More Tales from Kenya

By

Kevin Williams, Maywood Rotary Kenya Project Chair

 

 

          Well it happened again to me, for the sixth time.  One week, I am sitting home in Maywood where it had snowed and the next week I am in Nairobi Kenya in the heat of their summer.  When you were celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, I was working with 330 Maasai elementary school children and volunteers. And it wasn’t for our annual Maywood Rotary volunteer trip.  How did that happen? 

          Two years ago, I was privileged to go with Maywoodian Reverend and Doctor Karen Rezach on our annual Rotary volunteer trip to Kenya.  Karen is also the middle school principle of a private K-12 all girls school called Kent Place School in Summit NJ.  She was so impressed with the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project trip that she asked me to set up a trip for 6^th, 7^th, 8^th and 9^th grade KPS students.  So, I did.  Dr. Rezach, three teacher/chaperones and twelve courageous girls (and me!) left on Friday March 13^th for ten days of volunteer service for our one little adopted elementary school.  I have been honored to write five previous articles for the readers of Our Town on past trips.  Here is my sixth report to the readers and supporters of our Rotary Kenya Project about another wonderful volunteer trip.  I won’t bore you with every detail in chronological order, just a few of the many miracles I was privileged to see.  It’s not an official report on the trip, just my perspective. 

          The first miracle that deeply touched the hearts of all 16 Kent Place volunteers is the same one that all the past trip volunteers experienced.  On the first day, the volunteers walk about one mile from our tent camp to work at the school.  As they approach the collection of cider block walled and tin roof buildings, the come up the hill to see a wave of 300 children in red uniforms running fast to greet the volunteers as they approach the gate to the school.  Dozens of these jubilant children encircle each volunteer joyful to just touch them, hug them, shout “Jambo” or “Sopa” (hello) and bring them up to the school.  Trust me, it’s not because of anything we give them, it’s just because they are so happy to see new friends from their favorite place in the USA, New Jersey.  Most all of the volunteers are overwhelmed at the out pouring of love, attention and caring given just for being there.  For five years, I have heard from many volunteers that this is a soul moving event that they will not forget for the rest of their lives.  I understand.  And I agree, there is not enough money in the world to pay for such a wonderful experience.  I wish everyone in Maywood could know what it is like to be so wanted and welcomed by children who have so much less than our children have.

          There are so many people that make this event and trip possible.  One of them is a gracious woman called “Mercy Purity”, who now works for the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project since last year.  This is not a job for Mercy, she says it’s a dream come true to be able to work all day for Rotary to help the children of Empopongi Primary School.  Now Mercy is so happy that she has 16 new friends and she arranged for all their volunteer work for the week.  And on this trip, it’s all about life saving clean water.  You may not know that a source of fresh water can save more lives than three full time doctors in Africa.  In 2006, thanks to donors like you, we completed a water project that brought clean water to storage tanks the main area of the school. And we have previous built a school dormitory for the girls but the problem was they had no water pipes to the dormitory, two hundred yards away from the school water tank.  The girls had to carry buckets all the way to the tanks and back to the dorm just to wash up each day.  And bring even more water up to wash their clothes each night. A water pipe would allow them to use showers installed in the dorm and sinks to wash their hands and clothes. 

          But that would be a big, expensive, project that I didn’t think the Kent Place volunteers could complete in less than a week.  I got tired just watching them work, and believe me, that’s all I did was watch (I call that “supervising”).  I am too old for hard labor. The soil is rock hard and it would be a massive amount of deep digging in the hot sun with shovels and pick axes.  Boy, was I wrong!  By the end of the first day, the 12 girls, four chaperones and their assigned student buddies had already dug up the top part of the trench needed for the new pipes!  No one was more surprised than I was.  By the second day, they had dug deep enough to install the pipes from the tank to the dormitory.  And by the third day, the girls were already washing their clothes inside the dorms without having to haul buckets of water so far.  The Kent Place volunteers had also built a clothes line for them to hang their newly washed uniforms. 

          You would think that these hard working girls would be satisfied completing their main construction project and just spend the rest of their time being with the elementary school students.  But no, they noticed that the PVC pipe line from the water tanks to the school kitchen was broken because elephants had crushed the pipes while walking by.  This meant that that Lillian the school cook had to walk a long way several times each morning to fill buckets of water and carry it back in order to cook the 330 lunches of Rotary provided beans, rice and corn each afternoon.  This was not acceptable to the girls so I had to find eight 15 foot lengths of pipe to replace the broken plastic pipes.  Basically, I don’t like confrontation, so in a land of no Home Depots closer than 500 miles, I found a way to get them the pipes.  And of course, they spent many more hot hours in the sun digging and laying the new metal pipe to the kitchen.  Of course, I supervised. I can’t begin to tell you how happy that made Lillian.  She came to work at 6:00am the next morning just so she had the time to wash down the whole kitchen from the water that came out of her pipes!  Just another miracle for the Kenya Project. 

          By now, I figure my job as the trip organizer is safe and I won’t have to run around finding plumbers and pipe.  The Kent Place volunteers are done with the big construction work for the school, they will move on to teaching English, teaching a class on the USA, teaching a class on AIDS, sitting through the Maasai school children’s classes and having the Kent Place School teachers meet with the Empopongi School Teachers. Less work for me!  But NO!  One of the Kent Place girls discovered that the previously installed plastic water pipes from the tank to the vital school garden were broken because a jeep crossed the pipe line. 

          I thought to myself, “Oh, No!”  Yes, you are right, the Kent Place School volunteers demanded we also fix this water problem.  The school children showed up just after sunrise to dig the trench, the pipes were installed and the Kent Place volunteers buried the newly installed pipe.  I started to think, this is too much for me.  Three major and important water projects completed in only one week!   How lucky can I get? 

          But so much more happened for these brave volunteers on this trip.  In the next part of “More Tales from Kenya” next week in Our Town, you will meet many of the volunteers who made this life changing trip as well as the Kenyan people who worked hard to make this happen for 330 children on the other side of the world.  Stay tuned.

 

 

More Tales from Kenya

Part Two:

The Girls!

By

Kevin Williams, Maywood Rotary Kenya Project

 

            This was my sixth trip to Kenya and I have learned to answer to many names.  All the little school children scream out “Jambo Kelvin”, shortly followed by “Where is Corey (my son and frequent visitor).  The resident Maasai naturalist at Siana Springs tent camp calls me “Williams, Kelvin from the Rotary.”  I answer to that also.  But one day on the ride to the school, we passed a group of Maasai mothers washing their clothes in the stream.  One of them turned around to all the others and said loudly, “Look, it’s The Kelvin!”.  It was like she said, “Look, there’s the Pope”.  No matter what they call me, I couldn’t be made to feel more welcome.  And they ask about every Maywoodian who ever volunteered in the past.  “How is the Mayor?”  “How is Jay the veterinarian?”  “How is Judge Lois?”  “Nurse Alice?”  “Librarian Diane?” And so many others, they never seem to forget a volunteer.  Others asked what President Obama asked ME about Kenya; as if he is someone I have breakfast at Hillmans with every morning. 

            It was a new experience for me to bring the twelve girls from Kent Place School instead of mostly adult volunteers.  And it had a big impact on Empopongi Primary School.  You have to realize that Kent Place School is probably the best private school in New Jersey.  Their girls are extremely well educated, confident and mature beyond their years.  But the Maasai girls are taught from birth to be submissive and to always yield to any man’s wishes without question.  So, I was curious to see how this turned out and was happy at the result.

            What few girls who are not married off and drop out of school by the 6^th, 7^th, and 8^th grades were inspired by the Kent Place School girls. The Maasai girls worked side by side with the Kent Place School girls in the classroom.  They did geometry, algebra, English and other subjects together.  You might be surprised to know  that some of the best educated girls in New Jersey not only were able to teach their Maasai counterparts, you’d expect that,  but were also able to learn from them.  The Maasai taught the girls how to get the correct algebra answer one way, and the Kent Place School girls showed the Maasai another “American” way of getting the same answer. 

            You would expect our strong and confident girls to inspire the Maasai girls, but Mercy had another point to make.  She said that it’s just as important for all the Maasai boys to see that girls can be brave, confident, and outspoken because they know they are equal.  She’s right; some of the boys were absolutely amazed at the girls’ behavior in class.  And so were the teachers!  Our girls respectfully pointed out when a boy or even a teacher made a mistake in English or Algebra.  “No, that is not how you determine the volume of an Ostrich egg”, one student pointed out.  The teachers handled this culture shock very well in my opinion.  All the boys and the teachers will never think of girls in the same way after our visit.  That’s a good thing, even if it clashes with traditional Maasai culture. 

            I am not saying there were no cultural conflicts, there were.  All Kindergarten through 12^th grade students in Kenya are required to take a class each day on fundamentalist Christian education as outlined by the federal government.  Even our one Muslim teacher, Safia, must teach this course.  And every student must pass this course to move on to the next grade.  One of our girls was baited by a Maasai student who asked “You believe in evolution?  Prove to me that I was a monkey!”  They tried to ridicule her.  Now I, being a Christian, but also a hot head, would have made a big argument about this and insulted the Maasai. Luckily, I was not in that classroom at the time.  But not our Kent Place School girls, they disagreed with grace and dignity.  But I knew some of them were hurt by this.   

