Home again

After a very, very long two-day, 40+ hour trip from the Masai Mara to Nairobi to Dubai to SFO, 17 of us returned home to our families on Tuesday afternoon. (Alison returned to Daraja to spend another two weeks working at the school.)

Many of us are working through the physical aftereffects of the long trip and all of us are adjusting to the massive time and cultural differences that we've experienced in the past few days.

It was only three days ago that we were marveling at a leopard high in a tree alongside its dinner and watching Masai women carrying giant barrels of water on their backs. Then an eight-hour drive through rural Masai lands (the first 147 km on dirt roads), and miles and miles of humanity and traffic congestion on the outskirts of Nairobi - where driving rules are only suggestions. Finally a stopover in Dubai, with its melting pot of travelers and wall to wall high-end shops (and McDonald's).

Most of us have likely expressed gratitude for clean (and hot) water, the absence of dust, and the variety of food and drink available at home. But we've also begun to share stories of the experiences and relationships developed over the past three weeks - experiences that will certainly leave an indelible impression.

I keep saying that one can't romanticize Kenya - as friendly as we found the people, it's an extremely poor country and the culture & lifestyle are so vastly different from ours that those who haven't been to third world countries have a hard time viscerally understanding that gap. Experiencing Kenya in the way that we did was a life education in itself that will assist our students in understanding the world around them as they move forward in their lives.

At our last group meetings in the Masai Mara, we spent some time trying to process our weeks at Daraja. To a person, everyone talked about the extraordinary commitment and work ethic of the girls at the school.
To have come from the backgrounds and life experiences that they do and routinely work from before sunup to long after sundown to better their lives - without complaint and with friendship for all is remarkable. The teachers there are first-rate and the education (while delivered differently than at MA) is outstanding.

As we return to our regular lives in the U.S., all in our group expressed the desire to maintain to the best of our abilities the relationships developed with our friends at Daraja and to find ways to support this very special school.

Welcome home and asante sana.

-sd

PS We hope to share many hundreds of additional photos from the trip on our Photobucket site:

Photos:
http://s1199.photobucket.com/albums/aa471/marindaraja/

Daraja Academy Website:
http://www.daraja-academy.org