Dan’s blog – Sunday 5th June

Today we started off by setting my alarm at 7am.  Shortly after 7, we received a call from Lord Sugar (the security guard), who informed us that the man to cook us breakfast was here.  I told the team to be ready for breakfast in the boardroom (dining table).

After breakfast we made our way to Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church for morning mass.  After the service we went to Langata to play a couple of matches against Sadili boy’s teams.  The teams were split, me, Coxie and Lawsy and 4 girls from our Samba Girl’s Team, who played the first game.  The match finished 3-1 to the boys, with me getting on the score sheet.  The next game was John, Jordan and Sean, made up with the other half of the girl’s team.  Unfortunately they were beaten 4-0.  The results don’t matter too much, it was just great meeting our girl’s team and seeing how well the coaches over Kenya are doing.

Coxie gave a great speech to everyone who came down for the matches, we then said our goodbyes, and began a 30 minute walk to Maureen’s house.  During the walk to Kibera, a few of the girls came with us.  This was a great opportunity to actually get to know our girls team.

The walk was long and very hot as we sauntered our way to Kibera.  When we actually got to ‘the entrance’ of Kibera, it was a steep descent, and when we crossed the bridge over the flowing stream, it was a huge ascent!  It was really interesting coming this way through Kibera compared to our normal way.  We seen many different families, and although it is classed as a slum, there is a massive gap between some of the families, from complete poverty to poor.  It was a tough site to take, especially after seeing one little boy’s top was hanging together by a few threads.

 

We arrived at Maureen’s home and were warmly welcomed by all her family.  When we arrived there were other 3 visitors in the house.  It was Maureen’s sister’s (Emily) boss, Frank, and his friends who he was showing around Nairobi and Kenya.  Frank is from Australia, but has lived and worked in Tanzania for 13 before moving to Kenya in January this year to continue working.  It was very interesting to hear about his work, and he seemed keen to learn about our work.

They left shortly after our arrival, and then we spoke to the whole family and shared stories from the past year.  We had a huge feast and then sat relaxing for a few hours until we left to go back to our apartment.  We came back to the apartment and showered, ate a bit more, and reflected on the day.  Today was a good day, let’s hope every day gets better and better.

Regards, Dan x