            Simply put, the girls changed the school but they were also changed by the school, and I think for the rest of their lives.  They will never look at water in the same way, they will see it as a rare and life saving commodity.  They will appreciate what a luxury clean clothes are for people on the other side of the world.  They will come home grateful for paper, pens, pencils and school books because they are so precious in other countries.  They have learned that a school lunch of beans, rice and corn each school day can save your life if your family has no other food.  I think all of them have learned that by accident they are blessedly gifted to not be born in a poor part of the world.  And that these children, through no fault of their own, were born in a poor part of the world.  So, when I am elected to be “KING” of New Jersey, I will declare that EVERY school child must volunteer for ten days of work at a Maasai school.  It’s an education in real life that will last for the rest of their lives!

            The girls did not work every single minute of their trip to the school.  Who wants to go all the way to Africa and not see the wildlife? So I scheduled as much time as possible to go on jeep safaris so they could see the “Big Five”, the lion, leopard, elephant, rhino, and buffalo.  And they did see all of them.  Reverend Dr. Karen Rezach started to call me “Kelvin, the 6^th of the Big Five.”  I liked it.  I only heard one problem happening on the Safaris.  One jeep pulled up very close so that the girls could get a good look at a Kenyan lion.  Unfortunately, one 12 year old student forgot to turn off her camera’s flash which threatened the lion.  Luckily, instead of eating several high grade students, the startled lion just turned around and sat down. 

            Mercy and I had a surprise planned for Karen Rezach, the middle school principal of Kent Place School.  It occurred after dinner on our first night at the school.  About twelve Maasai warriors came to perform the traditional Maasai “baptism” and re naming ceremony of a worthy Mzungu (white person).  Karen was called up by the head Maasai warrior so the tribe could talk with each other about which Maasai name would be best for this honored person.  The tribe settled on “Nashupie”, meaning “Ever Happy”.  I think that Karen found this ironic, but was so pleased to be honored in this way.  The lead Maasai warrior instructed her to be sure to change her birth certificate and driver’s license when she returned home to Maywood.  For the rest of the trip, no one called her Dr. Rezach, Reverend Rezach or Principal Rezach; she was now called Nashupie by all the volunteers.   I think she liked that a lot. 

            Probably the hardest thing for our volunteer girls to do was to say Good Bye on our last day at the school, Friday.  They had grown very close to their assigned student buddies, the  faculty and other students at the school.  We were invited up to “Maywood Rotary House” (a small house on school grounds built by contributions so Mercy has a place to live while she works for the Kenya Project) for lunch.  After lunch, the girls and the chaperones walked back to the center of the school for the good bye ceremonies.   You could probably call it a tearful event because it was so heart breaking for the girls to say good bye to their friends.  They listened to many speeches of thanks and watched the students perform thousand year old dances and songs of appreciation.  Then came our turn to say good bye.  The girls wrote a wonderful speech/poem about how deeply their visit affected them.  The Empopongi school principal translated that poem into Mai, the tribal language of the parents who came to honor us.  They laughed, agreed and applauded the deepest feelings of our girls.  Because the Maasai performed for us, our girls got up and sang the Kent Place School anthem as well as Amazing Grace.  It was well received by the students and community.  When I saw the girls walk away from the school, it was a trail of tears.  Happy tears, but still tears. 

            How lucky could I get, to be a part of all this?  I used to think that all the donors and trip volunteers gave so much more than what they received, not anymore.  Now I know that anyone who gives their hard earned dollars, or gets to work at the school, gets so much more than they give.  Like Corey, they have changed the world; the world of 330 children on the other side of the world. 

            Next time, in part three of these articles, it’s going to be more of a personal look at what it was like for me to be on my 6^th visit to that other side of the world on the Kent Place School trip.  After reading it, you will never look at electricity or water in the same way again! 

 

 

              

 

           

         

         

         

           

2008 Annual Report for:

 

 The Maywood Rotary Kenya Project

 

            As Chair of the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project, it is my pleasure to submit this report on all of our activities this past year.  Five years ago, this project’s annual report could be summed up in two paragraphs, one about providing food and one about providing school uniforms.  Below you will find how much our project has grown since then. 

            Double the Donations:

 

            You may not know that the Rotary Foundation has tens of thousands of dollars available for Rotary service projects just like our Kenya Project, but there is one string attached.  You must have the cooperation of a local Rotary club in Kenya.  Dominic Jengo and I have been trying to accomplish this for five years and only ran into road blocks.  For example, none of the six Rotary Clubs in Nairobi were willing to help without demanding our donations pay for their club expenses to go down to Siana Springs Tent Camp.  As Chair of the project, I will not allow any donation to pay for administrative expenses.    

            But thanks to 08 trip volunteer Jerry Kallman (past president of the Ridgewood Rotary Club) and his relentless internet research, we now have an official in-country Kenyan Rotary Club in Narok (87 miles away from our school).  This very small club is very excited to work with us to get Rotary Foundation grants and they do not expect us to pay for them.  In effect, every donor dollar towards specific school projects will be DOUBLED by the grant for that project.  08 Trip Volunteer, Kathy Palumbo, will be in charge of writing the grants we need.  She will work with Diane Rhodes on this but please don’t tell Diane, she doesn’t know that she volunteered for this yet. 

 

            Our Angel Mercy moves into Rotary House:

 

            For five years, Mercy Purity, the front desk manager at Siana Springs tent camp, volunteered without any pay to be our representative to the school.  She got construction estimates, beans and rice for the children each school day, and a hundred other details that made our project successful.  But as the project grew, she could not work full time for Siana Springs and almost full time for us. It would be too much for any one person. It became necessary to hire Mercy away from Siana Springs (at a yearly salary of $5,000.00 per year) and build a home/office for her on the school grounds.  Thanks to the sponsor donations from the 08 trip volunteers, Mercy was able to move into her new home and new job this past month.  Her used furniture and solar electricity will be delivered this week.  Thanks to past donors, she has her own laptop and internet connection (via cell phone). You might want to send her an email of congratulations to Mercy@maywoodrotarykenyaproject.org.  But give her time to answer you; she has to answer all my Kenya Project’s emails first!!!

            Now I have become a boss and already Mercy is causing me problems.  She is working seven days a week and refuses to take off one, much less two, days a week.  And she won’t work less than ten hours a day.  You would think we pay her by the hour.

 

            Ridgewood Rotary starts their own Kenya Project:

 

            A great idea (thank you, Corey) spreads fast.

            There are so many other local Maasai schools that are as deserving of help as much as our Empopongi Primary School, but we don’t have the resources to help them.  Or perhaps more honestly, I don’t have the time in each day to help another school. Ridgewood Rotary Club has stepped up and created their own Kenya Project to assist another school called Kishermoruak Primary school, only nine miles away from our school.  Jerry and Lorraine Kallman came on our 08 volunteer trip to visit their newly adopted school and begin on the road we went down five years ago. 

            I will be assisting them in their own Kenya Project Volunteer trip which will occur the week after the Maywood Rotary Kenya volunteers work at the school next July.  We wish them the best of luck in changing the lives of the students at their newly adopted school.  May they do as well or even better than we have! 

            I foresee a day in the future, when I retire from this job, that Kenya Project Chair Corey James Eustace-Williams has gotten a Rotary Club sponsor for each of the 29 schools in the Maasai Mara!  

 

            Mercy comes home to Maywood Again!

 

            Yes, three years ago, Mercy saved up her money and took out a loan to pay for her visit Maywood for two weeks with James Kathurima, Siana Manager at the time.  They gave wonderful talks to over a dozen community groups and schools about the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project.  And then last year, Mercy came to bring Empopongi students Benson and Samuel for needed operations in Salt Lake City thanks to Coral Terry who covered those costs.  But Mercy has a personal friend who is paying for her to come visit her in her home in California.  I insisted that on her way back home she stop and visit her second home town, Maywood, for a few days because we all miss her.  07 Trip Volunteer Dorothy Fenniman graciously offered to host a reception for Mercy and all of you are invited.  RSVP required.

            If you wish to see Mercy while she is here either at Dorothy’s reception dinner, or hear her speak at Maywood Rotary, I’d be happy to tell you when both events will occur.  But as all of you know about Kenya, everything is relative and often changes.  As usual, the American Embassy in Nairobi is being difficult in granting Mercy a Visa. She is supposed to arrive on October 15^th, but I am sure that date will change several times before we really know when she is coming.  When I know for sure, I will e-mail you about the dates of Dorothy’s party, and when Mercy is speaking at Maywood Rotary. 

 

            Past Trip Volunteers do all the Hard Work:

 

            If only because I complain about it, most people think I do all the hard work on the Kenya Project alone.  In fact, this is not true.  Nine past trip volunteers  are part of a Volunteer Committee  who work hard all year around to assist me with all the work and difficult decisions on how the project should be run.  We meet in a different volunteer’s home for dinner and a meeting. 

            Let me tell you who they are. Past trip volunteers Jim Croal (06) and Linda Tobin (07) meet with me on the first Thursday of each month to record all the donation checks for deposit in our 5013c account. Then Dominic Jengo (06) makes those deposits.  Linda Tobin is also in charge of our emergency medical fund to help any school child or their family who needs urgent medical care.  And Jim Croal along with fellow 06 trip volunteer Dorothy Fenniman and 07 trip volunteer Arlene Rotolo are working hard mailing letters to everyone who has every made a donation to us.  They are asking them for their e-mail address so we can update them on the progress that their donation has made for our adopted school.  We can’t and don’t want to send out expensive fund raising letters, but email updates will cost us nothing.

