TEMBO BEACH, MUSOMA

I guess it’s been over three months since my last update, so I apologize. So much has gone on it’s hard to imagine. I left for Tanzania in mid-Feb and then returned 6 weeks later to Kansas for the funeral of my twin brother. After a month at home I returned to Tanzania in late April. I was met at the Nairobi airport by a former Maryknoll Lay Missioner, Kathleen Dunford. We then journeyed to Tanzania in late April.

            Kathy was in Kenya for 5 years as a Physician’s Assistant, so is comfortable with the life style hear, but Kowak and Tanzania are significantly different than the larger town of Kitale and the English speaking Kenya. So far she is doing very well and will be returning home (N.C.) at the end of July to discern what she wants to do next year. She has been a tremendous help in the short time here. She escorted one elderly priest, Fr Dick Quinn, back to New York after just being here 3 weeks, so that was a big help for the Maryknoll Fathers.

            I drove Fr Conard, our Kowak pastor, back to Nairobi in early May for his flight home. This is his time for a 3 months home leave, so he will return at the end of July and I will try to keep things running while he is gone. Of course, the Tanzania priest is here to do his religious duties while I do the project management and pay for supplies and salaries. I returned to Kowak a week before Fr Jim departed so spent most of that time getting the financial records up to date so he could see what we had to work with before his departure.

            One of the first things Fr Jim did was approve the payment for the new websites for the secondary school and the hospital. Kathy and I hope to finish most of the questions to get the hospital site activated by the end of July. It has been hard to find the time to work on that lately but things are starting to slow down a little now. In fact she and I are at Tembo beach, in Musoma, today enjoying the breeze and atmosphere of less people and especially less children that we are surrounded with daily in Kowak. Some of you may recall the name Tembo as the place we Lay Missioners frequently visited on Friday evenings after a hard week at language school in the winter of 2006.

            In addition to the weekly management of several construction projects at Kowak hospital I was asked to donate blood to a very sick freshman student at the secondary school. She has sickle cell anemia and her hemoglobin had dropped to 5.1. Her parents had driven up from Mwanza (4 hrs south) and they were frantically looking for donors, but A neg is a rare blood type here and fortunately that is my type. So I felt very fortunate to help and her parents felt like I saved her life. I’m not sure how accurate that was.

            I was especially blessed with a $1,000 donation in late Feb for mosquito nets by the youth group at Queen of the Holy Rosary near my home in KS. To that I added another $500 from friends in KS, Utah and England so I was able to purchase 420 nets for local mothers with young babies. I then met a young man, Charles, in the village who had just finished high school and was home deciding what to do next.  I was amazed to see how many people he knew and how many knew him so he was a natural to help prepare a list of mothers with young babies. They have a great system called Nyumba Kumi Kumi here in the villages of TZ. Every 10 neighbors has a group leader that they keeps informed about the needs of those ten (kumi) homes (nymuba). So Charlie went to each village leader and ask them for a list of mothers.

After a week we had a list of 130 or so families. He and I then spent the next several weeks, as time permitted, distributing nets, taking pictures and asking their religion, and number of children. So I spent 2 to 3 hours each day hiking up and down hills and through bush and really got my exercise. We visited 20 hoems each day. Ugh! But it was very fulfilling and I got to meet many new people as well as a few I knew from church or hospital or school activities over the years. A few weeks later I received 200 rosaries in addition to the 40 or so I was given before I departed in Feb. I then started distributing them and pictures to the 130 families I had given nets to earlier; again a lot of exercise.

Now I have another 140 nets and am preparing a list for two neighboring areas of our village. I hope I have the health and energy to keep going with Charlie. If not I’ll have someone else go but then the picture quality will be much less and I really enjoy the experience and need the exercise. I’ve lost about 6 lbs already.

We finished three hospital projects over the last 4 weeks. Those are two toilets and a wash station all for patients. We also finished the fence around the sister’s convent. Next we want to make a fence around the hospital and pave the area around the old patient toilets, bathing area and wash station. That will be paved with concrete bricks that are pretty decorative and made here by the school craftsman.

My health is staying good and I have had no malaria for over two years. I plan to return in early November to spend the winter in Kansas City and visit the new friends I have there now. I especially miss the contemplative group at Guardian Angel and they keep me copied well on their exciting activities. 

