Making History in Africa

Want More??? Click this link for more Photos

2007-08-16T00:37:00.000-07:00

As the media and PR representative for WCA, it was my job to compile notes for our trip and report them to the public. So have a look at more photos below and at the link to this post (http://isetinkenya.blogspot.com/).

Here We Go

2007-08-04T10:22:00.000-07:00

Click the title of this post to read some of the poetry that was inspired by the people.

A Day in Church was also a day with the children of Machakos. Aundre, Rev. William, and others were greeted with alot of interest. And De'Angelo stood up to make a bid on sugar cane during the service. The local farmers brought fresh produce to make their tithes. Worshipers and visitors were able to purchase items during an auction that made the Sunday service quite exhilarating.

Hakuna Matata

2007-07-26T22:24:00.000-07:00

An African saying that followed us on this trip was Hakuna Matata (don't worry about it). It was a refrain on dealing with the challenges of life, how people survive and find happiness when there are few resources. I think it taught those of us who have most of our material needs met that true humanity, grace, and friendship is what we really seek. I carried this copy of "Vanity Fair" magazine with me to remind me of the politics that can either help or hinder the effort to bring Africans out of misery... and of what we have done in the U.S. to focus attention on it.

What the gift of water means to a child, a family, a village, cannot be summed up with any quick review. An account of how often we are able to access it, for our cars, hands, hair, pets, lawns, dishes, clothes, plants, meals, is the difference in how we survive. Click on the link to this post for more about this method of bringing water to the villages of Africa

Efforts to deliver the tanks, medicines, and the school supplies is on-going. Above, are scenes from the Gospel Brunch held in March. Congresswoman Dianne Watson and Della Reese officiated at the concert held in B.B. King's Blues Restaurant in Universal City. There were also barbeque dinners, seminars, and medical drives. A letter campaign and church meetings made this enormous grassroots fundraising effort an experience, the lesson that we can make a difference. Students from my University campus and from area highschools participated.

Making History in Africa

2007-07-19T22:32:00.000-07:00

Making educational videos has come to be my way of teaching where a new generation absorbs and access media. Sooo... I took my cameras, with the prospect of finishing a video on the important work that WCA is doing in the next few months. Some of my previous DVDs on diversity can be accessed by clicking the title of this post and in the mean time, this blog has become a fascinating way of compiling notes and photos of some of what went on.

Among the best experiences was seeing USIU Nairobi, the private University my aunt Lillian spent 18 years helping to build. The Library named in her honor is part of hundreds of acres of land, and now boasts 37,000 students. Standing in the Head Librarian's office with Dr. Sophia Kaane made the visit very memorable.

There were numerous highlights, too immense to be counted and yet the whole experience has made me feel small and humble in God's world of diverse and amazing people.

Above is a monument to President Jomo Kenyatta, a photo of a "clean water" truck, two of our guides, Mike and Richard. There's Me and Aundre at breakfast in Mombasa; and three WCA members in their T-shirts: Reverend Anthony Hughes, his wife Rev. Dee, and Aundre.

Water For Children Africa

2007-07-19T22:07:00.001-07:00

The WCA site can be reached by clicking the title of this post. From June 19-July 4, the WCA shared more than just time and effort.

There were many friends we made in Africa: Elliot, the security guard at our first hotel showed me on a map just where the heck I was in the scheme of things. Fred was my escort and sentry when it came to navigating the downtown streets of Nairobi, and Nora befriended me at dinner and agreed to eat Ostrich if I would.

Here is Vickie, the executive director and below, me with some of the teachers of Machakos.

Some of the highlights of our adventure:
* Seeing the Rift Valley and Naivasha Lake; Storks in the city that were bigger than most dogs; crossing the border into Uganda where we thought we might have to stay a while to explain ourselfes; check points on the road where police in uniforms (sometimes with smiles) stopped us to inspect the van; filling out more forms when both leaving or entering any country including Amsterdam and the U.S. (with the same info on our passports), women carrying bananas on their crowns.

Springs of Hope Children's Center

2007-07-19T20:26:00.000-07:00

Click on the title of this post to see more of Springs of Hope Children's Centre. This is not their website, and they can be reached by email at eaglesfounts@yahoo.com or info @springsofhope.co.ke

Here is Mrs. Gunder holding Faith, and one of the staff with a young boy at Springs of Hope

Photos of Comfort and the other children at this blog site. Including the center Director, Mary Musyoka

Karibu! (Welcome)

2007-07-16T23:03:00.001-07:00

Treated to elaborate meals, I was impressed by how much I recognized the food. Their chapati was like our tortillas; rice both white and brown, and a version of reddish beef stew that kept me very happy.