            Often running the Kenya Project requires me to make ethical and difficult decisions, so past 07 and 08 trip volunteer Judge Lois Lipton has volunteered to help me do the right thing!  She is my Ethics Consultant.  That’s been invaluable help.  Also when you have a committee, there is always one person who has to do all the boring and tedious jobs like writing up minutes, writing long grant applications and scheduling meetings.  That thankless job goes to 07 and 08 trip volunteer Kathy Palumbo. 

            A new member of our volunteer committee is past Rotary President & 07 and 08 trip volunteer Diane Rhodes.  She is in charge of the library at the school and is working on ways to get adult books; so that even the faculty at the school will have books to read. 

            Former trip volunteer Lyn Ofrane was in charge of our very successful card sale fund raiser this past year and next year.  As a professional photographer, Lyn took the best of her great pictures, and put them on blank note cards for sale to raise over $8,000.00 in card donations for the school.

            You may not know that every single donor to the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project for the past five years has received an individual thank you letter from Kenya Project Co-Chair, JoAnn McKay.  Another big and hard, but unrecognized job that helps us succeed in our goal of helping the school. 

 

            Clean Water at Empopongi:

 

            In 2005, the first clean water source in the entire area was built by donations to our school.  In Africa, they say that clean water can save more lives than three full time doctors.  And we have found this true at our school.  But there have been problems we have to face.        

            Back in 2005, we built the water system with PVC pipes, which seemed like a good idea at the time.  I was wrong about that.  Elephants have walked across the water pipes causing them to break.  It’s obvious that we need metal pipes to prevent this interruption in providing clean water to our students. We also need pipes to deliver the water to the boys’ & girls’ dormitories, the kitchen and school garden. There is also a problem with getting this water to the school and Rotary house.  It seems we need a pump to accomplish this.  However, a gasoline powered pump would be too expensive so we are getting an estimate for a solar powered or manual pump.  We are currently getting an estimate of the cost of all these challenges and will try to get a Rotary Foundation grant to correct all of these problems.  And with enough new matching donations, we will accomplish this goal.   

 

            Scholarships for Empopongi Graduates:

 

            The Maywood Rotary Kenya Project has provided scholarships to 14 graduates of our school.  This entire effort is run by the trip volunteer committee.  With Mercy’s help, Jim Croal and another trip volunteer, Janice Goldfarb, make sure that each scholarship donor receives a copy of every student’s report card every semester, and a personally written thank you letter. 

            Also, committee member Linda Tobin wrote the last application for students wishing to apply for a scholarship.  And ‘08 Trip volunteer Ronald Smith has updated this application and worked hard on improving communication with the school on issues concerning scholarships.  He, trip volunteer Judge Lois Lipton and Kathy Palumbo have not only interviewed the current 8^th grade scholarship applicants while they were in Kenya this past July, but also conducted in depth person to person interviews with all of our past scholarship students. 

            Ron, Kathy, and Lois have been invaluable in improving the entire way scholarships are granted so that donors can be sure that their money is well spent. All of us have learned the vast cultural differences that affect schooling and are working to improve the scholarship program.   

 

            Food for the School Children each School Day:

 

            Every single school day for the last five years, donors to the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project have provided a well balanced lunch of beans and rice to each of the 308 children of Empopongi Primary School.  You may have heard of the political unrest that started last December.  This caused a large increase of the cost of food for our children.  We hope to increase our fundraising to provide the $425.00 per month cost of providing beans and rice to our children.  We are renewing our fund raising efforts to cover this increase cost of food, let us know if you can help. 

 

            Thanks to 07 trip volunteer Spencer Fenniman, we were able to start a school garden to help grow some food for the children and help them become more independent. ’08 Trip Volunteer Lorraine Kallman worked hard to help expand and improve the school garden.  The produce from this garden will supplement the children’s lunches each day. 

             

 

             Kenya Project Partners from Far Away Helping our School Children:           

 

            Several years ago, a British architect named Wayne Collins visited our school.  He wanted to help; so Mercy put him in touch with us.   He, and his friends in London, raised enough funds to build the Nursery (baby class) and Kindergarten (top class) building.  Wayne also designed “Rotary House” which Mercy moved into this month.  He has always been concerned about water conservation and recycling.  This November, Wayne will visit the school for several reasons.  Being concerned about using well water from the spring for the garden, he will be designing a “grey water recycling system” with gutters on each building to collect rain water into a tank for use in watering the garden.  Wayne will also be consulting with the school about next year’s big project, to build a building attached to the kitchen to be used, not only as a cafeteria (so the children can eat their lunch inside when it rains), but also as a Community Meeting place for the different villages, and as a Church on Sundays. 

            We hope to take Wayne’s plans and attempt to raise the needed funds for these improvements from our 09 Trip Volunteers.  Our trip volunteers on this trip will work on completing these construction projects during our volunteer week at the school.  This will be the biggest construction project we  have done for the school.

            When speaking of Kenya Project Partners from far away, we cannot forget to mention Coral Terry from Utah.  It was through her hard work and donations that Empopongi Primary School students Benson and Samuel were able to come to the USA for needed medical treatment.  But Coral’s help doesn’t stop there; she is a high school scholarship sponsor (at a cost of $2,500.00 for all four years) for six of our Empopongi Primary graduates. 

 

            Kenya Project Partners From NJ Helping our School Children:

 

            Every year, for several years, we have received considerable help from the Hackensack Rotary Club.  Through their donations, two classrooms have been built for our school. Hackensack High School’s Interact Club (a Rotary Club for high school students) has raised the funds to provide our children with the required school uniforms.    Maywood Avenue School’s React Club (a Rotary Club for middle school children) has raised over $1,000.00 in donations, each year at a Student Faculty basketball fund raiser for several years, to help our school.

            St. Martin’s Episcopal Church in Maywood, All Souls Presbyterian   
Church in New York, as well as many other churches have supported the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project for several years,  all of them have helped make a big difference in the lives of the students, year after year.   

 

            Even More Help for our School from a Summit NJ School:

 

            A few years ago, Karen Rezach, a principal of a private school for 600 girls, called Kent Place School, was a Trip Volunteer for the Kenya Project.  Her school has an “International Day” each year; they invite two teachers and two students from a foreign country to help their girls learn about different cultures.  This year, the school was kind enough to pay for Empopongi teacher Boniface Mwanzia, a seventh grade girl, Namunyak, and 8^th grade girl, Seenoi to visit Summit New Jersey for the International Day classes.  This was a very rare and wonderful opportunity for all three of them.  Karen Rezach has now asked the Maywood Rotary Kenya project to plan a March 09 trip for 20 students, five parents, five teachers and their group leader, (me) so that all of us can volunteer to work at the school for a week.

 

            Hygiene, Health and Medical Care:

 

            I have been told by our medical volunteers that many of the school children’s illnesses are caused by poor hygiene, specifically not washing their hands.  08 Trip Volunteers Richard and Maria Edmonds solved this problem by installing soap at the boy’s dorms, girl’s dorms and the central part of the school itself. They also taught the children exactly how to wash their hands.  Like last year’s health improvement, providing anti malaria nets for each child, I fully expect to see a reduction of communicable diseases from this effort. 

            There is no medical or nursing care at the school.  The nearest medical care is 87 miles away in Narok.  I was informed by my medical volunteers (Maureen Timony, Jay Buchholz, and Tim Eustace) that we must address this problem now because too many children are sick at the school and illnesses spread at a rapid rate to so many other students.  Dr. Jay Buchholz has donated thousands of dollars in needed medicines.  The Trip Volunteer committee has approved hiring a Nurse to come to the school twice a month at a cost of $100.00 per month.  We hope to start this program in October and hold a fund raiser soon to cover the $900.00 yearly cost of this small step to better health for our children.    

            And for the next year, teacher Kevin Moran at Hackensack Middle School has agreed to raise funds for the emergency medical fund.  This much needed fund covers emergency treatment for the teachers and students at our school.  In the past year, this fund has paid for medical treatment to two students who had eye injuries and one parent who was mauled by an elephant.  The students are doing well but the parent passed away from his injuries.   

 

Solar Improvements:

 

            As you know there is no electricity at our school.  So, funds have been donated to provide solar lighting in four places to improve the education of our students.  You may know that the 7^th and 8^th grade students have to go to school from 6:00pm to 10:00pm each night to study for their national graduation examinations.  Now solar lighting has been installed in these classrooms, but three 11 watt bulbs are not enough.  So wonderful donors from the Netherlands, Simon Watt and his family have made a donation to improve the solar lighting. Solar lighting in both dormitories has been provided by a donation from Rotary District Governor Dominic Jengo.  He has provided solar lanterns for both buildings. 

            After Wayne Collins from the UK built the new nursery and kindergarten, we were left with the old dilapidated two (very small) room building.  We made the needed repairs and one room became the school’s library.  With donations and the massive work by trip volunteer Diane Rhodes, we now have a well stocked library in one of these rooms.  Our library will not only have electric lighting but to provide electricity for one computer donated by a Dutch organization and a radio donated by Maywood Rotary.

            The other room was being used by the Teachers as a Staff Room.  But they gave up the only space they have to work in because they saw the need for a separate science classroom.  Wayne Collins donated the cost of a very expensive “Science Bench” that will now be powered by electricity provided by our new solar panels.  We hope this will help the children do better in the science portion of their graduation examination. 

