On to Marigat

Well today has been another whirlwind of a day. We checked out of Soi Lodge and headed for Marigat. At Marigat we met with the local World Vision guy. The meeting we had last week with World Vision Headquarters in Nairobi recommended to us that we talk to the local on the ground guys and see if they want to partner. They do. It was a very good meeting and I think something will come out of it. Hifadhi Africa is to draft a proposed MOU and send it to Vision for review and editing. During the meeting we provided the history of what Hifadhi Africa and Rotary had been able to do in Silale and we were commended for our efforts. The MOU will foster joint info exchange and joint project efforts. The WV Director told us that he really liked what we had done with rainwater harvesting and he thought that was a better way to obtain water than getting water from a borehole. Some boreholes have high chemical concentrations, particularly fluoride, and water is sometimes really hot. Like 130-150 degrees. WV has also been responding to emergencies and it was suggested that Hifadhi Africa and WV could potentially partner in that area also. I visited the same office in Feb 2015 and nothing ever came of it. What I have learned over the years is that to be successful, you have to put it in writing. We should have been more aggressive on writing letters and documenting all the issues.

Which leads me to our next visit. We traveled from Marigat to Kabernet, the Baringo County Seat. Kabarnet is an interesting city that sits on top of a ridge in the central part of the Great Rift Valley. The terrain is hilly so buildings are built on steep streets sometimes. We went to the hotel first to drop our gear and refresh. While preparing for this trip, I had tried on the internet to find a hotel in Kabarnet. While there is some info on their websites, it is difficult to find info such as prices and availability. Essentially, you can’t find anything other than pretty pictures. So I was concerned about availability. Don’t want to get stuck as has happened to other Rotary groups. We weren’t on this trip but on one Rotary trip to Uganda, rooms were not reserved in advance so when the group got there after a 10 hour bus ride, they only rooms that could be found where for local people stay and priced accordingly. Great price but the place had snakes in the hallways. We priced a hotel for locals and looked at it on our last trip. Price-$5.00 per night. I was trying to find a hotel closer to our project sites in order to save time. So we said no thanks and went to the Soi Lodge.

Our main purpose today was to visit various government offices and discuss issues. Our first stop was the Ministry of Health. Collins thought he had booked a meeting with the Minister of Health, a Pokot lady. Turns out she was in Nakuru and would not be available till tomorrow at 11:00 AM. So we met with another lady who said she would brief the director when she returned. The lady was very cooperative and we had a good discussion. We brought up the problem of fluoride in the water. She was not conversant with the issue. We recommended a study and she seemed responsive to that. I brought up the fact that the dispensaries in East Pokot have no medicines. She explained that each community and each ward ask for dispensaries. And this is in-efficient. It is better to have one good dispensary fully equipped than a dozen that have nothing. Seemed to make sense to me. She explained that the Ward Administrators are the conduit to get their concerns to the Dept. of Health. Since we had a meeting with the 7 Ward Administrators and have gotten to know 2 of them quite well, we will use this avenue in the future. She explained that the Ministry of Health is under budget restrictions and no hiring was taking place which made it challenging. At the meeting end we agreed to cooperate in 3 areas through formulation of a MOU. These 3 areas were: 1) Info Exchange ; 2) Providing of copies of studies to Hifadhi Africa and Bob Cairns; and 3) Provide training to Hifadhi Africa. I have already received 1 voluminous study for review. 

