Email from Karianduri School

While on our Global Venture to Kenya we visited Karianduri School in the Rift Valley. It was a special place to be and is one of the enduring memories of the venture. I have just received a very nice email from Karianduri headteacher, Anam Echakari, which I thought I'd share with you:

Dear Morgan,

Thanks a lot for finding time to be with us. It was such a great pleasure and privilege to have you in our school. And for the brief moment you interacted with us you lit our hearts with hope and confidence.

When we look at the world around, our hearts writhe and groan in pain. The devastating effects of global warming and the impacts of climate change have wrecked and altered the course of lives for scores.

Food security, water security, vanishing habitats, rapid spread of diseases, escalating carbon emissions and shrinking water levels is an is an eminent sign that our planet is under siege.

From a tiny remote village remote in Africa to the modern and sophisticated city in Europe, we are all under threat of extinction ! And unless, there is a concerted effort by all and Sundry to reverse this phenomena, we and those who will come after, may not have a place to inhabit.

Thanks a lot for what global footsteps is tenaciously doing to alleviate these global challenges by sharing knowledge and information and offering practical solutions to some of these endemic problems, I am confident that communities will essentially be transformed the ruined live & livelihoods be restored. This may involve huge sums of money, but what will finally be achieved is priceless.

We are joining your caravan as we go round the world campaining by playing an active in tree planting initiatives, carrying out environmental education communities respond with tenacity.

We have already started a tree nursery that we expect to generate 10,000 seedlings annually. We are also in the process of recycling waste paper as a mitigation measure against waste.

Thanks a lot for your kind donation of Kshs. 2,000. This will go towards purchasing tree seedlings . This of course will be a footstep that you will be able to trace even after a very long time.

I wish you all the best in your endeavours!

Thanks a lot.

Anam Echakari

Donating £20 to a school to help them plant some trees does feel a little bit like, as Sean Locke puts it, turning up to an earthquake with a dustpan and brush, but it all helps and if we all give it a bit it adds up! If you want to get some money to Aman's school please contact globalfootstep@googlemail.com and we will ensure it gets there.

Rites of Passage

Here is another post from Howard following the latest Global Venture:

Death is reflected in different ways depending on the cultural & religious practices unique to that community.

In Kenya funerals of the Christian religions take place on Saturdays.

Priests both Roman Catholic & Anglican travel the length of the country to bury their dead in the place of birth or their home town on a Saturday.

When interviewing priests of both the Catholic & Anglican faiths the concept of cremation & burial in municipal cemeteries is usually unheard of. They couldn’t understand why funerals in Europe take place on weekdays. To them Saturdays is the most convenient day as people are less likely to be working on a Saturday. They were also very disapproving of cremation that is standard practice in most parts of Europe.

Apart from the Sikh & Hindu community cremation is unique to them and not normally practised by other religions including Christianity.
The Kenyan people have a very matter of fact approach to death & there way of dealing with it is very different to that of European traditions.

The death of a loved one is very much a fragmented (DIY) Do it yourself arrangement. Unlike in the United Kingdom where a funeral director takes care of all the arrangements.

On weekdays in the local market you will see carpenters making coffins along the roadside. A practice unheard of in many parts of the western world.

On Fridays the municipal mortuaries are open to the public to collect their loved ones. However there is a restriction. If the family don’t have the money to pay the mortuary fees they are charged rent for each successive day the deceased remains in the mortuary. This often means they cannot be buried the following Saturday as planned.

Having overcome the obstacle of mortuary fees and your loved one being released from municipal refrigeration the process is still very complicated.

Whilst in Kisumu I witnessed many systems of primitive carriage for the conveyance of a coffin. Two of these included balancing a coffin on the crossbar of a bicycle or using a beer crate trolley. One of the priests I spoke to said it was not unusual to put the deceased on the roof rack of a car. For those that can afford it a hearse may be hired. An African hearse is not the same as we are accustomed to in Europe. Very practical they will use a Ford transit van. The seats are removed on one side to accommodate the coffin with the family sitting in what remaining seating space is available alongside.

Death is always a very emotional time for those intimately involved. It is very important that this taken into consideration by those directly & indirectly taking part. My experience in Kisumu was that the selling of a coffin was no different to the person on the next market stall who may be selling fruit & vegetables.

However in a country that is very poor materially they remain very strong in their Christian Faith. The African people approach death in a way that most Europeans couldn’t cope with. This is to their credit and shows how much we take for granted in the Western World.

Despite them being poor we have a lot to learn from them in a very materialistic world. What is important is that they never give up on their faith. They are very strong people both physically & spiritually.

Howard Marshall. Kisumu, Kenya. June/July 2009.