 

Volunteer Trips to the School:

 

            The July 08 volunteer trip to our school was a big success due to the hard work and sponsor donations of the twenty volunteers.  If you exclude my family, over twenty thousand dollars was donated by the trip volunteer’s family, friends and their community organizations.  This money allowed for many important improvements to Empopongi Primary School. 

            First, they allowed us to build Rotary House where our full time representative, Mercy, will be able to live in and work to help not only our school but other Rotary Club’s sponsored schools.  So, thanks to these trip volunteers, the Kenya Project will be able to help the Maasai schools for many years into the future.  But there donations gave even more, seeds and tools for the garden, solar lighting, paint for the classrooms, school supplies, more library books, underwear and clothes for each child, needed medicines, puppets, and yoyos, kazoos, for the children, solar flashlights for each teacher, signs on each classroom or building, soap, and so much more.  Each 08 trip volunteer worked so hard and put their whole heart into our adopted school. 

            The July 09 trip is coming together very well and the trip applicants come from varied backgrounds and have many talents that will help the school.  We currently have many applications and are interviewing possible trip volunteers in the next two weeks.  PLEASE note: applications will CLOSE on September 30^th, so if you or someone you know wants to go they must apply NOW. I am attaching an application with this report. After the committee interview applicants, we will vote and announce who will go on the 09 volunteer trip on October 12^th. 

            At this time, due to my family’s finances, I am sorry to announce I am not sure we will be having a July 2010 trip.  But I am sure we will have a 2011 volunteer trip. 

 

Financial Budget for 08 to 09:

 

            The trip volunteer committee has approved and submitted the following budget to Maywood Rotary Board of Directors for their vote and comments.  You will find this budget attached to this email.  Should you have any comments or questions, please feel free to email me.   

 

Our website: maywoodrotarykenyaproject.org

 

            Because of all our other work, I must admit that I have not devoted enough time to our website.  However, we have had 3,939 visitors to our website and many questions from people all over the world.  I hope to do better work on the website in the future. 

 

In Conclusion:

 

            I am confident that Maywood Rotary Club members, Trip Volunteers from each year and all the donors can be proud of the tremendous good we are doing for 308 children on the other side of the world.  We are building for the future of helping where the school can’t help themselves and striving to make the school more self supporting for where they can help themselves.  We are also working hard to over come the vast cultural differences and improve our communication with the Maasai. 

            I would never have been able to imagine that Corey’s little acorn could grow into such a large oak tree.  Well, in Kenya that would be a large Acacia tree.  It’s an honor to be the director of such a project for Maywood Rotary. 

            Should you have any comments, suggestions or willingness to help raise funds for a specific part of our project, please contact me at: Kevin@maywoodrotarykenyaproject.org. I also want to thank all the volunteers who work so hard so that my job isn’t so hard.  I promise NOT to send you such a long email until the next annual report.  

 

Respectfully Submitted,

 

Kevin J. Williams, LCSW

Chair

Maywood Rotary Kenya Project

September 19, 2008

Maywood Rotary goes to Kenya:

Making a Difference

By

Kelvin Williams

 

Part One (and more):

 

 

            We came.  We gave.  We made a big difference to 308 little children on the other side of the world.  And at the same time, we got so much more than we gave.  Here, in five parts, are some of the stories about the twenty ‘08 Maywood Rotary Kenya project volunteers. 

 

            Sudan Peace Conference, Fire Ants and a Pick Pocket attempt to Disrupt Maywood Rotary Trip: 

 

            All of us left on Friday morning from JFK on a fifteen hour flight to Dubai courtesy of Emirates Airline.  Perhaps I did not do a good job of trip preparation because when we landed, one anonymous trip volunteer said, “Welcome to Saudi Arabia!”  Of course, we were not actually in Saudi Arabia, but a different country called the United Arab Emirates. Three hours later, we left for Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, where Rose and Chris, members of our Kenyan family for five years now, greeted us.  We were supposed to stay one night in Nairobi at a modest little hotel after our long flights.  BUT, the government of Sudan was holding a peace conference and wanted to stay an extra night in the hotel, our hotel.  I have nothing against peace in the Sudan, but was annoyed that it disturbed our plans at the last minute.  However, we were “bumped up” to one of the most expensive hotels in Kenya, the Safari Park hotel at no extra cost. 

            As in life, a good thing can be a bad thing and sometimes it’s hard to tell which is which.  This leads me to tell you the first story about one of our volunteers.  Many of you know Maywoodian, Anne Quigg, who already was one of my personal heroes before she even arrived in Kenya.  She has always inspired me to get back up after life knocks you down.  We were eating our first dinner at the hotel and watching a Maasai dance presentation when someone stole her wallet, credit cards, hundreds of dollars of cash and most importantly, her passport. 

            Now I know this would have ruined my trip and be a cause for much complaining and whining.  But not Annie, she said, “It’s only money, it doesn’t matter, I’ve lost more important things in my life.”  Not one word of complaint left her lips and she still says it was the most wonderful trip of her life.  Almost all of the volunteers came up with handfuls of cash to loan her.  Rose and Chris arranged for Annie to get an emergency passport at the USA Embassy where she was treated in the most arrogant, rude and meanest way possible.  But trust me, if it takes me years, they will regret the day that they mistreated this Rotary trip volunteer.  That Embassy employee will be hearing from our congressman and state department very soon and often until a written apology is issued to Annie.            Annie was our group’s inspiration to understanding the true importance of our trip, helping the children. And she did this more than once.

 After Nairobi, we left on several tiny and terrifying planes to the Siana Springs tent camp near the school.  These planes are so small. How small are they? They are officially banned by the American Phobic’s Association.  We were warmly greeted by the staff.  One of the staff members is a waiter named Kennedy, who works from 5:00 am until midnight seven days a week, serving our group breakfast, lunch and dinner with the kind of service you rarely see in the USA.  And he is paid $70.00 a month for doing this.  We brought gifts for his two children (who he sees once every seven weeks for a few days), clothes for them and of course a big tip from the group. 

            All of our tents but one were wonderful, hot showers, comfortable beds with a hot water bottle placed in your bed each night. Each tent even had a dressing room area and front porch.  But Debbie Slevin, a drama teacher from Demarest, was Ann’s tent mate.  Late one night, they innocently walked into their tent to find Safari ants crawling over everything, including their feet.  Both ran out of the tent shouting while taking off their shoes and pants. Within seconds, the staff arrived to solve this situation; they emptied out the tent, sprayed and moved both the startled volunteers to a new ant less tent.  Both faced the whole thing with grace and courage, unlike me who would have wanted to go home to Maywood. And again, no complaints from Annie, she just moved on with the trip. She made all of us better people by coming on the trip.  If you run into her on Pleasant Avenue, tell her, “Way to go, Annie”.  Peace conferences, pick pockets and ants ain’t gonna stop us from making a difference for the children. 

 

            SHOWTIME: WE GOT PUPPETS!

 

            If Annie was our teacher on how to be a better person, her tent mate, Debbie was our Master of Creativity.  Often volunteers come to me with ideas on how to help the children that sound strange, wrong or won’t work.  Debbie proved to me how wrong I can be about that.  She bought ten very beautiful, professional quality puppets each representing the animals of Kenya and taught the children how to use them.  Of course, they have never seen a puppet in their lives.  Surprisingly, the younger children loved them immediately while the older children were a bit scared at first.  But all of them enjoyed Debbie’s puppets so much, they wrote their OWN play about them and presented the puppet play to us and the entire Maasai community on the last day of our work at the school.  Debbie taught all of us to have the courage of our own ideas even when Kevin doesn’t agree, because you can truly enrich the lives with something new and meaningful for these children who have no TV, no computers, no Xboxes. And yet, I think that Debbie has no idea how large and meaningful her contribution was to the children.  

            So many people in Maywood think they know our Maywood veterinarian on Pleasant Avenue, Dr. Jay Buchholz.  Trust me, you don’t. I’ve come to realize that you don’t really know anyone for sure until you’ve been to Africa with them.  Dr. Jay paid for and brought thousands of dollars worth of much needed medicines for the school children.  But you’d expect that from a big hearted guy like Jay.  But you wouldn’t expect that he has a previously undiscovered talent as a puppet master who can make you laugh long and hard.  I know I didn’t expect that until one night.  My tent was very close to the area of the camp where each night they have a bonfire, and guests from many different nations sit and listen to the Kenyan guitar player perform for them.  One night, when I was trying to sleep, I heard this singing and a loud, high pitched, Shari Lewis like voice screaming, “Yes, tell us about Africa!”  Jay was standing behind the guitar player putting on a puppet show that had all the guests enthralled.  When he wasn’t busy painting the 6^th, 7^th and 8^th grade classrooms, Jay brought us all together with his talent as a comedic puppet master.  He was so good at it that at times, I found myself listening to and answering the puppet as if it was a real and separate person, completely forgetting that it was really Jay Buchholz. 

 

            Government Grants, Bull Stuff and Teaching:

 

            You might also think you know our Maywood Mayor, Dr. Tim Eustace.  I know I thought I did.  In one way, he did exactly what you would expect of Tim.  For years, I have been trying to get several local and federal politicians to come to the school and increase the $1.42 per student per year financial support.  The Maywood Rotary Kenya Project is always working on ways for the school to become more independent, to stand on their own two feet as much as possible.  But these government representatives never answer my letters and invitations to come see the little miracle school in the Maasai Mara.  This year, they showed up and the Maywood Mayor gave them all a wonderful speech, a certificate of appreciation from Maywood Rotary and the gift of a Maywood Rotary polo shirt.  And when they left, we had an agreement that as of September 1^st, they will fully pay for three new teachers, build a new building on the school grounds AND purchase a school bus to transport the students to school and events.  I was afraid that if the politicians stayed another hour, Tim would have gotten a “Streetscapes” grant from them too! 

