Eight days to go

Greetings

I can’t believe it I am actually writing to my blog for two days in a row.  Let’s see if I can keep at it.  Today we reached a new milestone.  We have now been viewed at every corner of the world.  It took 54 countries before the number 55 in Bolivia.  So now South America has viewed the blog.  Out of the 55 countries 20 have been in Europe, 13 in Asia, 10 in Africa, 6 in the Middle East, 3 in North America, 1 in South America, Australia, and New Zealand.  Now we need one of those lush Pacific island nations like Fiji to take a look.  Anyone know anybody in Fiji?  Pass along the blog.

Since my return to the states in July I have been in communication with my friends in Kenya and I really really need to learn Swahili.  I saw this commercial on TV where this guy walks up to this other guy says something into his phone and it translates it into the other language so the guy he is talking to can understand what he is saying.  When is someone going to invent a device that can be implanted into my brain so I can communicate properly with anyone anywhere in the world?  Don’t laugh it is just around the corner.

As I said yesterday we will be planting about 24 orchards of passion fruit in and around Kakamega.  While I was in Kenya helping plant the first orchard I came up with a list of costs to plant orchards of various sizes.  We learned that we did not need to have as many support posts as I had done with the widow’s plot.  I have also learned that if we have long rectangular plots the cost of posts go down even further since we really only need two large posts per row.  I was also able to reduce the future cost of the support wire and barbed wire if we were to purchase larger quantities.  I believe there might be other savings in the quantities of scale that can help us out.  I had come up with a figure of about one thousand dollars an acre.  This includes seedlings, posts, wire, plowing, fertilizer, and chemicals.  Maintenance and labor would be covered by the stake holders. 

I am going to do my best to get these 24 plots on a total of 5 or 6 acres planted for the budget of one thousand dollars per acre.  We are going to purchase as if we are planting 5 or 6 acres and see where that goes.  To plant the sixth of an acre that the widows had was about four hundred dollars without fencing.  I did not include the research and traveling around doing everything in the price.  I also did not include the training in the number since training will be more of a case by case basis.  I pray that we are successful in reducing the cost of a smaller plot to something that is more affordable and we can reach many more people then only planting larger plots.  Please keep us in your prayers because I have my doubts and my faith is not where it should be. 

I still have not figured out how we are going to provide training.  We do not have enough money in the budget at this point to provide the training to everyone.  I am hoping that the lesson I learned with the spaghetti in Mumias will repeat itself.  It was day 36 Mumias on June 13, 2011 and I was told that there would be about a dozen maybe 15 people at Mathew’s house for spaghetti dinner.  I purchased what I thought was enough for 15 people.  By the time dinner was ready there were 40 people that had showed up for the show.  Everyone had their fill and no one went home hungry.  This is how the Apostles felt when people were showing up and they only had a few loaves of bread and some fish.  Check out day 36 back in June it was a good story.  I am probably over reacting to all these little issues and should have more faith in God to provide what is needed as he sees it.  What is the Kenyan saying “No worries”?

Again keep me and my friends in Kenya in your prayers as we get ready to what I believe will be a near miracle to get all these orchards planted in the next couple of weeks.  Again if you feel compelled to donate to help with my expenses or to help with transportation costs on the ground, or training costs please feel free to give us as much money as you like.  Sometimes people feel bad when they can’t give a lot of money to a cause.  Let me tell you that even 10 bucks goes a long way.  My five star hotel only costs 10 bucks a night.  A good meal for a couple bucks.  What really costs is the gasoline at almost 6 bucks a gallon.  I know that quite a few of you that are reading this understand that it does not take a ton of money to make a difference in the lives of these people that are less fortunate then ourselves. 

You might also consider when you are budgeting your charitable giving to take a look at some of the organizations such as World Vision or Compassion International when deciding to help out.  Sponsoring a child doesn’t cost as much as you might think and the difference in their lives are enormous.

You can write a much appreciated check to:   

Olathe Wesleyan Church
15320 S. Ridgeview Road
Olathe, KS 66062

Attn: Dave Wood Kenya Trip

Take care and God Bless

Dave