Our next meeting was with the Ministry of Water. This meeting did not go well. I had met Dr. Joel Koima 2.5 years ago and he remembered me. I imagine he doesn’t get many white folks visiting his office. He was unsympathetic to our requests and was rude in the way he conducted himself. He played with his computer while we were talking and answered at least 4 phone calls during the 1 hour meeting. One thing I have really noticed is that cell phones ring continuously here. He had 2 cell phones. He brushed off by first saying that we needed to deal with the office in Marigat. We brought up the issue of connecting the 225,000 liter rainwater harvesting tank to the JICA borehole. JICA stands for Japanese Aid Agency. The borehole had been drilled at least 7 years ago and until the last month had been inactive. We saw a water kiosk next to the well while we were visiting the rainwater harvesting tank. It is about 300 meters between the borehole and the tank. We have the materials and I told him I could hook up the tank by myself in 3 days with the proper tools. He said it is not possible to make the connection. Reason was that Baringo County had a contract with JICA that said there was a 1 year warranty and then 1 year of use and then a M & E(Maintenance and Evaluation)study would be done on the 70 boreholes that JICA had drilled. Not until the M & E was done could we make the water connection. We also needed permission from the Great Rift Valley authority. Ward Administrator Dan was with us in the meeting. As we walked out, the first word I heard was “bullcrap”. Later Dan told me that we don’t need his authority and the well should be just hooked up. He was going to work with the community and get formal requests into the Ministry of Water. We talked for over an hour about many other subjects. We asked for the Ministry to look into what could be done with the Nakoko borehole. It was the only functioning borehole that we know of in Silale that has good water. It is shallow and went dry last year. Answer was that he was aware of Nakoko but the public participation that had taken place showed it to not be a priority. When he used “You People” directed toward us, my hair really stood up on my back. His condescending tone and lecturing attitude was very evident. There were 5 of us in the meeting with the Minister and all of us agreed after leaving the meeting that drafting a MOU and other letters to the Ministry of Water was the only way we would get their cooperation. We encountered the same attitude 2.5 years ago but it was not as blatantly obvious as it was this time. Documentation would be the only way to get cooperation from the Ministry of Water.

Last on our visits, was a quick trip to the Deputy Governor for Baringo County. We met with the person in that position 2.5 years ago. When elections were held in 2017, the governor and all of his key staff were thrown out. The Deputy Governor was not in so we left our contact information. The governor is in Iowa. It is amazing to me that a small county spends their money on what Americans called junkets. Here it is very blatant and a waste of the few dollars that they have. That money should go to helping eradicate poverty in one of the poorest counties in all of Africa.

The evening was quite an experience. Collins, the Master Organizer, set up a meeting with people from East Pokot that held prominent positions or jobs. So we had 14 people plus our contingent of 5 people. The attendees were a medical doctor, Baringo County employees, Educators, a Pastor, 2 elected officials representing East Pokot, a ward administrator, etc. Collins refers to them as the Pokot elite. I had met a few of them the year before but there was not much discussion. The meeting started off by all of us introducing each other. Knowing how difficult it is to get an education in East Pokot, I was truly impressed. The medical doctor had been trained in Cuba and was doing his internship now. I met his fiancée who he met in Cuba. She is from West Pokot and he is from East Pokot. Strange how people met half way around the earth. As each person introduced themselves, they told us where in East Pokot they were from. It is getting scary when you know all the difficult African geographically names. I was second to last to speak and I gave my history. It was a bit detailed but I wanted them to understand why we were here, how fund raise, projects we have done, etc. The group expressed in many ways how appreciative they were of all that we and Rotary had done. Last to speak was Collins and he gave a detailed history of what Hifadhi Africa does, its priorities, how we can work together, etc. Collins is a gifted speaker and the group was very attentive to what he was saying. After Collins finished, a discussion was opened up on issues. The issues are endless but the concentration was on education, clean water, health and disease prevention. An educator let off the discussion and made a strong point that East Pokot needs a teachers college. There is a shortage of teachers in East Pokot. The teachers that are assigned to East Pokot that are not Pokots leave as soon as they can. Security is an issue and last year many schools lost lots of teachers. He said the biggest problem in HS’s was performance and the biggest problem in primary schools was language. He stressed that the school boards needed to be trained and more supportive of the schools. Lastly we needed more volunteer teachers in the schools. Barpello HS was held up as an example of a school that really works. Next was a discussion on malaria. A story was told about how the people thought it was caused by a curse and they had some kind of knife ceremony to rid the person of disease. It was malaria. Treatable and preventable. Next a person talked about youth empowerment and the need for equipped dispensaries. Next was a lady who was an elected official called an MCA. There are 7 MCA’s representing East Pokot in the Baringo County legislature and we me 2 out of the 7 and are supposed to meet the 3rd this morning. Diana talked about FGM. FGM is a horrible cultural practice. The Senior Chief in Kolowa told us that he solved FGM by throwing the PR actioners into jail. Diana talked about the need to train farmers and the need to empower women. Women needed to be trained on how to run a business. Roda, a Ward Administrator, spoke next. We met her in Feb 2015 when we had the kickoff ceremony and she burned Chris’s ear off at dinner about issues. Roda talked about the need to improve KCPE(Kenya Certificate of Primary education scores and the need for scholarships, particularly for girls. KCP is a national exam which the students must pass at the end of HS or they cannot attend a university. Roda told us stories about how girls run away from their parents because they want an education and not early marriage. Lastly she spoke of the need for training on the basics of good health and hygiene. Leonard, a pastor, was the last speaker and he talked about cultural things and the challenges that they impose. He also spoke about health. The room was difficult for me to hear in but I think I got the jest of what everyone was saying. I suggested that the group exchange e mail addresses and that Hifadhi Africa put out meeting notes. This was agreed to and we broke for supper at 8:30 PM. The discussion could have gone on for hours but it was a really good meeting. I suggested to our group of 5 that we not sit together and mingle with the Pokots. My table had some good discussion and Ken, the Ward Administrator for Silale, was very animated in our discussion about the meeting with the Ministry of Water. Ken was present in the water meeting with the Minister of Water. He said he would work with the community and the well would be hooked up shortly to the rainwater harvesting tank.