HAPPY FAT TUESDAY

        Happy Fat Tuesday y’all. I’ve been in Nairobi a little over a week now and with some luck I’ll be departing tomorrow (Ash Wednesday) for Tanazania. This special day is probably not the best day to travel but my options are a little limited. I’ve really been enjoying my time here visiting the priests that reside here and old friends who, like me, are just passing through. I’ve also really enjoyed the daily 7 am Masses at the chapel where the priests reside, next door to my accommodations here in the Maryknoll compound. There are usually 3 or 4 priests, a brother, a seminarian and a couple lay missioners in attendance, so it is packed. The homilies are short but great and we are done by 7:30 am and ready for breakfast. What a great way to start the day.

      They tell me it has been unusually dry lately and the rainy season does not start until April. It has also been very warm (85F) as is typical this time of year. Actually I don’t notice the heat so much since it is so dry due to the high elevation of Nairobi (6,000 ft). Also it is nice and cool at night (65F), like Kowak, my village. Anyway we got a nice shower Sunday and Monday (yesterday) and a pretty heavy rain last night, so things have really cooled off and it has been very pleasant. We even had a roaring fire in the fireplace the last two nights which we all really enjoyed, especially the two children here this week.

      Anita and Curt Klueg arrived by train from Mombasa late Friday evening (1 am) with the kids after a 30 hour trip; 9 hours of delays. They are finishing their second three year contract here in May. Both girls were born in Mombasa and are now 8 and 9 yrs old. They are cute as they can be. The family came to renew the US passport for the oldest, Rehema. Bethany will get hers renewed next year.  We all attended the wedding and reception of our young Maryknoll bookkeeper , Francis and his bride Winnie, at the Kenyatta Univ chapel on Saturday. The newest lay missioner for Kenya (Teresa) also attended. She is about 26 yr, old and came with the Kluegs as she is attending language school in Mombasa. 

         Teresa and the newly ordained Fr Lam from Tanzania and Margaret from Kitale are all attending a 3 day course at the Tangaza University given by Maryknoll and Fr Mike Kerwin’s instructors on mission integration. If I had known my departure was going to be delayed I probably would have attend it myself. I was fortunate to attend two 3 hour classes there last week at this Catholic university. The morning session was for 30 seminarians on Small Christian Communities for youth (YSCC); youth meaning between ages 14 and 28 years of age. It was given by Fr Joe Healy who teaches there every Thursday. The afternoon session was about Peace and Justice in Africa.

      Most parishes in East Africa have from 20 to 60 SCC that meet and pray together weekly. Each SCC is limited to about 20 members. The YSCC are becoming very popular but it is hard to limit them to 20 members. These are for the unmarried youth of each parish, so when they become married they are required to join the older members in the SCC. They may start forming SCC for young married adults.  The SCC concept is really the heart of most parishes in East Africa because the members get to know each other so well and care for each other as the need arises. It seems like this is something we could really use in the US churches. There are already 160,000 SCC in East Africa; see smallchristiancommunities.org.

     I also got to see my friends Russ Brine and Cindy Korb for a few days. Cindy was heading back to Kitale after 2 weeks of physical therapy for back pains. She and her husband are from near Kansas City and teach in Catholic schools in Kitale. They will return home at the end of the year after two 3 year contracts.  They have a very good blog called “kenyaforus.blogspot.com”.

       Russ is also in Kitale and has been there 15 yrs. He was on his way to Cambodia to investigate a new mission site as his 5^th contract ends in the Spring of 2016. I hope to go visit both of them and the rest of that crew in Kitale this summer, time permitting. I plan to keep busy in Kowak with two new websites and a new blog for the hospital called “kowakhospital.blogspot.com”. My goal is a blog update every two weeks.

        My old MKLM lay missioner classmate, Tara McKinney, was also here for a few days on business for Cross International. It was great to see her again and meet her co-worker David from Florida. Tara is now living in Mozambique, so that was a real pleasant surprise.

