This past Saturday afternoon, the CARITAS students who attend St. Peter Secondary School met at the Nkokonjeru Parish to help clean up the church and the grounds. Tasks included scrubbing the church floors, weeding along the church steps and weeding, raking and hoeing the parish yard. The activities occurred just in time to spruce up the parish for the Feast of Corpus Christi on Sunday, June 7th.

Sometimes, I realize that I don’t give much thought to boarding schools. I spent my whole life in public education, so there was no reason to ever ponder about the life of boarding school children. So many things make a lot of sense, but yet are totally new to my worldview. For example, it makes perfect sense that boarding school teachers live on the school compound and that they might bring their family and children to live with them. It was seriously mind-blowing to me when I found out, but that might also be because everything feels different being in a new environment. Anyways, sometime in the first week of school, I went to the nearby Internet café sponsored by USAID. The internet was free (another mind-blowing discovery)! I ran into one of the teachers’ kids on my journey back with Flavia. The walk was long and hot with little shade for comfort. After this first day, I doubted that I would make the walk to town from Stella Maris very often. I was right about that. Come visit during dry season and you’ll understand.

During my first few days in Nkokonjeru, I was given time to adjust and acclimate myself to my new environment. Bless my on-site coordinator, Joseph Kkonde, for this. It's definitely a different experience waking up to the sound of chickens, roosters, and cows as opposed to the city noises that I am used to in Chicago and Madison, Wisconsin. It is so peaceful hearing the wind rustling banana tree leaves, which sounds like light rain. I could go on and on about how beautiful this place is, but a picture is sometimes worth a thousand words.