Sad stories remain in the focus

This morning Fundi, our Hospital manager packed his furniture to be moved to a small village at the border of Uganda, were he spent his youth. He and his family ran for their life when the turbulences started in Nakuru. I spontaneously gave them shelter. After a while his wife and children returned back to their parent's home. They belong to the Kalenjin tribe. As the wife couldn't take all the belongings with her, her husband is now bringing the rest. It is an 8 hour journey. Hope all goes well and he will be back soon; we need his help.

After returning home the phone rang and it was John, our clinic doctor. With agitation he reported that our youngest nurse Aska had been attacked yesterday evening and had to be delivered to the town hospital where they treated her for 6 hours, before she could go home. They also stole her salary that she picked up from the bank. She saved money for three months to help her mother whose house had been burnt. And she wanted to build a little hut around the hospital to be together with her animals. For the time being she had to take shelter in the police station. It is disheartening to hear all these stories. It seems that sometimes human beings are more cruel than animals. - Mama Matata

The rainy season started also in Nakuru ...

Nakuru town: expensive and dangerous

rs. This morning I went to Nakuru to make some payments and was looking for mattresses, but I couldn't find any. Before the elections, normal foam mattresses cost 235 Kenya Schilling, now they are 3 x more. It's unbelievable how the prices rose, also in regard to food. People try to steel money wherever they can, especially those who are not town residents, but come from other villages and from the show-ground. You have to be very careful when walking in the town and you have to carefully close all zippers of your jacket. The situation in the street is getting very unsafe and quickly I went back to my car where my boy "body guards" took care of my car. As recompense they usually get milk and bread. After returning from town I quickly checked the hospital before returning home.

Falling temperatures, rain and a birth

rs. Stephan and the other Swiss returned home and here I am back alone with our daily duties. The temperatures drastically fell to 18°C, it is heavily raining and it became windy. The rain season cannot be stopped any- more. Today a new soul was born: Jakob. Besides this many daily routine and office work and some troubles because of our inconsistent power supply which is especially bad if you are working on the computer.

This is the Hospital ground with the tent camp

Today marked the last day of our stay in Nakuru, that means of Nicolas Senn, his mother, Gaby from the Swiss TV and myself (Stephan). Tonight we will return back to Switzerland via Nairobi. We had again an active day giving out the food for many refugees in the hospital area. It is always a big task to handle the masses but Ruth Schäfer has the needed poise together with a hidden firmness to keep the situation under control. As a last excursion Nicolas and myself went a little up the mountain to make some shots from the Rhein-Valley Hospital ground with the tent camp.

Nicolas and Ruth

Visit our Kenya Photo-Blog !

On the new photo blog "Kenya Photos"
you will find one new picture of Stephan Holderegger every day,
and even in much bigger format!
Here is the link:

http://kenyaphotos.wordpress.com

Another Dulcimer concert on 2700 m

Today we visited the water station in Thugunui on 2700 m where all school children gathered together to attend another concert of Swiss dulcimer player Nicolas Senn who is currently staying in Kenya together with his mother. The water station was opened on November 15th 2007 together with the Austrian help organization "Schilling für Schilling" and allows the whole community to have fresh drinking water the whole year round ... and even free of charge! The children were very receptive and happy. The adults were also listening and all had a good time. At the end the community thanked Mama Matata and the musician. Nicolas took the opportunity to walk down to the Rhein-Valley Hospital ground on 2000 m and realized how much effort it took for the locals in the mountain village to bring the water up the mountain before the water project was established.

This old men sponsored the land for establishing the water station.

Film shooting at the Aequator with Nicolas Senn

ns. Today the Swiss delegation (Gaby from the Swiss TV, musician Nicolas Senn and Stehan Holderegger) went to the Aequator and visited a village where Nicolas had a concert last September. The locals immediately recognized the Swiss dulcimer player and showed autograph cards from last time. Gaby filmed the meeting and could make several interviews. We even plan to organize a big concert together with Kenyan dancers. Fortunately we had no rain on the way back to Nakuru. Soon the rain season is expected to start here and we already had first showers last night. Let's hope that the thousands of refugees in the camps will survive! The conditions will get worse and worse.

In today's newspaper...

Clip from today's edition of Kenyan paper "The People Daily"

Easter Sunday together with the street boys

After the successful concert of dulcimer player Nicolas Senn around the Rhein-Valley Hospital we planned to go to the city centre of Nakuru to play again for the street boys and bring them some food as a little Easter present. As soon as we approached the main post office the people rushed from all sides towords us and were astonished about our colorful outfit in the Swiss tradition. We also were astonished to see so many poor people on the street that have nothing but their life, and the youngsters most of the time spend their time with sniffing. After the concert started the children were laughing and seemed to get some happiness. It didn't matter if it was a traditional Swiss country song or a American Rock'n Roll. Gaby Schädler from Swiss TV was trying hard to capture the atmosphere without being overrolled by the masses. The situation became tense when we started to give out some food for the people. They feared not to get anything and were panic-stricken. Mama Matata had to climb on the roof of her car to bring herself in a safe position. From there she tried to continue with the food distribution but finally we had to stop the action and escape in the car. It was not safe for us anymore, to say the least. Anyway, we manged to make around 1500 young people happy this Easter Sunday! - Nicolas