The Close of a Chapter

It was an amazing week serving at Imani B. It was truly hard work of a different breed. This time Nathan and I got to serve as manual day-laborers. Our original purpose behind being sent to Imani B was to aid in the moving of heavy stones for some large project going on there. They had dug a giant hole about 20 feet in diameter and 25 feet deep to act as the coming location of a massive Bio-Gas Chamber. I didn't know what on earth that was so it was explained to me. Basically they will take their huge surplus of cow poop and store in the enormous container underground where it will ferment for about 20 days. The gases which continuously rise from the poop will be routed via pipes and tubes to the kitchens where it will fuel the stoves and ovens... Soooooo, in short, our food will be cooked with cow farts... I can hardly wait! Hahaha. ANYWAYS! None of this miraculousness could occur until we first drained the hole of all its ground water and overlaid the floor with cement. This was to be where Nathan and I would come in. Unfortunately we only got about 1 full day of work devoted to the project before running into continual snags and obstacles. At this time we were relocated to the farm area where we worked with two young Kenyan men named Ryan and Vinny. It wasn't long before we all became good friends and were laughing and joking with each other regularly.

We did many various jobs including feeding the 6 female cows and 2 bulls, feeding the geese and ducks, and one particular day we had hours devoted to shoveling the cow poop and pee out of their cement field. We had a few reoccurring tasks but many of our jobs arose with the spur of the moment and often led us all over the compound. It was quite the experience. Oh! Nathan and I even got our shot at milking a cow! Now that was strange. Vinny showed us how to do it multiple times but it seemed like no matter how closely we mimicked his movements it was never quite the same outcome, lol. This was intrinsic of many of our tasks. Both Ryan and Vinny were both very experienced and skilled in their trades and as hard as we would try to help or serve, they would often step into the situation--using only a fraction of the effort--and show us how much more efficiently the job could be done. Darn farm boys! Haha.

Towards the end of the trip our chance to rise above them finally arose. On our last day there, the four of us got into a tiny, MAN-competition. I think it began with a comment from Vinny about how surprisingly strong daily farm work made him. I in no way disagreed with him. Watching what those two did all day, I would expect them to be exceptionally strong. Then he followed up that statement by saying he was stronger than me, and well... we can't have that, haha. So he challenged me to arm wrestling and before we knew it Nathan saw what was going on and came over, and just as we were about to get started Ryan strolled by with his wheel barrel. Then the games began! It was so much fun messing around and arm wrestling each other. I got it all on tape and its hilarious! It was a prideful series of arm wrestling matches, followed by some various push up exercises, and then quickly accompanied with more matches. All around it was a bunch of goofy guys strutting their stuff, trying to prove who was the strongest. Tons O' fun, lol. When it was all said and done the Americans rose victorious. It was a grueling battle, but entertaining every step of the way. We finally were able to step out of their shadow as the inept farmhands, lol. I was quite happy about that. :)

It was an amazing week of more back-breaking work, sweat and effort, all for our glorious Father. Except for the Man-Matches of course, that was pretty much our playful flesh, haha. When we had finished out the week it was pretty tough saying goodbye. Making new friends is always a blast until you have to part ways. We gave them our FB profile names and told them to look us up, as well as challenged them to make it to the states and come say hi sometime. Yet another adventurous experience under our belts. The Christian life is truly a gift!