In early June some dear friends, Ron and Janice from Poteau, OK came to Kenya for four days for a pastor's conference. Janice met with the pastor's wives on Sunday and then again on Monday morning, but on Tuesday she and I had the whole day to spend with one another. I took her to one of my favorite spots -- Kitengela Glass. It is a wild and bizarre place where they take bits of used glass, crush it, melt it down and make something new and beautiful with it.

We stayed in a nearby lodge and walked across the field with our Maasai guide/guard to get to the factory. On the way we encountered gazelles and antelope. We also saw this little guy very busy with his buffalo dung. This is a dung beetle. They roll up these balls of dung. It is such a funny sight to see them rolling this dung around, but they are very useful little creatures.

When we got to the river gorge we could see Kitengela Glass across the river, but to get there you had to walk across this narrow, swinging suspended bridge. First our guide had to whistle to get the attention of the Glass employee on the other side. There are actually locked gates on either end of the bridge to keep people off until the attendant can lead them across. After the attendant arrived he unlocked the gates and made us sign a waiver to cross the bridge! Janice and I both wish we had kept a copy of the waiver. It said

"I promise not to hold Kitengela Glass responsible for injury or loss of life from crossing the bridge"

We paid the $2.00 fee and crept onto the bridge. I went first so I could take a picture of Janice. It was scary.

After the bridge crossing you enter into another world. Its as if some hippies from the 60's moved in and created this wonderland. This floor in the "bead" showroom is made from glass.

There were these funny chairs throughout the compound.

This room just sparkles and glows from the sunrays hitting all that hanging glass.

Janice posing on the "lady" lounger

This face was pressed into the concrete sidewalk.

More funny chairs.

This cracked us up. It is an old style travel trailer covered in concrete and glass made in the shape of a dinosaur. Someone actually lives in it.

My turn to cross the bridge last so Janice can take pictures. I had to prove that I actually walked across that scary bridge. I would do it again. Anyone interested?

On Saturday, July 3rd, Rachel, Ricky and I, along with Jeremiah, Pastor John and his wife Maria, traveled to the small community of Iyarat for a women's literacy graduation. This was actually one of the first classes we launched this year, but the teacher took a job and left without telling us, so for three weeks, these ladies were without a teacher. That break in their class time resulted in basically starting over when we located another teacher for them. Now, 20 weeks later, they are excited about what they've learned and we had a wonderful day.

This beautiful lady is one of the first Maasai I became acquainted with 7 years ago when my ministry here started. Her name is Peninah. She has a son, Josphat, who is in Bible School. My ministry, Starfish Charities, has supported him financially by paying for his fees every quarter. When his wife gave birth to their first daughter, they named her "Rhoda" after me!

This lady came to graduation even though everyone feared she would give birth before the day was finished. I knew she was pregnant, but I had no idea it was time! She was very quiet throughout and it was only afterwards that I learned how close to delivery she really was.

These are our proud students, along with their teacher (pictures on the left). We started with 10 and ended with 9.
Passing out gifts to them is one of my favorite things to do. The beautiful wraps they wear get very worn out in a short period of time, so our gift to them was a Starfish bag, a wrap and a handkerchief. To them it was better than Christmas!

Happy faces while they display their new wraps.
You can't outgive a Maasai. They had gifts of earrings and necklaces for me and Rachel and even a necklace for Ricky.


Rachel and Ricky all decked out in their gifts.
We went outside for a group photo session. What a glorious day.

My daughter RAchel, and her husband Ricky came to Kenya in June. I will be posting a series of Blogs in random order about our travels and ministry while they were here. Last week we traveled to Maasai Mara to see God's magnificent creation in the form of animals. I am labeling each picture in case there are some strange creatures you may not have encountered before. Enjoy!

Male Ostrich

This is called a Secretary Bird
Most of you will know these are warthogs. I wish we could have captured them on the run because their tails are straight up like little flags when they are running. They often eat on their front knees.
This is a wildebeest. These travel by the hundreds of thousands or possibly millions in an annual migration from Tanzania to Kenya. We didn't see them in those numbers, but the migration has begun and we saw several clusters of them. They normally travel with zebras during migration.
This beautiful bird is called a Lilac Breasted Roller. (Try say that 10 times fast)

This is a Bustard
We were delighted to see these two beautiful cheetahs before we even entered the gates of Maasai Mara. They were teasing the zebras and wildebeests. They would first run at the other animals and then back off. Then the wildebeests and zebras would run at them. I think the cheetahs were seeing a meal, but it didn't happen while we were there. They eventually ran off into the bush.
This is the Sand River Crossing at the Tanzania border. We walked through the gates and stepped into Tanzania.

Jeremiah couldn't resist touching the skulls of an elephant and caped buffalo at the Sand River Crossing.
I never tire of watching these magnificent creatures. Elephants are so interesting to watch. They are very loving and affectionate to one another.
Additionally we saw the following:

Zebras

Grants gazelles

Thompson gazelles

Giraffes

Topi

Silver backed jackal

Antelope

Hartbeest

Vultures

Superb Starling (bird)

Egyptian geese

Waterbuck

Lizards

Maribou stork

Babboons

Hippos

Mongoose

Cape buffalo

Dik Dik (smallest deer about the size of a dog)

Lion

Hyena

It was a wonderful trip enjoyed with family and friends.