Upgrading - Mud to cement

Bre and Rebekah:  To be completely honest, when I woke up this morning, I thought there was no way I would make it through the day.  Yes, I know, lack of optimism but it was tough getting out of bed this morning.  Class was taught by Vincent and Samu and all things considered, they kept it pretty light for us.  We got to practice handstands - little treat to start the day.

Breakfast was amazing.  Krissy hooked it up with some peanut butter - thanks Krissy- and Cosmos cooked some delicious eggs with veggies and lots of avocado.  Bellys full and water bottles loaded, we took off for the work site.

The day started off slow.  We had to begin by creating the cement.  We added water to piles of dry cement and dirt mixture....yes, you got it, more dirt! And just as before, we were instructed to throw the cement at the wall.  So throw we did.  This time, however, we used trowels or "spoons" as the fundis called them.  We were shown the wrist flicking method, which the fundis have down to an art.  I, however, not so much.  It's amazing how the fundis do everything using traditional, manual methods.  Mixing the cement compound for the walls was tough as the dry cement, sand and gravel were dusty and blowing in the wind...so, another day for dirt in every orafice!!!  Lots of throwing ('flicking') cement today and tons of shoveling...we'll certainly all be sore tonight and tomorrow!  Our evening meeting is surely to be quiet.

Lunch was once again made by local Kibera women at the other Shining Hope community centre.  We ate another traditional meal which might sound familiar - ugali and skuma.  Ugali is so fun to eat, you get to use your hands.  Thanks ladies for brightening our day and helping us get through the tough work.

Our buddy Sampson showed up in the afternoon to help us out once again.  Several of us were caught transfixed by his ability to 'flick' the cement mixture at the walls.  Maybe it was incredible or maybe we were all so tired and sore that anything would have been amazing.  But, high five to Sampson for being a  super star!  And to Bruno for continuing to be the machine that he is!!  

Saving grace for the last few days  has to be the crazy banter and wild singing that goes on during the work days.  It feels so good to know that we all came here as strangers, but will leave as a family :)

On the way back to Dreamfish, we were stopped trying to get out of Kibera by some men who apparently wanted money to help pay for a funeral for a friend.  They were quite irate and demanding...tensions got a bit high as we felt a little trapped on the road in the slum.  We had our windows open and had to close them quickly as some of the men approached and I had a hard time with the idea of closing the window on the men's faces.  Our driver managed to explain that we were a group of service workers and the men didn't seem to like that the driver was carting a whole bunch of mzungo's around.  We eventually moved on to these same men banging on the side of the bus.  Bus ride was fairly somber and pretty quiet....lots of sleeping going on.

We are now back at Dreamfish and getting showered while trying to keep each other awake.

As an aside to the specifics of our day....one of the things that we had done when we arrived as a group was to start a gratitude wall to remember all the people who supported us on our journey to this Seva Safari and to express our gratitude to those who have been amazing while on the trip.  It has taken the shape of a fish which is appropriate considering where we are staying.  While the wall continues to grow as the days progress, we find peace and warmth as we walk by and review the names on the wall on a daily basis.  It is refreshing, after a hard days work, to be able to walk past the wall and be reminded of all that we have.  We truly are all grateful for our friends and family back home who have been supportive and helped us to find our way to Africa - we couldn't have done it without you!!  Love You  :)