Day 2...done!

Today was our first full day in Kibera, which is the slum of Nairboi. Pretty much Nairobi has about 4 million people, 2 million which live in the slums, and 1.6 million of those in the slum we were in today, Kibera. We went to church there today from about 10:30- 1 pm. We had the chance to opportunity to talk to a lot of the little kids and especially two young girls, Jen and Faith. They are both 19 which is Melissa's and 1 year younger than Crissy. It was really cool for us to be able to talk to them about their lives and what they do. They grew up in the slums but they wouldn't have been able to go to highschool if they hadn't of been sponsored, here it costs $250 a year to go to highschool, which sounds like nothing to us but here they are lucky if the parents make $50 a month, if they even have a job. But these girls were sponsored by people in the US to go to highschool and actually finish, so now they are teachers in the slums in which they grew up. They hope to go to university and help educate their people about getting educations of their own.

It was a very humbling experience today, because I(Crissy) have been on 4 mission trips and on all of them I have seen poverty and experienced villages, but nothing on the scale that we experienced today. We are traveling with a group from the Phillipines (HOW COOL...we send missionaries there and now they are sending them!) But the missionaries from there have been there for 10 years and they have seen those slums, but they have never seen as many as we saw today. It was also extremely heartbreaking, me and melissa had to carry tissues because of all the times we almost broke down crying. These beautiful children and beautiful love Jesus, and love people! Those commercials that you see on TV about the sad, desperate children...not at all! Yes these kids desperately need shoes, clothes and education BUT they are so happy and love everyone they encounter.

We also got a chance to meet some young girls and boys that we well...LOVE. Haha We are probably getting too attached but if you saw their faces, you would understand. Our "favorites" haha would be shalom, diana, cynthia, naomi, elizabeth, dina, bryer (genna if you read this...haha) and many more. They would hold our hands and talk to us like we were best friends already! We promised diana a soccer ball tomorrow and oh my goodness was she excited!

At the end of the day we got to do a ground breaking service for the church that the Met Church is building for the people because they have outgrown their own..WHOOP! God is good!

Lastly, we went to a market and I dont know if any of you have been to Chinatown in Manhattan...but its about 10 times worse and crazier than that! Haha melissa proved to be a an all-star at bargaining...Crissy? Not so much. haha Good thing she brought a good amount of spending money!

Then we went to dinner and came back to where we are staying and got a chance to talk to the pastor of that church Simon Kibaki, what a wonderful man. He has the most amazing story and he is so blessed about everything that is given to him. Multiple times while listening to him talk I (crissy) almost cried just because if you really think about the extreme poverty of this 3rd world country..its heartbreaking and you want to do something to help change it so desperately. But the little we are helping seems to make a huge difference and with the help of Sandy Baird and Manna Worldwide and the Met Church Houston, God is doing big things and it is so cool to have a small part!

MUCH LOVE!

Crissy && Melissa

ps...its 8:33 pm here in Nairobi, I hope you all are having a wonderful sunday afternoon, and to those who graduated from high school this weekend, CONGRATS!!!