We unloaded boxes of supplies at the Hospice in Uganda. After the first week and a half, we took in sites of the city, shopped in Kampala, lounged on the beach at Mombasa, dined in restaurants where the cats greeted us (this reminded me of Paris), and were treated to ceremonies in the forest country of our hosts. A time of great joy.

Probably, one of the most important highlights of the trip was when our director, Vickie Butcher was made a Queen Mother. Her dedication of years of bringing clean water to the villages and children of Africa was well deserved.
Having Vickie's grandsons and nephews (wearing blue T-shirts) De'Angelo, Raymond, and Garrett help with some of the heavy lifting meant a lot to the other travelers. Along with our team guide, Richard.

There was also a dress shop owner named Anne, who was so glad to have us visit (and Rev. Dee's fervent prayers), that she gave me two outfits! We made a donation to an HIV/AIDs Hospice in her name.

Photo Gallery #3

2007-07-16T21:51:00.001-07:00

Everything was red. Except one of the aerial views of the village, the earth and the air was tinged by the minerals of the land. Even the satellite view of Uganda was red.

Photo Gallery #2

2007-07-16T21:37:00.001-07:00

July was the time to be in Africa, since Vanity Fair was doing a series on the Continent: 20 different magazine covers. Click on the title of this post to see them all. Standing among the children of the Chandra school are me and Mike, the driver who also lent a hand on filming their performance.

Vickie Butcher, the team leader gives a word of encouragement to children in the Chandra School of Machakos. For more than 12 years, she has embraced the mission of bringing clean water to Africa. Their math quiz on the chalk board is featured above in post called Karibu! (Welcome)

Photo Gallery #1

2007-07-13T00:39:00.000-07:00

These are scenes from the border country of Uganda, left to right. At the top on the banks of the Nile River are Sisters: Charlene, Aundre, Iset, and Margaret. Next are brothers on the team: William, Richard, and our driver, Mike. In Kampala we visited a hospice, the best of facilities. In the photo are Ann, Rev. Tony, Iset, Vickie, William, Mother Rita, and Dominick. The bottom photo is Iset holding Comfort at the Machakos orphanage, Springs of Hope.

Morning in Nairobi

2007-07-11T21:41:00.000-07:00

They produce such lovely things... full of color and detail, and many we met were so generous. One dress maker gave me two outfits while a woman from the village who could only communicate with her smile handed me a huge bag of green beans.

A day..., a day. We began with no coffee (except for the adventurous couple, Pastors Hughes who ventured onto University Avenue), and a quick pace of going to pick up, purchase, and learn about the water tanks.

The staff of Kentank was awesome. Chocolate folk with MA's and studied manners, very aware of protocols. At least three of the four were female, the marketing specialists who declared that clean water will become available to children once we involve mothers in the distribution. I felt as if I was one of the women who should claim the tens of thousands of children who siphon water from the mud puddles along the road.

The plant was surrounded by barbed wire, a prison among a village of prisons out in the open. We were not accustomed to seeing the piles of garbage on the side of the road; not the metallic shanties of slums where tens of thousands go without electricity, sanitation, water. I realized that anyone visiting modern Africa should read the great classics of African literature to process what they see. Post-colonial Africa is described so deftly in novels like "The Beautiful Ones are Not Yet Born" by Ayi Kwei Armah. As Americans we have our own dramatic dilemmas for sure, though nothing that compares to the "lift" needed on a daily basis in these places.

The big loads being drawn by men or carried by women on their heads were nearly vestiges of memory until you see that its true, up close. the people survive as though it takes them all day to manage rather than to grapple with the world.

I'm sure it is how most of us feel, that our circumstances are all there is to manage until we can get out from under. It's human.

A Different Land

2007-07-11T20:58:00.001-07:00

Digesting all the variety of scenes, from the cows and livestock along the road (and yes, we did see wildlife--Zebras, baboons, impala, and monkeys--now and again) to the economic disparities meant guarding my emotions. As the photo at one of the orphanages shows, the broken glass of the doorway was within reach of the children.

The people made a big difference; we met some of the most caring, gentle, and strong. Many were women. I felt honored to meet Jayne (my sister through our "Mum" Dr. Lillian K. Beam.

Jayne invited me to the exclusive Safari Club where she oversees public relations in downtown Nairobi. Her skilled business sense was as prominent as her caring attitude about the people of Kenya, and to welcome a daughter from America.

There was also Elizabeth, the sister of our host, who designs fashions. At the Sunday brunch in Mua, we dined outside with the extended family in a what felt like private park.