            Tim taught all of us in our group how to be a leader: don’t complain, work hard at hard jobs, and forget about taking credit for it.  Two years ago, Tim and that year’s trip volunteers built a mile long fence around the school to keep the wild animals away from the little children.  Unfortunately, since then, large elephants broke down certain parts of the fence because of me.  In an effort to encourage more independence, I pushed hard for the school to plant corn for the school lunches.  No one told me that elephants can smell corn up to three miles away, so the fence was in disrepair.  While repairing the fence with this year’s team of volunteers, several Maasai warriors near the worksite asked if Tim would help them slaughter and skin one of their cattle so their families could have some food.  If you want to know if Tim did or didn’t help, you’ll have to ask him yourself because I won’t tell you in this article.  

            Volunteer Kathy Palumbo, a middle school teacher in New Milford, is the invaluable kind of volunteer that every organization desperately needs.  The Rotary motto, “Service Above Self” is her middle name.  If there is a thankless, boring and detailed job, Kathy does it all without complaint.  She made sure that every needed school supply item, from flash cards to microscopes were purchased, packed and delivered to the school.  She also does all the boring, but necessary things like taking all the meeting notes at the school and back here in the USA when our committee meets.  And much more, she taught us all how to really help others. 

            But Kathy is a teacher and as a repeat trip volunteer well known to the  teachers at the school.  One day, a teacher asked Kathy to teach his class.  Some of the students were interested in the form of government in the USA.  Kathy moved up to the painted on black board and proceeded to teach the legislative, executive and judicial branches of government compared to the Kenyan form of government.  Then the teacher pulled out a hand drawn picture and said, “Now, Miss Kathy will teach us about the different parts of the human heart.”  Her head spinning, Kathy switched subjects and proceeded to teach about the four chambers of the heart as well as the major veins and arteries.  These diversified lessons continued to jump from one subject to another unconnected subject for over an hour but Kathy was a trooper and although dizzy, did a great job. 

 

They made me cry, a lot!

 

            We even had a spiritual teacher among our volunteers.  Maureen Timony from Rochelle Park is a nurse at Hackensack Hospital who works with adults who have Leukemia.  Since she was a small child, she felt a strong connection to Kenya after watching Kimba the White Lion, seeing Born Free and then reading Out of Africa, by Karen Blixen.  She even named her daughter Karen after the author who helped Kenya so much before her death in 1962.  She stumbled upon our project after reading about it in the Our Town last year, and decided she HAD to go.  After saving a few dollars each day, her dream came true.  It did.  Not only did Maureen teach first aid to the teachers, and provide medical services to ill and injured volunteers and students, but she was “picked” by the local Maasai to be honored in a name changing ceremony.  Maureen was baptized with her new tribal name, “She who is at home in Kenya”.  I cried, a lot, just watching how deeply moved she was during such an honor.  We also visited the home of her heroine, Karen Blixen, in Nairobi.  Although I must confess that some volunteers were not all that interested in this part of the tour, ALL the volunteers wanted to take a picture of Maureen standing on the front porch of Karen Blixen’s house. 

            I work all year full time on this project with no paycheck.  But watching Maureen gives me a paycheck bigger than any salary of any person in Maywood.  She inspired all of our volunteers to follow our heart to help our brothers and sisters, even if we never have met them and they happen to live on the other side of the world. 

            Please don’t think I am bragging, I am not.   Our son Corey contributed what he did not because I am any kind of great parent.  He did it because of who he is in his own heart.  Five years ago he fought me tooth and nail to help these children who looked like him but had so much less than he did; I told him we can’t possibly do it.  But, as usual, he didn’t listen to me and said, “What about Maywood Rotary?”  The rest is history. 

            It’s nothing new that Corey makes me cry.  I cry every time I look at his messy room or see his report card.  But this time in Kenya, I was crying for different reasons.  We brought a lot of needed clothes to Kenya for the children.  For hours on end, fourteen year old Corey was in the kindergarten classroom picking out children with no underwear (most all of them), badly tattered sweaters, worn out shorts and no shoes.  I watched him pick out new clothes, fit them for each child, dress them and after that each child walked out smiling with pride and gratitude.  And he did it all with an open heart. Several times, I just left the kindergarten, walked around the back of the building (not to have a cigarette) and cried shamelessly because I am honored to be the parent of such a good person.  Take it from me; you are one lucky and blessed parent when your own child can teach you how to be a better person. 

            You may wonder who brought all those clothes.  It was Lyn Ofrane, a repeat trip volunteer, and excellent professional photographer from Teaneck.  Do you happen to have a friend whom you love deeply but frequently want to kill her because she drives you nuts?  That’s Lyn Ofrane for me and she made me cry.  One day about a month ago, she asked me if there were some last minute things that the school might need. So I found out they needed underwear and maybe some soccer balls.  But only if we could find a few, and put them in our luggage and it was okay if we couldn’t.  But Lyn, who never has heard the motto, “there is too much of a good thing”, wrote an email to hundreds of her generous photography clients, and asked if they would like to drop off some clothes or deflated soccer balls at her home.  You can’t imagine the hundreds of soccer balls, underwear, and even new clothes that she collected.  Under pain of death, she bullied each of the 20 trip volunteers to take at least one of her 50 pound duffle bags of supplies. 

And the entire school is much better off because of this wonderful woman who has such a big heart.   She was our teacher and we are grateful she was able to teach us how to give. 

 

Maywood Rotary goes to Kenya:

Making a Difference

By

Kelvin Williams

 

Part Two:

 

            Many people ask, what is this “Empopongi” (pronounced “mmm Poe-Pong-e”) school we are helping?  It is on a Maasai reservation called the Maasai Mara, not far from the boarder with Tanzania.  There are nine teachers for 308 pre school to 8^th grade classes.  The school is ranked as fourth in the area.  The children study the same subjects in the same grades as our children do but they must take a national examination at the end of 8^th grade to graduate elementary school.  The government pays $100.00 per month per teacher, and they also pay $1.42 per student per year.  That amount is suppose to pay for construction of all school buildings, all textbooks and school supplies, food each day for the student, and school uniforms.  Even in Kenya, $1.42 a year doesn’t come close to paying for any of those needs in full. 

            We have helped in many important ways but to be honest, the conditions for the students are still miserable.  Since we provided a source of clean water in 2005, there is a dramatic decrease in the number of children who die from drinking polluted water.  But we need donations to insure the water flows every day because the pipes often break when elephants walk over them.  I hope to replace the PVC pipes with stronger metal pipes and install a solar powered water pump this year. Each child is so grateful for the beans, rice and corn we provide each day but it is often their only meal of the day and most students are always hungry.  We started a huge school garden and protected it with a fence but it is not big enough to feed all the children. Since the political unrest in December, the cost of beans and rice has tripled and we must work hard to raise the funds to cover this essential cost.  Although we provided anti malaria nets to each family and the deaths from malaria have gone down dramatically, many of the children are very sick with infections, ringworm, allergies, and more serious illnesses.  There are no doctors in the area and the nearest clinic is 87 miles away in Narok. We hope to raise enough donations to hire a local nurse to come to the school for one day every two weeks.  Every child is proud and grateful for the simple uniform we provide each year but long before the end of the school year, they are tattered and worn out.  It would cost $4,700.00 to give them a new uniform more often than once a year. Many of the children are also cold (it’s their winter when we visit) and we hope to raise the donations to give each child a sweat shirt to keep them warm in the cold months. 

            People often ask me “Why isn’t the government helping more?” and “Why aren’t the parents contributing more?”  Those are good questions with sad answers.  Why didn’t the United States government help Native Americans more when they forced them onto reservations like the Maasai have been forced?”  The Maasai are not liked, they have no political power in the government to improve their own lot.  And Kenya is a very poor country, it was only a few years ago they instituted a “Free Education Law” for elementary students.  But as you can see it’s really another unfunded mandate like we have here in the USA.  Free education has turned out to be very expensive for these poor people. As for the parents, the nearest real jobs are 87 miles away but they won’t hire Maasai even if they could read, write and speak the national language (Kiswahili or English).  But the parent’s can’t, so they can not contribute more to the school. 

            WE INTTERUPT OUR PROGRAM FOR A FEW WORDS FROM OUR SPONSOR: You can see we need more help.  If you, your family, your friends want to help us get more done for these children, please send a donation to: Maywood Rotary Club Foundation, 453 Golf Avenue, Maywood, NJ 07607 or make a credit card donation from our website: “maywoodrotarykenyaproject.org”  The children will be grateful to you.

 

            But enough sad news, let’s go back to our story of glad news about our volunteer trip. 

            Ridgewood Rotary President Lets Us Down & Wife Picks Him Up:

 

            On my five trips to Kenya, my Kenyan friends have brought me to other local elementary schools.  I think this was a mean and sneaky thing to do to me.  It’s emotionally devastating to see how bad the other schools are.  They have no sponsor like Maywood Rotary but deserve help just as much as Empopongi.  Because taking care of this one school is a full time job for me, I have always been looking for another Rotary Club to sponsor another school.  My prayers were answered with Jerry Kallman, president of Ridgewood Rotary who, with his wife Lorraine Kallman, started the Ridgewood Rotary Kenya Project this year!  Both came along as volunteers on this trip to work with us and to visit their newly adopted school, KISHERMORUAK (don’t ask me how to pronounce it) Primary School.  They spent two days at the school and told me that they felt the same overpowering emotions that I must have felt seeing Empopongi Primary for the first time five years ago. 

