooks to do work, which we cant issue, as we leave on Sunday and cant trust that they will return them to us before then. We decided to close up school and take the afternoon off, going for a walk to a small valley, finding a rock overlooking it, and reading!
Its crazy to think that this time next week it’ll all be over and we’ll be back in London! But we cant think of that now…there’s too much chai to drink in the meantime!
