A Walk in the Park Haller Park that is! Haller Park is a nature park in Mombasa just down the road from where we are staying. It is the transformation of a quarry wasteland into an ecological paradise where they have lots of animals. Today we had the opportunity to take the 6th grade classes from Bomani and Vipingo on a field trip there. Now I don’t know about you but taking 70 kids on a field trip isn’t such a walk it in park to me but we had them in groups of 4-5 and then matched them up with one of us and it was a lot of fun. Before we left we collected digital cameras people didn’t use anymore and brought them with us so the children would learn how to use one and be able to take some pictures from their field trip. I wish you could have seen their eyes light up when we told them we had cameras just for them to learn and use, it was one of the highlights of my day! To me one good picture is far better than any souvenir you could bring home. It reminds me of the people I was with and the good times we had together. So, after familiarizing ourselves with the cameras, we set off into the park. We were assigned a guide who told us about the history of the park and the animals. I absolutely love how our guide started us off. He talked to us about how important it is that the students learn about the animals and how to take care of them because they are the future. One day the children will be the ones that will need to be take care of the animals and they will be the ones who will teach others. That is why we took the kids on the field trip, not to just teach them about animals but to work at being young leaders of tomorrow. We take them to do something fun, build relationships and next week they are going to be helping us lead the activities for the younger students. God has called each one of us to be a light unto the world no matter how old we are! This trip has opened the door for lots of good conversations! Other fun facts we learned along the way: - If you are out in the bush and you get cobra venom in your eye you can put urine on it and it will save you. If you are at home you can use beer or milk (The guide then told the children not to drink the beer, so don’t go home saying he told them to drink beer. Hahaha!). - Crocodiles don’t have a tongue, (needless to say no taste buds neither) so all meat taste the same to them. - They also leave their mouth open because it’s their way of cooling down their body - Antelope will bite you to death but they won’t eat you because they don’t eat meat. Yes, things here are not sugar coated at all =). After the Haller Park visit, we had lunch with the children in Vipingo before starting our next adventure: hanging mosquito nets! We went out into the community to hang the mosquito nets that were provided by Fox River and people like you. We took along men from the bible college that were able to help us translate and share the love of Jesus with the people in the community. When you’re walking around the village and see how little the people have but then God tugs at your heart and reminds you that He is all they need! It is life changing. We can bless a family with a free mosquito net to help prevent malaria but it is just a door to talking about the free gift that Jesus gave each one of us! Just like when we ask them if we can give them a free net, all they have to do is say “yes”, God promises us so much more then just a net IF we will say “yes” to Him! Gina was sharing about what a blessing it was for her to be able to hang a net for a family and then say a prayer as asking God to bless them. I have a few prayer requests: - That God will continue to use us to grow His kingdom as we go into Bomani tomorrow afternoon to hang nets and share His love. - For strong health, we have had some people not feeling 100% and not sleeping through the night yet. Pray for Gods hand on them. - This is a big weekend for outreach. We have our celebrations Saturday at Vipingo and Sunday at Bomani. Pray that God brings people out and that they would be open to hearing the gospel. Note: We have a schedule change for tomorrow. We will be doing Sea Safaris on the beach tomorrow with the 7th great classes. 