            Jerry Kallman is a big hearted, wise and loveable kind of guy.  He decided to bring some fun into the lives of the students by bringing kazoos and harmonicas for them.  He taught them how to play them and was surprised at how quickly they caught on.  The Maasai traditionally have great musically abilities.  However, Jerry (we call him Jelly) had both of his knees replaced this past winter.  While walking to a class, he fell down on the job and our medical volunteers decided he must go back to Nairobi to get an x ray to confirm or deny that.  It turns out he was fine and he made it back to the school to continue to bring the joy of music to the children. 

            If it is at all possible, Jelly’s wife, Lorraine is even bigger hearted than her husband.  She brought seeds from American and was a workhorse in improving the garden.  She even made signs for each vegetable in English and Kiswahili so that everyone knows what is growing where.  She worked hard each day in the preschool and kindergarten classes making sure that each of the 80 little children got a big share of her love and attention.  That was an exhausting job.  And you can bet that she will be the foundation of the Ridgewood Rotary Kenya Project, working by her husband’s side making sure that every little detail gets done right.  And whenever anyone was stressed out or had a problem, Lorraine was there to be supportive and nurturing to them.  The next time you have a project, find yourself a Lorraine, you can’t go wrong. 

            In know this is true.  I warn every volunteer that you must always keep an eye on your personal belongings even when you are sitting on the porch outside your tent.  But did I listen to myself?  No.  One day, I walked into my tent to go to the bathroom and left my personal bag outside on the porch.  In the middle of my personal business, I heard a loud warning from Lorraine Kallman, “Kelvin, get out here now, the monkeys are eating your diabetes medicine!”  I did and they were.  I am just glad that there were no monkeys needing anti depressant medication.  Thank you, Lorraine. 

 

            Smart Man, Wonderful Woman & Two Tireless Substitute Teachers:

 

            Each of the ten classrooms doesn’t look like any American classrooms.  They look like a typical Maywood garage but with a tin roof.   They have concrete floors, cinderblock walls and it’s very loud inside when it rains.  But the sixth, seventh and eighth grade students study each night for their graduation examination and it gets dark.  The nearest electrical lines are 87 miles away.  Trust me on this; if you need something at the school, it’s always 87 miles away.  So, we needed to install solar lighting for the night classes.  But the bare concrete walls would absorb the light if we didn’t paint the walls a bright color.  That job fell to Jay and an Englewood Rotarian named Eddie Hadden.  No offense to any other volunteer but Eddie was probably the most well educated volunteer among us.  He’s the kind of guy you just want to sit down with, shut up and learn from him.  We spent many a night sitting in the lounge watching Eddie debate with the local people the African American experience, slavery, the middle passage and history.  It was an education for all of us. So, if you’re going to Africa, take Eddie with you, you won’t regret it.

            Yet, he was stuck with getting the painting done and was a real trooper with the host of problems that came along with that task.  The rollers didn’t work, the paint was mixed wrong, the children helping never painted anything in their lives and of course the ladders we bought weren’t delivered from Narok (87 miles away, again!).  But as you would expect, Eddie got the job done.  Each classroom is ready for solar lights so the students can study at night.   But that wasn’t enough for Eddie, he went around, interviewed many students and teachers, and put it on video.  Soon, we hope to have the best of the interviews on our website so you can watch and hear the actual words and feelings they have about our help.  Thanks Eddie, despite what I’ve said, you are the best.

            You may think you know Diane Rhodes, the even tempered, efficient, model of mental health who is the director of the Maywood Public Library.  But you don’t.  She is not only our library director, but she has a second unpaid job as the director of the Empopongi Primary School library.  She catalogued countless books for the children and parents in the seven surrounding villages to read in the only library in the entire area.  She organized thousands of dollars of donated school supplies we brought.  But late at night, this mild mannered librarian turns into Wonderful Woman: hilarious, outrageous and fascinating.  It’s going to be very hard for me to go on the next trip without her.  I’ll miss her each day AND night.  So, the next time you go to the Maywood Library, give Diane a big “Jambo!” (Hello in Kiswahili) and a wink to let her know that you know she is an incredible woman who made a great contribution to our work.

            You might also not know that Diane has a great 24 year old daughter named Carolyn who also came a second time on our volunteer trip.  She, along with another volunteer named Maria Edmonds from Ridgewood; both had the hardest job of all of us.  You see the preschool and kindergarten, 80 children in all, used to have two teachers.  But one left and wasn’t replaced yet.  So the remaining teacher, obviously exhausted, was helped by Carolyn and Maria.  Both very shy women, you would not expect to see both of them open their hearts and jump into the chaos of caring for so many needy children each and every day of our trip. Yes, other volunteers tried to help Maria and Carolyn but couldn’t work more than an hour because it is so physically and emotionally hard to help so many needy children at the same time.   You’re the greatest, Carolyn and Maria!

 

            Soap on a Rope, Judge Prevails, & More

 

            Hygiene is very important in cutting down the rate of communicable diseases and the Maasai need a lot of help in this area.  Dr. Tim, Dr. Jay and Nurse Maureen taught separate health classes for the boys and girls on this subject.  But the school has no money even for soap for the children to wash their hands.  But Maria brought along her husband, Rich Edmonds, a macho, Marine, fighter pilot who creatively solved this problem with his wife.  It was a “soap on a rope” kind of solution.  They placed soap bars in each of the dormitories and at the main water faucet in the center of the school.  Rich engineered the logistics for a rope system where the soap can easily be replaced when it is gone. After installation, I was privileged to see Rich, standing in front of twenty Maasai children, washing his hands as an example to teach them how to do it. All of them promptly copied his actions.  It may not sound like much to someone in Maywood, but this little miracle that is going to have a big impact on the reduction of illness among these children.  And trust me; it took an innovative fighter pilot to solve the many logistical problems for this task.   And like with Eddie, we have Rich to thank for video taped interviews with many students as well as him videotaping the Farewell Ceremony that the Maasai performed for us.  Coming soon to the “maywoodrotarykenyaproject.org” website near you!

 

            Every volunteer project has a jewel in its crown and for us, the last three trips; it was Superior Court Judge Lois Lipton.  You may not know that our project is sponsoring fourteen graduates from Empopongi Primary so that they can go to high school.  It costs a total of $2,500.00 to pay for ALL the expenses for these four years for one child.  Lois spent hours eloquently explaining to our scholarship winners that we expect them the minimal requirements we demand for them to continue their scholarships; a “C” average, writing one letter a semester to their sponsors and other culturally different complex concepts.  You would think this would be easy, it was not.  It’s like trying to explain to the Maasai what snow is.  Or that we have been to the moon, concepts that are out of their realm of experience.  But Judge Lois succeeded, not only in her meetings with the students but also with our meeting with the school’s Board of Education explaining the complex rules of Rotary giving as well as doing individual interviews with potential scholarship applicants from the current 8^th grade.  It’s not just that she is a great communicator; it’s that she is a wise and wonderful woman who generously gave of her talents to make the Kenya Project even better. 

 

            Long after registration closed for this past year’s trip, Judge Lois called me and said we need to take one more person, Melanie Long, a DFYS worker in her court system.  I have known Lois since Kindergarten at MAS.  You don’t say “No” to Lois because it would be wrong.  And it would have been.  Melanie was described by another trip volunteer as “no nonsense, straight shooting, clear headed. You are a pleasure to be with, such a direct, upfront person. Our court system is so lucky to have you!”  That’s true.  Melanie worked hard in the hardest job of all, with the 80 children in the Pre School and kindergarten.  She also taught all of us volunteers how to face unbearable poverty with limits and class which helped all of us appreciate the limited help we can give.  We were lucky to have Melanie. 

 

            You would think that Judge Lois wouldn’t trade on our friendship again by asking for more but you would be wrong.  She called again to ask if her friend, Ron Smith, would be also able to go on our trip.  Again, I caved in to the wisdom of Lois and am glad I did.  How can I describe Ron?  A British citizen living in Kinnelon?  A doctor of Anthropology?  An invaluable asset to our group?  A 70 year old power house of wisdom and experience?  No, he is a lot more than that. As the head of the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project, I consider information to be as valuable as gold.  Ron took his wisdom and interview skills to Maasai families to find out how they really feel about the help from our organization.  His report will determine the direction of our project for years to come. And his wicked sense of dry British “humour” helped all of us cope with the stress of being in Kenya and trying to help. 

 

            See Samuel Run. Run Samuel, Run! Merciful Rotary House and ME!

 

            Our last trip volunteer came the farthest to help the children, all the way from Salt Lake City, Utah.  You may recall from past Kenya Projects that we brought two students from our school for needed medical operations paid for by Shriner’s Hospital in Utah.  Our volunteer, Cassandra Steel was one of the caretakers for the two boys.  Fifteen year old Samuel had his club foot surgically corrected there.  Before this, he could hardly walk on the bent food.  One day, Cassie was in our van on her way to a village to interview some parents of the school children.  They passed some Maasai walking in the same direction so Cassie asked the driver to stop and pick them up.  She then turned her head to see if the boys were catching up with the van and was stunned to see Samuel actually running!  If I were there, I would have cried.