      

NAIROBI ARRIVAL AS PLANNED

     It’s Tuesday morning in Nairobi. I arrived late last night as scheduled and got an amazingly good sleep at the Maryknoll house here. That is not a sure thing depending on how much rest I get on the planes getting here. Actually I did sleep pretty well on all three legs: to and from Dallas and from London. I read a little and watched a couple movies so it was a relatively smooth trip despite the lack of internet in the airports, until I was about to leave London (Heathow). That was a little frustrating, but I finally tried resetting my iPod settings and that finally worked. As usual I left my mobile phone at home with my sister, since I have no use for it here. I have a mobile phone here in Nairobi and hope to reactivate that number for Kenya and another for Tanzania. After 7 months of no use I’m sure both sim cards have been deactivated. 

       I got very sad news this morning via email from my sister. My twin brother had a doctor’s appointment Monday and it seems his health is failing much faster than anticipated. So I will stay here in Nairobi for at least a week, until I decide what to do. I have a meeting tomorrow with a website engineer that I have been working with online for the new Kowak Hospital website and potentially the Girl’s Secondary School site. Fortunately there will be a lot of lay missioners coming thru here in the next few days that I am anxious to see. In fact I just had breakfast with two of them this morning; Tara with Cross International (formerly a Maryknoll Lay Missioner) and Cindy Korb from Tonganoxie.

        Tara and her manager, Dave, from FL are here on business for a few days and Cindy has been here about two weeks for physical therapy for her back. He husband John is teaching in Kitale, where they live as lay missioners. Brother Frank Tenhoppen is also here from NY. He has been home for health reason for over a year. We are expecting Russ Brine from Kitale to arrive this week-end on his way to Cambodia. He has been a lay missioner here over 12 yrs and is thinking of changing countries. It will be great to see him again. Also the young couple living in Mombasa are coming in with their two children and it has been many years since I’ve seen them. 

MY LAST DAYS IN KANSAS...for a few months

MY LAST DAYS IN KANSAS,,,for a few months!

     Well, I think I’m finally headed back to my Tanzania mission after an extended stay and a beautiful Summer and an amazing Fall (can you believe World Series at home) in Kansas City. I did spend 3 weeks in East Africa last June, but only one week in the village, as I had hospital business to work on in Nairobi upon my arrival. After a few months at home with my ailing twin brother I had prepared to return in early December, but God had other plans. I ended up in the hospital in Houston on Thanksgiving Day to treat a serious bladder infection, which required follow-up in a Kansas City hospital for a few days. That was followed with prostate surgery, which was followed with another extended hospital stay on Christmas Day with a bleeding prostrate.

      So now that things seem to be stable with me, my brother started having problems with internal bleeding. When it rains it pours.  He just got home yesterday after an 8 day stay in the hospital but is still very weak. In January I spent one week-end with my son Adam and his family in Louisville, KY and another in Atlanta with Kyle and his family. It was great to spend some time with all of them; especially the three grandchildren. It may be 9 months before I return so I’m sure they will all change a lot in that short time.

     Last November I made two slide presentations of pictures of Kowak village and hospital and other travels around Tanzania. The first was to a senior citizens apartment complex near me and the other was to a few classes of primary school students at a local Catholic parish after a Sunday mass. Both were enthusiastic and very interested in helping the Kowak Hospital in any way they could. The Sante Fe Towers seniors contacted me later and were able to collect $95 for mosquito nets and several dozen rosaries. Then the kids at Queen of the Holy Rosary informed me of a bake sale they organized. They generated an unbelievable $700 for mosquito nets. The sisters at Kowak Hospital will be thrilled.

      I recently received an email from the Kowak pastor and hospital manager, Fr Conard, requesting my help. This facility has been expanding quickly over that last 8 years since I arrived. They now have 174 beds, but only 4 PA’s and one doctor. Fr Conard said they are in dire need of a second doctor and ask for ideas on how we could find a source of income to support the salary of this second doctor and continue that support if and when something requires his absence or move from the mission. He has been there 38 years and is now 85, so his days are limited despite his amazing energy and current good health.

     I mentioned this challenge to a few friends from my contemplative group one evening and they suggested I make a slide presentation to the entire prayer group and ask them for support or suggestions. Our group leader was very receptive to this idea, despite his planned agenda for the group that day, if I could make it brief.  I did that presentation this week and was amazed at the extremely generous reception and hopeful ideas that would allow us to proceed with hiring a new doctor.  It is really overwhelming. What a wonderful month this has been. Of course, I am anxious to return to the mission but will miss my prayer group dearly. 

