SERVICE PROJECT TRIPS

Friends of Kakamega conducts a Service Project Trip each summer of approximately three weeks. The trip is focused around working with the children in a "summer camp" experience with arts, crafts, games, sewing, woodworking, soccer, singing/dancing, etc. Smiles, laughter and wondrous joy fill these weeks for these children who have so little outside of the Care Center and Sponsorship Program. Everyone who has taken the trip has found their lives to be forever changed and great richened.

The following are excerpts and photos from the report of the 2006 Trip led

by Sukie Rice:

2006 Trip Report

How can I describe the atmosphere of Joy that I experienced while in Kakamega. This was a joy that permeated everything and everyone at the Care Center: the 40 children who live there; the 60 children who come each day for the feeding program; the 12 high school students who joined us during their school break; the 20 home-based sponsored children who came for a week to the Care Center to be a part of the "camp" we held and who never dreamed they could be so happy; the staff at the Care Center and the youth pastors with whom we worked (and had a blast), all of whom give the children such guidance and love. Then, of course, there were the eight of us Americans who were drinking it all in and loving every minute of it. It was just this incredible Stream of Joy that lifted us all up in spirit and brought us closer together in this exchange of cultures and hopes.

CAMP ACTIVITIES

As long as there was a ball, it was in use. Soccer, volley ball, beach balls, just plain ball -- playing ball seems to be as essential to life as eating and drinking.

Bicycles were purchased for the Care Center and lessons given to all the kids during the Camp. What an experience of Joy for the children to be able to ride a bike!

Devis helping Silas learn to ride.	Keeping Maureen upright.

Come on, Violah, you can do it.	And Tyson is up an running.

Go Armstrong!	Housefather, Godfrey is keeping of the pump.

The children loved learning how to bake (not to mention loved eating the results).

Priscah and Jenipher mix up the banana bread.	Kristan leads a group of boys in making cookies.

Sewing and crafts were on-going activities of the Camp

Donated laptop computers were set up and the teenagers were thrilled to learn how to use them. Computer lessons every day were an important part of the camp.

One of the highlights was a trip to the Kakamega National Rainforest, the last remaining rainforest in East Africa. The children were deeply grateful for the opportunity to visit this Kenyan treasure, to walk beneath the canopy with monkeys swinging above and to learn about the trees and wildlife of the forest.

Both Camps 2005 and 2006 had woodworking opportunities for the children to pick up carpentry skills. Some of them showed special promise and want to learn more.

Joseph learns how to build a bee hive.	Helen planes the wood.

Then there is the Singing and Dancing, a staple in their lives, expressing the Joy and Faith, Praise and Gratitude and Hope.

The Stream of Joy: it is contagious.