             Another volunteer described Cassie as “a rose in the middle of the desert”, and she is.  This wonderful Mormon mother of three children has a deep love for the Maasai people and worked hard on gathering information on how best to help them.  She also interviewed current 8^th graders who would like to apply for a scholarship to high school and past scholarship students who needed to understand Rotary rules for continued funding.  Beyond that, Cassie researched the progress in the school garden and will prepare a full report on how we can improve it (with no elephant attracting corn, please). 

 

            People give me a lot of credit for working full time on this school project.  But I don’t actually get three estimates for each construction project, buy the paint and have it delivered, deal with medical emergences among the students or meet with the school board each month.  That almost full time job goes to our Angel in Africa, a woman named Mercy Purity.  She is the Front Desk Manager at our tent camp near the school where she works from 6:30am to midnight.  One day, I got an urgent phone call from her sister Rose, our in Kenya travel agent.  She was worried about Mercy doing two full time jobs, one for the tent camp and one volunteer job for Maywood Rotary.  “She is doing all the work for one school, but she works so hard she is loosing weight and very tired,” Rose said, “And now Ridgewood Rotary wants to adopt another school. She also runs the micro loan water bottling project for Rotary so the mothers can earn their own money. And I know you, Kelvin; you will get more Rotary clubs to adopt more schools. She can’t go on with this work without getting sick.”  And if we lost Mercy, the whole projects stops. 

            Rose was right, so we came up with a solution for our Angel in Africa.  We hired her away from the tent camp to work for us and all the Rotary clubs full time and we are building a modest building called Rotary House near the school so Mercy has a home and office for only one full time job.  Her $5,000.00 a year salary, worth every dollar, is being paid other Rotary clubs and by many past trip volunteers who see how hard Mercy has worked for us for five years with no salary at all.  When Mercy starts work for us on August 31^st, we will be ready for the future.  It will be a future of changing the lives of many more students in many more schools in the Maasai Mara. 

 

            Not that you asked, but for me, it was the best volunteer trip ever.  If I might get personal for a moment, dealing with clinical depression is something I won’t wish on most of my worst enemies.  After trying and continue to try all the medications and therapies, on many days it’s hard to get out of bed and do the family’s laundry as well as all the other tasks any stay at home dad should do.  But on even the worst days of depression, I can plug in my laptop and spend hours working to do some good for 308 children in Kenya.  So to everyone who thinks I give so much, it’s actually the opposite, I get more than I give.  I am not saving them, they are saving me. 

            Yet, being depressed comes with being constantly agitated and that’s not a good thing for any group leader.  For that, I apologize to the volunteers who put up with me. But I am good enough, at least until someone else wants to do this job.  But, on the volunteer trip when we walk up the hill to the school and see literally hundreds of children running towards us with joyful faces just wanting to welcome us, I am happy.  On those mornings, I am the most mentally healthy and highest paid person in Maywood.  And it’s cheaper than Prozac! 

 

            You interested?

 

            So many people ask me if they can share this life changing volunteer trip in either 2009 (filling up fast) or 2010 (filling up).  If you can save $75.00 a week until next July to cover the $4,000.00 cost, fill out a volunteer trip application (available on the website on August 30^th), and be interviewed by the volunteer committee, you have a good chance of going. 

            If you can’t go but want to be a part of this miracle, you can still help.  Ask your children to donate the cost of a slice of pizza each week to help feed the children lunch.  Instead of a Christmas gift, ask Aunt Martha to donate money so that the children have clothes to wear to school.  Ask your church or temple to raise some funds to keep the clean water running at the school.  All of this can be done by making out a check to “Maywood Rotary Club Foundation, 453 Golf Avenue, Maywood, NJ. 07607” or by credit card on our website, “maywoodrotatykenyaproject.org”

            And please remember; don’t leave your medication where the monkeys can get at it. 

 

 

 

           

                       

 

 

           

 

 

           

It was time for me to go back again, to head back to our adopted school in Kenya on December 7^th. One reason was that the two students we brought over to the USA for needed medical treatment were ready to go back home.  They have spent the last four months with our Rotary Kenya Project “Angel” in Salt Lake City, Utah, Coral Terry.  After visiting our school last year in Kenya, her big heart told her to help Benson who is missing an arm and Samuel who was born with a club foot.  Coral opened her heart and home to these boys, arranging for donated medical care from the Shriner’s hospital in Salt Lake City.  Driving an hour and a half each day for months, she made sure that both boys got the love and medical care that they needed. 

07 12: Latest News: Our July Volunteer Trip Blog:

           Kevin Williams, Kenya Project Chair

            After a wonderful Bon Voyage party thrown for us by Maywood Kenya Project co chair Joann McKay, 22 of us left for JFK to start our adventure. 

            But we picked a very bad week to fly to Nairobi via London’s Heathrow airport; they had a terrorist threat, heightened alert, and baggage mismanagement problem for ALL passengers’s transferring to other flights. When we arrived in Nairobi, all of our luggage was lost!  You may have read about that in the news, but we thought it was just our luggage lost, not tens of thousands of people’s luggage. Some luggage was found after four days, but for six volunteers, their luggage only arrived hours before we left.  Can you imagine living out of your carry on luggage all week?  But my 21 volunteers didn’t complain but took it as a challenge.  The people who did get luggage shared with those who didn’t.  We bought out the gift shop’s t shirts and taxed the tent camp’s laundry.  It was a bonding experience for all of us.   One volunteer summed it up, “How can I complain about not having my seven days worth of clothes when the school children only have one uniform for the entire year?” 

            Worse than losing our luggage, we lost four volunteers, Jeanne Matullo, Monica Reeder, and Bill and Doreen Wetzel who were stuck in London security while our plane to Nairobi took off.  We were constantly worried, but they had a nice night in a good hotel in London courtesy of British Airways and then joined us in Kenya the next day.

             For the rest of us, we spent a wonderful night in a Nairobi hotel and then a nice visit to a giraffe rescue center.  They ate right out of our hands!  Then there was a 45 minute flight in a too small plane to Siana Springs Luxury Tent Camp.  Everyone was so surprised at how wonderful their beds, showers, electric lights and full bathroom was, they expected primitive not luxury.

             On Sunday night, we had our first dinner at Siana Springs.  Shortly after dinner, you could hear the singing of the Maasai warriors approaching the open air dinning room.  And they came with a surprise for one of our volunteers.  Diane Rhodes, the head librarian in Maywood, was to start that day as the new incoming president of Maywood Rotary but she was in Kenya.  So the Maasai Warriors held their own “Installation Ceremony” to officially recognize Diane’s presidency.  She was pinned by the warriors and given an honorary Maasai name which in English means “Dependable”. She was very surprised.  It was  Maywood Rotary’s and probably any Rotary Club’s first Maasai Installation!  

Every morning, our volunteers could have an in person wake up call with hot coffee and or tea delivered to the porch on their tent.  And if you had your coffee on the porch, you might be joined by a few small deer that are called “Dick Dicks”.  One volunteer, Michelle, said, “We aren’t going to a zoo, we are living in a zoo; all the animals just come right to us.: And to everyone’s surprise, the tent housekeeper placed a hot water bottle in your turned down bed each night!  And every night, there was a cacophony of animals sounding off and led by the Tree Hyrax. 

            You might ask, “Why a hot water bottle in Africa?”  No one believed me when I told them that where we are going in Kenya it is NOT hot.  But it was very cool at night and in the morning.  In fact, on Monday, the first day of our visit to the school, we were greeted by Boniface, the assistant head teacher, and he was wearing a full length down filled ski coat!  He said, “I apologize for my dress, but it is very cold this morning.”  It was 58 degrees!  While you were having a heat wave back here in New Jersey, we were wearing sweaters and long sleeve shirts while sitting around a bonfire each night to stay warm.

Monday was our first day of volunteering at the school for all but four stranded passengers.  Volunteer Lynn Ofrane was the head of the volunteers who wished to walk the 1 kilometer each morning to the school.  It was her responsibility to collect the walkers and find the Siana Springs security man who accompanied everyone with his rifle so we did not lose any valuable volunteer labor to hungry wild animals.  We called him Chuck Connors.  Few in Maywood will believe it, but I actually walked to the school one morning and have the pictures to prove it.

The rest of us went in a Jeep to the school at 8:30 each morning.  The first day was the most meaningful to many volunteers.  They were astounded and deeply moved at how hundreds of children ran up to them to greet them.  They wanted to touch them, hold them and hug them while they thanked them. They shouted “Jambo” in Kiswahili or “Soapa” in their native language “Mai”. It was a warm “Welcome” in any language.  Several returning volunteers were so surprised that the students remembered their names.  Kelly Wright of Maywood listened while the Kindergarten children sang the songs she taught them last year.  And when I started to speak at the welcome ceremony, I asked all the 280 assembled students “Do you remember who I am?” and they all shouted “Kelvin Williams Rotary!”    

We were given a tour of the school showing all the progress that was made thanks to donors during the last year.  I was so impressed by the new school kitchen built with the donations from two elementary school children in Glenn Rock. Unlike the old kitchen, it had a roof, four walls, a fireplace for three large cooking pots, a storage space for the beans, rice and corn as well as the very first building in the entire area with water piped into a building!  Imagine your kitchen not having water and you will see how important this is.   

Last year, the volunteers gave a four year scholarship to the only 8^th grade girl, Janet Lepore.  Janet was the first Maasai girl to attend high school, such a thing never happened before. And Janet came down from her high school to see us give the second four year scholarship to 8^th grader Margaret Letura, again, the only girl in eight grade. 

