When we decided to start a business in a developing country, we knew we’d run into challenges.

Most of the women we work with never went to school, so many are illiterate. They might know how to write their names. Last week we found out that the problems we were having with inaccurate sizing were due to the fact that instead of measuring with a ruler starting at “0 cm.” some were starting at “1 cm.” The things we take for granted…

Electricity is not dependable. Sometimes we find ourselves in darkness in the middle of the day because is either no power or no light bulb, the tiny room we’re in has no windows, and the door has to remain closed because passersby will see mzungus, think there is money there, and come back at night to rob the place (yes, this happened). 

Slums are just dirty. Even with impressively dedicated cleaning standards of Kenyans, it is still difficult to make beautiful and high quality creations when there is dust and black mud and dirty water everywhere. 

Early death is an everyday issue. Yesterday we were walking through Marigoini to Rose’s house for a group meeting and we stopped to peak into a house on the way. “This is Regina’s place,” she said as we waved inside [Regina is another Marigoini group member]. “Her sister died yesterday. But she’s coming.”

But even this doesn’t even begin to touch on the challenges that present themselves in the world of HIV and other cultural issues.

One of our partners isn’t available to work with us because she’s in hiding. Her husband is threatening to kill her, probably because of her status (HIV+), so she has had to leave her home and two of her children (cultural customs dictate that she only gets custody of the children that bear her name, not her husband’s name- in case, only one of her three kids), and pray that her husband doesn’t find her. 

Another one of our hardest working partners is also missing in action. Her husband, also one of our partners, has a first wife (first meaning also current wife. yeah… polygamy is still very much engrained into certain parts of kenyan culture). The first wife came to Nairobi from upcountry and moved into house…. kicking our partner out with nowhere for her and her beautiful baby to go. The husband is responsible for providing home for both wives… but he can barely pay for his one “house” in Mukuru. 

Yeah, I know. What the heck?? Can we get an HR director around here?

Praise the Lord, the women are still safe and in good health. And, we work with some pretty amazing social workers and counselors that can offer help and support in these situations.

But reconciling running a business and also being present in the lives of our partners- even when their lives are consumed with situations like this…. it’s difficult. It’s easy to get into business mode and think structure, efficiency, and results. But how can we be concerned about these things when partners can’t work because they are literally running for their lives?

For me, it continues to teach this:

1) That this whole “new kind of business” thing isn’t all fancy campaigns and fairy dust. It’s sticky and messy and hard hard work. You have to be OPEN to dealing with all of these issues and not see them as limitations but as part of the work.

2) Jesus was really serious when he talked about the “least of these.” Because our broken world has spent a lot of time creating lots of least-of-these. Everywhere we turn, there’s something that might be disguised as a distraction or a limitation to something else we’re doing. Even if that something-else is helping people! But the real Work is usually the intangibles.

The other thing is this: 

We know that Christ-redemption is whole… He intends to redeem our whole earth. Even that nasty sewage ditch full of stagnant germfest that runs about 10 inches outside the entrance to our meeting place yesterday- the ditch barefoot babies fall into all the time. Ditches like that aren’t part of His plan. Christ is living water- water that provides life, not disease. And that is encouraging.

bananas and beads

Long week. So blessed by the women we work with.

Sylvia’s and my joke all week was: “Field work. So many advantages.” Although we had tired feet, muddy clothes, and pretty much no free time, our bellies were always full, our wrists and necks adorned with jewelry (Sylvia says she’s taking “samples” for promotion), and our fingers and toes pampered care of CHM School of Hairdressing students.

The Marigoini group.

We spent all day in Rose’s house working on jewelry… learning, teaching, but mostly laughing. And eating. Oh man, so much food. Really really good food… but so. much.

Rose’s house felt pretty spacious for Mukuru. She stays there with several of her children, including her daughter Caroline, a 28 year old women with special needs. Caroline sits on the bed 24 hours a day because it’s not safe for her to walk around in the slums outside. She’s too old to go to school, and Rose hasn’t been able to find any programs for her in Nairobi. There seems to be a glimmer of hope though- Rose found a program in Kisumu (about 350 km away). It costs 6000 kenya shillings a month- about $75. Rose doesn’t have the money. Pray with us?

JLew doing some mobile accounting work at the Fuata Nyayo group.

Hanging out with Zilani and Nyambura.

Nyambura is so beautiful. She has some pretty intense prayer needs right now. God knows- pray with us?

These are Zilani’s two children- Mercy and Jane. The first born is Mercy because after 10 years of being told she was barren, Zilani was blessed when God had mercy and gave her a beautiful daughter.

Jane and Mercy sat in the mud like this for most of the day. I don’t even know how many dirty things they were chewing on. At one point I looked over and Jane was lying face down on the ground, just smiling and playing away… Part of me is sad and scared for them… and part of me knows they’ll be ok and laughs silently thinking about how an American mom would handle this. A lot of parenting techniques change when you live in a slum. 

Kayaba A group. Josephat is the man. He’s cutting leather for some new designs.

Sylvia doing her thing. Probably saying something incredibly inspiring that I was scrambling to write down in my five-star. I’ll share some of those words of wisdom one of these days.

Thanks for your prayers, friends.

Pray for mercy this week. Pray for God’s mercy on us as His servants, and that our work would simply be an outpouring of that grace and mercy.

Time is flying… but crawling at the same time?? Africa time is a difficult thing to get used to. One part of me feels right at home here (ask any of my friends about my punctuality problems…), but the other part is learning lots of patience :) In Nairobi we can put one, maaaybe two things on the schej for the day- and still be exhausted by the end. It’s mind boggling, really.

Like Saturday, for example, the one thing we had to do was “eat lunch with Pastor Ben,” one of the pastors at CHM. It took us about five and a half hours.

But really- who can complain when we get to spend that time with little ones like Bridgette:

And eat a pretty tasty meal.

[meals seem to alway taste better in the slums… why is this?]

Pastor Ben lives in the slums, close to the City Harvest Hairdressing school with his wife and four kiddos- in one room. Although I am impressed with the creative usage of space (i.e. kid’s bike hanging from the ceiling doubles as pot hanging tool), no one should have to raise a family like that. His impressive library of theology texts seems especially out of place. As always in the slums, the threat of fire is always looming (a fire nearly consumed his place just this Sunday), not to mention the danger of poor sanitation, robbery, and violence.

Pray with us for better opportunities for Pastor Ben and his family.

On a different note, we’re meeting with all the Kianga leaders tomorrow for a training session.

Pray with us!

-that we will learning valuable information about what is working and what is challenging

-that we can structure the project to cater to each member’s individual strengths

-that we will be able to communicate our ideas and designs in a clear and productive way

-and MOST importantly, that we do this all with a heart full of love, as an extension of Christ and as work for the Kingdom :)