Mt. Longonot

I went up a volcano and down a crater- and somehow managed to return safely. The volcano, Mt. Longonot, lies in the middle of the Rift Valley. The hike up and around the crater rim is about 13 km, but my friend Haron and I added at least another 2 km on the vertical spectrum as we scrambled down and then climbed back up out of the crater. The walls are so steep that I imagined stocking the 4 km across crater with animals, Jurassic Park style, with visitors walking around the rim to view the wildlife below.

Faith, Joseph, Dan, Me & "Pinky"

The best part of the day had to be meeting so many people my age. I went with a group of 20 or youth from St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church. On the way up I got to speak Spanish with Faith, who is training for the tourism industry. My Kiswahili is eating away at my Spanish vocab since they have similar pronunciation, but it was good to see I could still hold my own. I then trekked around and below the crater rim with Haron, and we talked about life in America, life in Kenya and global politics. On the way down I spoke with Joseph, who is heading off to South Africa for six months of missions in January. We talked about the future of the church and congregations who rely too heavily on enigmatic preachers versus strong personal development of faith. I also played Frisbee with Francis & Andrew, got connected with the worship praise band thru John and will be practicing with them next week, and spoke with Linda (friends call her “Pinky” because she is lighter-toned and turns pink in the sun- although certainly not Irish-Pink) about university life (she’s training to be a lawyer).

I write all of this to you both to remind myself of all the good people I met, as well as inform you of the connections I’m making. I really value my time spent with Kenyans, and would be missing out in a huge way if I weren’t able to relate to them as friends.