This year, I decided that the best way our volunteers could better understand Maasai culture was to assign each of them a “Student Partner” who would “shadow” or be with them the entire week.  It was the smartest idea I came up with. Each volunteer was assigned their student on Monday morning. And relationships grew very deeply by the end of the week to the point that one volunteer from Maywood, Linda Tobin, promised her seventh grade student a full four year scholarship to high school.  And that’s a $2,500.00 donation!  Other volunteers are considering doing the same gift to their students. 

Monday was a difficult day with more challenges.  Four volunteers were still back in London.  The truck carrying library books, garden tools, seeds, school supplies (pens, pencils, blank notebooks, etc) thousands of library books, two swing sets, one see saw, one jungle gym, other playground equipment, 36 bunk beds for the boy’s dormitory did not arrive.  But that did not stop our 22 volunteers.  They took the paint that was already there and started to paint the entire boy’s dorm.  Other volunteers cut the tall grass and dug up the hard dirt for the new school garden.  Nothing was going to stop our volunteers. 

What happened with our volunteers during the next four days was just one miracle after another: 

Returning volunteer and former Maywood councilwoman Jeanne Matullo had a great idea that was very popular among all the students and staff.  She enlarged and printed out all the pictures she took on last year’s trip and put them into an album she donated to the school.  For children who have never seen a picture of themselves, it was a wonderful gift. Jeanne also had help from her fellow volunteer Gail, also from Florida in assembling all the playground equipment.  The children had never seen a swing or sea saw and had to be taught how to enjoy them by another returning volunteer, Kelly Wright from Maywood.  Professional photographer Lynn Ofrane from Teaneck took Empopongi Primary School’s first class pictures which she will print and matt at her own expense and sent to the school as her gift to the children. Her last “class” picture was of our 22 volunteers which she labels “Mr. Kelvin Williams’ volunteer trip class 07”!  

When the supplies did show up, there was no one happier than the Director of the Maywood Library, Diane Rhodes.  She was joyful to be able to create the first school library in the entire area.  With her volunteers Dorothy Fenniman, Bill Wetzel, Doreen Wetzel, Jane Dineen, Cathy and others, they cataloged over a thousand books purchased in Kenya with donations to the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project.  The library is no bigger than a very small bedroom in any house in Maywood, but it is the most beautiful library I have ever seen in my life. Diane set it up so that the surrounding two schools and seven villages can borrow any of the books the teachers requested we buy. 

The Maywood Rotary Kenya project is always looking for ways to make our adopted school more self sufficient.  Last year our volunteer team built a fence around the entire school to keep the animals out.  That accomplishment allowed us to build a school garden so that the school could grow their own food for lunch each day.  We were lucky enough to have Maywoodian Dorothy Fenniman’s grandson, Spenser Fenniman, a manager of an organic farm in Maine join us.  Spenser spent months researching how best to start the garden while each of the students of Empopongi Primary students brought cattle manure to the school each day.  With the help of many of our volunteers and dozens of students, they planted Kale, pumpkins, onions, tomatoes, carrots, cabbage, spinach, lentils and potatoes.  And Julie Harris Kleinert not only dug the garden like Peter Rotolo, she also made up signs for each plot from small pieces of wood she found.  When she wasn’t busy with the garden, Julie spent time painting the boy’s dormitory.

Cathy Palumbo, another volunteer, had a complaint about painting the dorms, if she stopped painting for even one moment; one of the student partners would grape the paint brush right out of her hand.  All the students wanted to work on our projects because it was their school.  At one point I was worried because we had to carry the parts for 36 bunk beds from a storage space up several hundred feet to the dorm for assembly. It would take the volunteers a long time.  But before our volunteers could start the work, dozens of very small children were carrying bed head boards, foot boards and box springs!     

Maywood volunteers Bill and Doreen Wetzel, both Clinical Social workers, got a special assignment.  About a year ago, a tourist from Utah, Coral Terry, visited our adopted school.  She noticed two children who needed medical operations, Benson with a missing arm and Samuel with a deformed foot.  She made the commitment to bring both children to Salt Lake City for the medical operations they needed.  Bill and Doreen did many hours of interviews with both students so that we would have the information needed to make them feel more welcome and less uncomfortable visiting the USA. In the process of these extensive interviews, Doreen and Bill became our first hard experts on Maasai culture, learning more cultural information than we could have hoped for. Look for them to give a talk about it soon in Maywood. 

Returning volunteer and Superior Court Judge Lois Lipton taught “Gender Equality” last year.  This year she used her skills to help run the meeting with the Empopongi Primary School Board of Education.  Lois was impressed that all the elders were sincerely grateful for the four year’s help by the Maywood Rotary Kenya Project.  They did not want to be dependent upon us and agreed to help cover 10% of the cost of all future construction projects.  That is a massive amount for the Maasai community and a good step towards independence. 

The board of education members wanted to show their gratitude to me personally for all the work I do for the Kenya Project.  I was honored until they explained to me that the highest traditional Maasai honor they could give me was to give me a newborn daughter!!!!  Knowing that Tim would kill me, I had to decline so they offered me two cattle.

Volunteers Alyssa Locascio, a first grade teacher from Glen Rock and Kelly Wright from Maywood, provided a lot of joy for the children.  Alyssa taught yoga to children, wisely using yoga positions the children would understand: the lion, the cat, the rabbit, and other animals the children were already familiar with.  Kelly brought music and taught the American dances they learned last year during her visit.  There were literally hundreds of children crowding around both volunteers and eager to learn. Carolyn Rhodes, another volunteer had the brilliant idea of bringing bubble mixture and wands for the children, something they have never seen before.  With the help of  Monica Reeder, volunteer from Washington, the Maasai children learned how to blow bubbles while other children chased the bubbles.  Monica had another great idea, she brought many jump ropes, something the Maasai have never seen before.  But within a few short hours, they learned how to “Double Dutch” with great skill. 

 If you have seen the pictures of our adopted school, you know it is rather stark looking, so one donor gave specific funds to plant flowers and bushes around the school.  Volunteer Michele Dick and Arlene Rotolo, with the help of many students, dug through the hard soil to plant these flowers and bushes.  It took a lot longer that you would think.

Some of our volunteers did manage to do some teaching.  With the battery powered DVD player we brought to donate to the school, Linda Tobin taught a class on different American families.  Linda told me, “I have found that if you have an 11 inch DVD screen, you can fit 22 attentive Maasai children in chairs to watch the entire DVD.”  Bill Wetzel did a short health class for the older boys.  And Alyssa Locascio and Kelly Wright gave an extensive, detailed and helpful health class for girls.  Dorothy Fenniman stood at the door making sure no boy students tried to get in.

Did you know that the Maywood Rotary Club’s Kenya Project has a branch in London, England?  It’s headed by Wayne Collins a donor who has provided so much to the school including a new Nursery/Kindergarten last year as well as two four year scholarships to 8^th grade boys to go to high school.  This year, he donated the cost of the girls dormitory and brought his party of six volunteers to work with us at the school.  They arrived on Wednesday July 4^th, so naturally, we invited them to our surprise (to the volunteers) 4^th of July party!!!  Being good sports, they joined us in a special dinner in the bush under a tent decorated with 4our surprise (to the volunteers) 4^th of July party!!!  Being good sports, they joined us in a special dinner in the bush under a tent decorated with 4^th of July decorations.  Our Master of Ceremonies, The Honorable Superior Court Judge Lois Lipton made the following official proclamation at the party:

“By the legal power invested in me by myself, I hereby proclaim that every USA and UK citizen will be an honorary Kenyan Citizen tonight and that every Kenyan Citizen is an honorary USA and UK citizen today!”   But Judge Lois didn’t stop their.  She then insisted that all Kenyan citizens (every staff member), UK citizens and USA citizens sing their national anthems, one after another.  It was so wonderful, it almost made up for missing Tim as Grand Marshall.  But when we were done singing, Lois wasn’t yet done.  She then ordered we all sing all our national anthems at the same time as loud as we could.  We did and it was hilarious! 

The “Brits” as they became known as, were a very helpful, important and funny addition to our volunteer group. They would work hard at the school each day and then at night we would all meet in the bar lounge. The Brits on the left side of the room and the Yanks on the right.  The rivalry continued with a singing competition.  Led by Jeanne Matullo, the American’s would come up with one song, like “My Country Tis of Thee” and then the Brits would retaliate with “God Save the Queen”.  At one point, a Swedish Doctor came into the bar and we all switched to singing Abba!  I haven’t laughed that hard in years and look forward to seeing the Brits again next year.  They are Rotarians without even knowing it. 

Our last day at the school was deeply moving.  The students came to dance and sing for us.  But most impressive to our volunteers is that almost every student’s father and mother showed up to thank us.  The mother’s presented each volunteer with hand made jewelry as gifts of thanks.  It was heartbreaking to say good bye to our student partners, the teachers and all the other students.  Every one of our volunteers left a piece of their heart at our adopted school, Empopongi Primary School. And as group trip leader, I am so proud of each of them.  I hope next year’s group leader is as lucky as I am with the volunteer’s contributions and hard work. 

Four years ago, Corey saw the school and said something had to be done about it.  I told him it would be impossible.  I was wrong and I am glad that Corey was right.  It changed the world for over 280 children and their families because now they can live with food, clean water, an equipped school and hope for a better future.  

 

Kevin Williams, Chair

Maywood Rotary Kenya Project

July 13, 2007