Protests Have Been Called Off

---

Protests were planned to continue until the government would address the opposition's compliments, but in an effort to limit further deaths, fires and destruction Raila called them off. Similar protests happened in 2007 and caused a 8 month long civil war that saw significant deaths, damage and sever impact on the economy. Many were worried this might happen again, but fortunately it is not. The unfortunate part is that the current government is no longer being pushed to improve living conditions of the people.

With this news I returned to Nairobi to spend a few more days with PTS before returning home. I joined the fashion class for an afternoon while they were learning to make different styles of blazers. Their first garment is always a group project so I joined them as they worked to construct their first item.

I also worked with Lydia on the start of their financial literacy curriculum. Several of the professional development courses taught to the girls is done virtually, so we plan to do the same for financial literacy. I will join the ladies over video so we can add this important piece to their studies.

I had an opportunity to spend more time in the slums with the PTS Board Chair who was like most of PTS was born and raised there. We spent an afternoon and evening walking around, greeting friends of his and visiting some small shops. There are many similarities between these slums and the ones in Bangladesh most importantly the lack of access to clean water and waste disposal.

Additionally, I had the chance to visit the Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage. This Project cares for and releases orphaned elephants (and sometimes rhinos) back into the wild. There are several reasons an elephant might become an orphan. The mother could be killed for her horns, the mother dies from a drought, the baby is separated from the mother in the search for new territory among others. Babies under the age of 2 years can not survive without milk in addition to the vegetation they eat. The elephants spend their days in the bush and come back around lunch time for their milk. They also return at nighttime to sleep in a protected shelter. The caregivers are rotated daily so the elephants do not create close bonds with any one human. When the elephant is 2 or 3 years old they will start to return to the shelter to sleep less and less until they are fully returned to the wild. The caregiver said it is not uncommon for a former orphan to return with her babies just to show the keepers how well she is doing. I thought perhaps the mom was going to drop her baby off for the caregivers to raise like boarding school. 😉 One baby took a liking to my scarf and played with it for awhile with her tusk between munching on some branches. To date they have returned 318 elephants to the wild. There is one rhino who will live at the shelter for its entire life because it is blind. They do hope that this male rhinos still might breed to help increase populations.

Here is a link to photos: https://www.icloud.com/photos/#0a1C5PmLKuw4-cr2vCE67ptaQ

---