Back in Kansas City

     I did not think my next blog posting would be from Kansas since I was headed to Tanzania for 8 months at that time. But my brother Jim's poor heath made me decide to spend a little more time at home with him and my siblings. It has been a beautiful summer so far and we are just now getting some warm weather (> 90F). Jim's health is a little better than I had anticipated but we did spend a couple days in the hospital on July 4th and 5th due to breathing problems. That seems to be resolved and he did start chemo therapy a couple weeks ago which is going well. He also had a gout attack which was not expected and was very painful but he is now on medication to control that.
     I have had my own share of problems with my teeth (crown and root canal) so it is just was well that I was home for that. I have been having lots of family visitors every week-end to enjoy the nice weather and pool in the yard so that has been fun. I've recently started riding my bike for exercise and weight control so that has also been fun. I'm trying to learn how to make a website for our high school in Tanzania and then for the hospital there in our village. This has been a goal for a long time and our pastor is now encouraging it since his donors need a little more accurate information about his construction projects than they can get from the existing Maryknoll Fathers website. I got a quotation to have the websites made for me by professionals in Nairobi, but I was encouraged by friends here to try it myself to save some costs. It's going slow but there is hope.
      I was pleasantly surprised to see some friends from Maryknoll Lay Missioners during my two week stay in Nairobi in June (Mary Oldham, Fr John Eyble and Cindy and John Korb) so that was a special week-end treat to get updated on their busy lives. None of them live in Nairobi but were just passing through, like me.  Of course, it's always nice to see the Maryknoll priests that are in that area. I had several meals with Fr Joe Healy and Fr John Conway but most of the others were out of town. I did a little business while I was in the city to get a new generator order processed. I think it finally arrived at our hospital this week. So at least I got a little accomplished.
      Fr Eyble was also headed to Tanzania so I saw him a few days later at our village where he came to visit Fr Conard, our pastor. I gave Fr John a tour of the school and hospital and introduced him to our Discipline Master, Mwl Saronge. I was shocked to learn of Mwl Saronge's death a few weeks later, so I'm pleased I was able to see him one more time. He has been a close friend while I worked at the school and has been very helpful to me and many other volunteers. He has 7 children and the youngest is just 6 weeks old now. A very sad event for our school and the surrounding village where was born and raised. He was our most tenured employee and taught English as well as be the Second Master recently, 

BACK IN NAIROBI

        Well, I just made it back to Nairobi after 7 wonderful and eventful months at home in Kansas City. I hope to be here until late January before returning to KC via a short stop in Zurich.

       My brother’s health is pretty stable now and I’m so glad I was able to spend these last few months with him as he started dialysis. We had a great 70^th birthday party on Memorial Day week-end with lots of family and old friends in my backyard. I flew out two days later. Our sisters and nieces did a wonderful job in organizing everything and our two elderly aunts even made it; Francis is 90 and Mary is 100. My sons from Texas and Atlanta were also there with their families. We had about 70 in attendance.

      I got some of my hardwood floors finished in May and three rooms painted so I feel like I got a little accomplished this time. We also replaced the liner in the pool just in time for the party week-end. I had a wonderful 10 day trip to three National Parks in Utah (Arches, Canyonlands & Capitol Reef) with my close friends David and Jim in early May. I was amazed at the number of tourists from Europe & Japan.  We got lots of exercise on those trails. It was a perfect time to catch the cactus in bloom. I then introduced David and Jim to my friends Jeanne and Henry in Salt Lake, who so generously allowed us to use their condo in Moab for the week. We got a nice tour of Salt Lake and met a few of their friends after there parish mass at the University. One was a young lady from Ghana who had just graduated in sociology.

      As always I really enjoyed my weekly visits with out contemplative group at the Catholic church in Westport. I made closer friendships with several and even made a few new friends through that group. It continues to be very popular and has grown to over 50 members now. I will miss them and all the activities they have planned; esp. the retreat and speaker (Fr Meniger) coming on June 6. I did get to see my friends Tom Chitta and Dr Getha from India at a church dinner in early May and that was a pleasant surprise. They run the FCN group that I visited in India in 2011. It seems to be doing very well now.

     This will be a hard year to beat. Yes, I even enjoyed the little snow we had, and I especially enjoyed the many baseball games which Jim and watched nearly every night. At least the World Cup is just around the corner (June 12) and you know that will be on all TV’s here. I will also miss the weekly golf with the Johnson brothers. That was fun. 

