Off to Nakuru – 6.23.08

We headed out this morning around 9am on a three hour trek to Nakuru. Nakuru is northwest of Nairobi and is the country’s fourth largest town with a population of 163,000. Upon our arrival at the Hotel Kunste we were informed that we would each be sleeping in single rooms! No snoring! Yes! We dumped our stuff in our rooms and headed downstairs for a buffet lunch in the hotel banquet room.

Following lunch we headed to the nearby Nakuru New Life Home to play with the kids there for a couple hours. Two administrators run the Nakuru Home, a married couple named Wilson and Beth. Before that New Life Home location actually opened, there was an orphaned infant in need of immediate care and shelter. Unsure of what to do, Beth and Wilson took the sickly malnourished orphan into their own home until they could take him to the home when it opened up.


The orphaned baby, Charles, was about 3lbs. when Beth and Wilson took him in. After spending a short time at the home he was almost completely healthy. They began welcoming more orphaned babies in need of medicine, food, shelter, and love. Less than a year later, Wilson and Beth adopted Charles as they continued to run New Life Home – Nakuru.

I bonded with Reuben all day at the Nakuru home. He’s a small handsome young man. He can’t walk yet and he was just getting over chicken pox. He still has a slight cold and some difficulty breathing. He barely left my side all day.


We were given a tour of the home and the school before we fed the kids. Anne, the teacher, showed us around. The little school for the Nakuru kids is located on the same property as the home, right in the backyard. It’s a quaint little building with toys and learning materials for the children. Right now, they are in the process of creating a library for the kids in a room right off of the kitchen.

There are a great many toddlers at the Nakuru home and most of them can sit and feed themselves. Smaller babies, like Reuben, still need to be fed. He was not happy when he finished all his fruit! They exercise precise portion control in that home so seconds were not an option.

Before we left the home, our Amani group planted and dedicated a tree to the Nakuru home. Our leader Jane gave a short speech before placing the tree in the ground indicating that this meant that we would be coming back to Nakuru and that we’d be around for a long time. Each of us put some dirt back in the hole as confirmation of our commitment then everyone (kids included) added more dirt to stabilize the tree!




We left the home and went to the Lake Nakuru game reserve to see the animals. We rode in the vans and popped the hood up so that we could stand and take pictures. We saw lions, rhinoceros, gazelles, water buffaloes, and flamingos among other things.

After a couple hours we were all pretty beat. We headed back to the hotel for dinner and we young adults quickly migrated to our rooms afterwards. Tonight is supposed to be the night of the flies. Nakuru has malaria carrying mosquitoes within its province. Now we’re all on malaria medication and the probability of contracting the disease is highly unlikely, but we’ll still have to sleep with nets over our beds tonight. Tomorrow is another early morning. We head back to New Life Homes – Nakuru for a special open house at 8am then it’s off to Kisumu!