Important Moments: We arrived at night, so appropriate for being in a dark place. I took the black rock that had been among the stash of things Dr. Beam had given me (I'd carried it for the entire 6 months of preparation), and returned it to the ground outside Jomo Kenyatta Airport. All the boxes and luggage were assembled in what was deemed a short travail through customs, and we were home, done with 22 hours in the air.

The next morning we posed in our team shirts. Dominick, Rev. Dee, myself, Tabor, and Rev. William look forward to the culminaiton of our journey and a visit to the village. We were headed to the schools where our water tank purchases would be installed.

What I learned of the land was most surprising; that after walking upon the roads, the rocks and red dirt, was that it "gives back." I felt the rhythm and strengths and ills of the people and most importantly that it was different from walking upon the sidewalks of California. It had meaning. The beauty of its pebbles is beyond description. Everywhere I looked the rocks glistened like sugar and it was easy to understand why outsiders knew about its riches, the wealth of gold and diamonds that rest in Africa's skin. I was mesmerized by the very foundation of human civilization.

A personal comment: Meaning was the hallmark of the excursion. As an academic who'd studied the Continent for more than 20 years, this was my first time in the flesh being in a place I'd often mused about having a tie with. It was real before I arrived, though till now, had occurred souly in meditation over its historical issues, its legacy of greatness and subjection, its myriad cultures and performance on the world stage. Yet in all that time, I'd managed to miss the opportunities to visit. I'd receive grants in the past, and each time was unable to pursue them. I concluded that a "research trip" as the consummate scholar was out of bounds for my purpose; that I needed to travel free of any constraints to produce a report or adhere to funding guidelines that would conscript my vision as something other than a child of this great place.

Interestingly, my vision of seeing Africa as an unencumbered, free person would occur on dates that signify all that liberty might mean to an African American: we left on June 19, the day that freedom from American slavery was announced in Texas! "Juneteenth" is still celebrated with parades throughout the country. We returned on July 4, a mark of national independence from England that is a national holiday. Frederick Douglass lambasted African Americans for celebrating the day when their own freedoms were violated so flagrantly in the nineteenth century. I couldn't help but acknowledge that each of these dates sculpt my own existence, primarily as statements of what blacks in the U.S. have demanded for themselves, and what they have bequeathed for all.

Last Minute Preparations

2007-07-11T18:48:00.000-07:00

With just a week before the trip, I sent forth a call to friends who might want to contribute to our medical supplies. The Water for Children Africa team had 15 suitcases to fill, and were meeting twice a week by phone to coordinate the last of our contributions. We had 8 boxes of surgical gloves and various pain relievers, but little in the way of childrens' meds. The Black Faculty and Staff Association (click the title of this post for our homepage) at my school had already embraced the cause of sending supplies and funds for the water tanks, and were quick to sign on to sharing the trip with the campus at Dominguez Hills. We set up two drop-off centers on Tuesday, June 12, and by Friday had received the generous outpouring of support from various personnel, including the entire College of Business. There were bags and boxes of everything from flip-flops and ear drops, to diapers and baby tylenol.

By Saturday, (a day away to San Diego) my friends, Evelyn, Dana & her daughter Camille, and Adrian, had come to say farewell, loaded my suitcases and several additional boxes and bags of yo-yos decorated as lady bugs, playdo, and many different over-the-counter meds into the car. There was no room for more. I stared in amazement at the cartons of gauze, the vitamins, motrin, antiseptic wipes, cough syrup, ointments, hydrocortizone, cotton balls, crayons and colorful markers, chapstick, and hand sanitizers... and thought this project might just make a difference to little ones in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania.

"You will never be the same"

2007-07-09T10:29:00.000-07:00

This was the prophetic word from my pastor. I'd been fortunate enough to attend a special prayer session he had called for the members of Faithful Central Bible Church. We formed a circle around the Tabernacle, and prayed for one another, and especially for Bishop Ulmer who was considering some big decisions .

It was the answer I had hoped for, and had sent First Lady Togetta a note asking for prayer since I was going on a mission that loomed as a turning point in my faith: along with fifteen others, I would be taking water tanks, medicines, and computers to villages in East Africa.

The Bishop was available to chat about my upcoming trip to Kenya and Uganda, and shared his insights on what it would mean to my life. I nodded at the thought, though felt less trepidation that before the prayers went forth. As I stood in the Presidential Suite of the Safari Club in the finanacial district of Nairobi two weeks later, it was clear what this declaration would mean. I was changed.

Other insightful commetns:

"I'm so proud of you" (My best friend, Dana and her dad, Joe)
"I have that excited nervous feeling in my stomach" (Mom)

"That's Sooo Cool" (Camille, my niece and Barbara, my mentee)

"This is going to be so good for you" (Dr. Joyce Johnson)