SPRING PARTIES 2014

       Yes, I’ll still in the US but I did make my flight reservations this week. I depart for Tanzania May 27^th, the day after Memorial Day. Boy, there has been lots of fun stuff going on the last few weeks. My son Kyle married his childhood sweetheart, Chrystal Martens, on March 1. They flew back to Houston for the wedding from their new home in Atlanta. The weather was absolutely beautiful (80F) all week-end and the venue was excellent, since it was on the water at a small family yacht club just 30 minutes from my old Friendswood home. Six of us came in from Kansas City. I drove with my brother-in-law, Phillip, who was the preacher of yet another family wedding. My sister Janice could not make the trip due to her recent back surgery. But my sister Peggy and her husband were there along with their daughter, Marisa, and niece, Natalie. The wedding was wonderful and the food was great all week-end. Phillip’s son, James, and his family also drove in from Austin along with many old family friends.  Everyone was amazed at Kyle and Chrystal’s beautiful son, Ryan, and how much he has grown these last 5 months.

      This week-end was Phillip’s 66^th birthday (Mar 14), so lots of family and friends came in from out-of-state in addition to many local family. Nephew Braden and Shaina are expecting their first child any day now, so they were not able to make it.  But my son Adam and his family drove if from Houston. Adam was able to spend a few hours with Braden playing Frisbee golf Sat. morning. James and his family drove in from Austin. Phillips brother, Joe, drove in from Florida and nephew Paul and his family drove from Denver. So we had lots of small children and that made for a wonderful week-end. Of course the beautiful weather and the St Patrick’s Day week-end made it a cause for additional partying on Saturday. We started with the annual Snake Parade in North KC. Then we all gathered at Eddie’s lovely country home near the airport for a fun day of food, drink, kites, croquet and two more birthday parties. One of them was a surprise party for my granddaughter, Audrey, who just turned 9. It was especially fun to see all the kids enjoying themselves in the tree house and all around the wooded property. Eddie even had a children’s parade by pulling the kids behind his rider mower. The two 8 month olds rode in their own red-rider wagon. The food was wonderful with Irish stew and corn-beef and cabbage to start things off.

     We had a little accident at my house the night before which dampened things a little bit. Phillip’s old friend David Rothgeb was staying in my upstairs bedroom and fell down the stairs early Saturday morning. The X ray confirmed that he broke his left forearm. What a shame. This is the second time one of my guests has had a similar accident, so I have a serious design problem yet to be resolved. It was very embarrassing. When my nieces live in my house they have slept there for years without this problem, but I guess they don’t need to pee at night.

       A few days ago I got the sad news that my old friend in England, Susan Seed, passed away suddenly last Sunday. I got an email from her daughter, Jane, who was just 3 years old when I lived with the family in 1973/ 74 while I was working for British Nuclear Fuels. I have visited the Seeds several times over the last 40 years and watched their children and grandchildren grow up. It’d been fun to read her beautiful granddaughter’s postings on Face book now that she’s in college. Suzie was still in her 60’s, so what a shock for that family.

      On a more pleasant note, I’ve really been enjoying my weekly “sits” with the  Mystic’s contemplative group in Westport. It is an amazing group and I will really miss them when I return to my mission in TZ. I have made several good friends and the Johnson brothers have asked me to join them on a short trip to some of the National Parks in Utah. I’ve wanted to make that trip for many years, so I’ll try to squeeze that in in late April, God willing.  One thing that may affect that trip is my brother Jim’s health. He has been doing very well on dialysis these last 2 months. He is even driving himself to and from the three sessions each week. But his hemoglobin is still low due to a bone marrow problem (MDS). He had to have another transfusion this week so we pray that this is not a sign of more frequent transfusions in the near future. We have a big 70^th birthday party planned for Memorial Day week-end and I depart the next day for Africa.  Both of my son’s and their families hope to be here for that week-end.

       This is exciting times (March Madness) for college basketball, which I normally don’t get to see. I’m also enjoying the start of the pro Golf season on TV and Spring Training for baseball season. Spring seems just around the corner but we woke up to another inch of snow this morning after wonderful warm weather these last few days. We need to replace the leaking pool liner in my back yard pool in the next few weeks and may even add a pool heater if the family decides it is affordable. It would double the swimming season.