Mercer On Mission Blog Posts

Just in case you haven't been following the blog posts, or the tweets, and so that we'll have it on our blog, I thought I'd transfer the first week over to ours. So far it looks like everything has been going pretty good. Indie has crossed the equator, seen a pair of hippos (hopefully from a very safe distance), met the community, and they have begun their work. As expected, the Sisit women can run circles around them. I bet the 8 yr olds can outwork them. Indie might have eaten agali with her fingers from the communal pot if she was A) hungry enough or B) was concerned about offending the community and/or the warriors who carry spears to protect them from the hippos. Grab a snack and enjoy... but if you want to see a couple pictures, click on the link:

TWEETS:

• First day of labor at Sisit. Moved + sifted + washed + dried a lot of sand. The Sisit women hauling sand were amazing. about 20 hours ago
• Good day at Sisit. Planning for sand source for water filters+water pump+pipeline. Met community. Labor starts tomorrow. 1 day ago
• Arrived Marich Pass. Rough roads but safe journey. Work at Sisit starts tomorrow. 2 days ago
• Dr. McCreanor is the mercer bear! 3 days ago
  
  
  http://mom-kenya-2010.blogspot.com/
  

6/5

Today started with a very early and completely amazing boat trip on Lake Baringo. The landscape was incredible and we got to see local wildlife including a fish eagle plucking a fish out of the water and a pair of hippos.

We then loaded up the vehicles and head into town for a breakfast of fried bread and eggs and then on to the Longiwan Integrative Child Development Center. The work Sam has coordinated at this site includes a nursery school building;a water supply and treatment facility for the nursery school, elementary school, and local community; garden area with grass for cattle feed and thatching roofs, millet, and maringa; and bee hives. The community fed us a very generous lunch of agali, rice, maringa leaves, chicken, and goat. On the ride back we saw monkeys and ostriches.

We spent the afternoon relaxing around the cabins and were visited by one of Sam's favorite birds, a Paradise Fly Catcher.

We will be up early tomorrow for the second half of the trip to Marich Pass and our main project while here. We will not have internet service once we leave Lake Baringo but think we have sorted Twitter out so, we should be able to send updates but, they will be brief.

6/4
Our updates may be coming in via Twitter so, be sure to check the side bar for updates. You can also check www.twitter.com/MOMKenya2010.

We are at Camp Roberts on Lake Baringo and have a signal on our wireless modem. Today was another day of travel with some flouride removal science and crossing of the equator to break up the trip.

We had a nice breakfast at the Archbishop Desmond Tutu Ecumenical Center then loaded up and started the trip towards Camp Roberts on Lake Baringo.

We stopped about halfway at the Catholic Diocese Flouride Removal Facility which is helping local communities by supporting water treatment systems for large and small facilities and homes. The systems use ceramic filters to remove bacteria and cintered cow bone to remove flouride. The high levels of flouride are a real problem as they cause the adult teeth to come in brown and weaken the bones of the body.

We lunched at the Yama Choma (The Barbecue Palace) - plates of fresh cooked meat, veggies, fries, and flat bread.

About an hour out from Lake Baringo we crossed the equator where we stopped to get some souvenirs and got a lesson in the high pressure sell.

We arrived at Camp Roberts about 4:30 and were sitting down to a cup of tea in our awesome accommodations within 30 minutes. A helicopter landed about 20 yards from us shortly thereafter.

We are still working on the Twitter updates, but no joy yet.


Lastly, a reminder for friends and family just in case we can't get back online - on our return trip, we arrive at the Atlanta airport at 6:10 PM on Thursday June 24. Not on Friday June 25.


6/3

Today started with a great breakfast in the hotel restaurant. There was an excellent millet porridge and Marielle invented a new breakfast sensation - coffee french toast.

After breakfast we took off and had a crash course in Kenyan driving and traffic followed by a tour of the Nairobi National Museum where we got some good background information on the history and culture of Kenya as well as the wildlife and natural history. We lunched as a group at the Savanah Coffee Lounge and then went to the mall to get our money changed.

In the afternoon we napped and relaxed around the hotel. The birds and cats at the trash heap were a great source of entertainment.

Sam took us to dinner at the Abyssinia, an Ethiopian restaurant. The food was experienced but not necessarily enjoyed by all. Sam took the leftovers home for his dogs.


Tomorrow we take off for Lake Baringo and then on to the Marich Pass Field Station and won't be back to Nairobi until the 23rd of June. Internet service will be spotty at best so don't worry if the blog is not being updated.


6/2
Today was a safe and pretty uneventful day of travel. We took the 7:15 bus to the airport, cleared baggage check and customs quickly, almost everyone at some chocolate, and we were in the air pretty close to on time.

8.5 hours later we landed in Nairobi, passport check and customs went smoothly. Sam and some of his crew met us at the airport and transported us to our lodgings in Nairobi, the Rev. Desmond Tutu Ecumenical Center. Sam also took the 10 duffels of vitamins off of our hands.

We get to sleep in a little bit tomorrow and will do some sightseeing in Nairobi. We leave Nairobi on Thursday.


6/1
Everyone got checked in and onto the plane in Atlanta. The flight was mostly uneventful except when Dr. Lackey got a big kiss on the cheek from the Senior Cabin Steward after she explained what we would be doing in Kenya.

After a little bit of logistic trouble with our ground transport we decided to take basically public transport to our hotel and the duffels of vitamins and research equipment cases were checked into baggage storage at the Heathrow airport so that we did not have to lug them around with us.

We had a nice lunch at our hotel at 3:30 PM we re-grouped and took local buses and the tube to the Green Park station in downtown London where we got on an open top sightseeing bus. We were blessed with some good English weather (cold, wet, and rainy) and after about an hour were below deck or under the top floor shelter. The tour was about 3 hours and gave us a great overview of the many historical sites in London.

After taking the tube back to our hotel, we picked up dinner to go (Sam's Chicken, Kentucky Fried Chicken, or Indian Deli) and caught a bus back to the hotel.