So this morning we are headed to a meeting at 9:00 AM with the 3rd elected official from East Pokot. Never a dull moment. A few photos are attached. The photos are of us in front of the WV and Ministry of Water offices. The third photo speaks for itself.

  Jumbo Everyone,

You have just learned your first word in Swahili. It is a greeting that people say to each other here in Kenya.

Part II is totally different than Part I. In Part II we stay in one place and not nearly as much time is expended traveling. Also, it is focused on one thing, STEM Education.

So on Saturday we rode the new train built by the Chinese. The Chinese are a big force in Africa and the American presence is zip compared to the Chinese. The train now runs from Nairobi to Mombasa. Eventually, it will go to Kisumu. The train is quite comfortable and modern. During the train ride, a number of different animals were seen from the train. We were met at the train station by the driver we met last year. We piled into 2 vans converted to safari vehicles and we off to Taita Hills Lodge, the location of the STEM training. On Sunday we unpacked a ton of gear bought by the Seattle teachers. It is probably literally a ton. Maybe 2. There were 20 plus suitcases full of netbooks, projects, document cameras, etc. The tools of modern education are so much different than when I was a student. The logistics and preparation to teach are far more than I ever realized. We set up the room, preparing it for 50 plus Kenyan teachers and educators. There are also 28 primary teachers being trained at a local teachers college.. There are 2 training sites this year. One at a teachers college which hosts and one at the lodge. It was great that the Baringo primary schools sent a full contingent of 3 teachers per school. The HS’s for complicated reasons did not send a full contingent. On Monday, some of the teachers went to various schools and conducted a learning session with those schools. These learning sessions were video-taped and used as a training aide on Tuesday. We kicked off the STEM education training on Tuesday. It is amazing to see these teachers in action. The first day a number of fun, training exercises are conducted. It changes the mood of the teachers and they become a great deal more interactive with the American teachers. As an icebreaker exercise, the Kenyan teachers were exposed to rock, paper and scissors plus an egg/spoon race and a sack race. It was out of control fun. Everyone got to know each other much better and became prepared for the training to come. Education is so critical to African countries and it is critical that the African youth become as educated as their western counterparts.

One of the aspects of Part II is that there are and were family members that want to contribute in their own way. Last year we had a computer expert and his 2 sons. This year we have a skilled handyman and his 9th grade son. His contribution to education is to provide desks for students. I volunteered to help him so today we started our first desks. Getting wood in Kenya is an education. Kenya has outlawed tree cutting because of the devastation caused by cutting trees and making them into charcoal. Lumber is expensive and of poor quality. We suppose to get the lumber delivered yesterday and it didn’t get delivered till today. It was fun and challenging to see a skilled handyman in action. We cut almost enough for one desk and assembled what we had. We are building a prototype before we implement mass producing desks.