And then we went to work

We start the day off with a great spread of breakfast choices. The same spead that we have had every day. Not bad, but predictable and good at the same time.

Following breakfast we loaded into the two buses to head into the mathare valley where we would be doing the majority of our work. Michelle is on the medical team and myself on the construction team.

We pray divide into our designated areas and meet our missions of hope workers, trying to get a grasp on what tasks were at hand. Each group has a few translators and a few Kenyan workers who are as surprised as us.

Something we had trouble with was trying hard not to force our western ways. The go go go pace of America isn't exactly the same for Kenya. the workers are paid by how much work there is to do and not how long they work.

Also, the language barrier wasnt too difficult, but the dialect was difficult on both ends. Because a lot of Kenya was colonized back in the day, the verbiage was something to get used too. For instance you don't wait in a line, you wait in a queue. The first floor of a building is called the ground floor and the second floor the first. Not confusing at all. Especially when you are directed to go somewhere.

Getting started was a bit of a task. We didn't have the best direction of what we building or constructing. We knew that we were building shelves for the classrooms. All we were given was wood, nails, glue and a hand saw. Yes a hand saw.

So we jump right in like typical Americans, go, go ,go. Unfortunately the Kenyan way more of the slow and steady mentality. Cuts and measuring take us to our mandatory tea break. And by mandatory, I mean all work stops literally and we go and drink our tea and eat our sambusa. Which is basically a crescent roll with meat and onions inside.

Soon after tea and getting back into the swing of things we take lunch. For the most part every meal has rice, some form of meat, which is usually lamb, and vegetables. We finally get back on track with what to build and how to build it. By the end of the day and all of the confusion we ended up with one desk built and hung.

Hopefully tomorrow we can at least get a system going and be more productive since we know what we are doing and what we want to accomplish.