The waterfall adventure and other stories

Hi all! Sorry it's been a while - I've been having problems with computer access recently because we've been having a lot of powercuts. I wanted to at least try and update you before the weekend though, incase I never return. I am off to visit the home of a couple of my friends. These would happen to be my Maasai friends - Paulo, and his brother Moses. To be honest, I am not yet sure exactly where I'm going or how far away it is. I do believe it is somewhere between here and the Serengeti. Perhaps it is actually in the Serengeti. We have to get a dala dala, then a bus, then a landrover (pretty sure the landrover part may have been lost in translation). They also keep talking about me staying there for a month, which is a bit worrying. My friend Amy is accompanying me so we will be in it together. On the good side of things, we have been told we won't have to drink blood (Paulo doesn't like it himself). However, I may well have to become a meat eater for the weekend. In all seriousness though, don't worry - Cornelius knows where we are going, and we plan on coming back on Monday. We have our gifts of tea, sugar, and rice ready, and are all set to go.

School is going well. I received a few more parcels from some of you and they have loads of great things in them. I am planning a party for my last day (next Friday), and plan on giving each of the kids a present (potluck style). We have introduced star stickers and, each day, we are giving one to the child who does the best/most improved work. You would be amazed at the improvements we have seen! Oh, I just remembered (as he got yesterday's star) - Dennis is fine. We didn't even end up having to take him to the hospital. He has fully recovered now and is back to his normal self. We have been doing quite a few arty things recently. Today we did some finger painting (which they absolutely loved). It was a shame that today was also the day that I decided to wear my hair down and the kids decided I have hair like Jesus and so wanted to play with it all the time. We have also made some paper chains (which my friends and I are going to use as part of our decorations for our party). I am really going to miss the school and am not at all looking forward to leaving.

Outside of work, I have been spending a lot of time with the Daudi family, which seems to be growing by the day, and I've no idea who is related to who or in which way. I have been to their house several times, either to eat, go to church, or go and visit some waterfalls. It's a shame - I have so much to talk about right now but I am going to run out of time. First off, we did sing in church, and it was TERRIBLE! Maybe I should say that WE were terrible. We thought that, on Tuesday, we were going to the church to be taught a song, and to practise it. Turned out that we were also singing the song in public that same day (less than half an hour after we learned it). We also had to sing in harmony. I can't sing in the first place never mind in harmony. Three of us (Amy, Aimee and myself), were up on stage, each with our own microphone, basically looking down at the pastor with 'please help us' looks on our faces. Quite an embarassing experience. We still enjoyed the dancing afterwards though, and are now getting to know the moves!

On Sunday we went to visit some waterfalls. They were absolutely stunning. The Pastor and I first walked to the village chaiman's house to request a permit to visit. The chairman's wife wrote a letter on notepad paper, and stamped it, to say that we are friends of the pastor and are volunteering here, and she approves us being admitted for free. We started walked to the falls (after the pastor assured me that his son knew the area very well) and got extremely lost. Two young boys offered to show us the way for 1000 shillings each, and started to, until they heard a ranger/landowner/dodgy bloke looking for money, and ran off. At this point, we were on a ridiculously steep embankment, with one side being the cliff, and the other being deceptively grass covered but actually mainly a sheer drop through the trees. We didn't know if we should go on or quit while we were already not ahead. Sophia (Mama Daudi's 16 year old daughter) started calling across the river to the man that we had heard - "we are lost, help us, can you show us the way", etc.....we had to climb down, cross the river, climb back up the other side, and being a debate about paying for a permit/our letter etc etc. We ended up paying 10,000 shillings for the four of us - not bad at all. The guy then showed us the way (back down the embankment) and along the river to the falls. The falls themselves were beautiful but we really didn't appreciate them at the time having feared for our lives several times to get there (I wish I was exagerating). We returned to Mama Daudi's house, extremely tired, to a tasty bowl of sweetcorn and beans, enough in each bowl to feed a family of four. We then headed home (after being asked for my shoes). No one is shy to ask for your belongings here. Anyway, moral of this story - you're probably best paying for a tour. The food might be better also.

I'll go for now to see if I can add a few photos. Oh - remember Agata? She is learning to walk! It is quite amazing to see actually, because her legs and feet are absolutely tiny but she's pretty much holding herself up already. Jen and Sal - I thought you'd be really happy to hear that!

Wish me a good/safe time this weekend! I don't think I'll be forgetting this one!

Take care,

Joanna x

p.s. sorry to all of you whose emails I have not returned - like I said - computer access terrible right now.

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