We are currently emailing back and forth and there may still be a phone call or two, but things are coalescing. Each team member gets two checked bags on our Lufthansa flights plus their carry-on. In the early days of our project, we would take maybe 60 footlockers with us for four or five churches, loaded up with clinic supplies, and we were required to take responsibility for two footlockers each, meaning we lived for 10 days out of our carry-ons. Easy for a man to do, not so much for the ladies! These days, we order the bulk of our supplies through local Kenyan businesses, boosting the local economy and meaning we get a little more luggage space for ourselves. Many of the things we used for the clinics came from China anyway, so they would go from there to America and then come with us to Kenya. Much easier just to cut out the middleman!
As always, we bring things for our missionaries that are on the ground all year round for our project. For example, a bottle of shampoo or conditioner is the equivalent of $15, so rather than bring travel sizes, we pack full sized bottles and give the bulk of it to our friends when we leave. There are certain brands of cereal or candy that folks get a craving for that are not available in Kenya, although much has changed since I first went there in 2009. They now have KFC and Subway, neither of which I've been to there. Why go halfway around the world to do something I can do at home?
We will be flying out of Bush International in Houston Thursday afternoon and will arrive in Frankfurt, Germany around 8am local time Friday morning. We'll be screened for Covid as they examine our vaccination records and online documents we have already uploaded and I'm sure we'll go through a security check before we board our next flight. We have almost a 3-hour layover, so that should be plenty of time as long as our flight out of Houston isn't delayed. I don't need any big adventures like the time we missed our flight in London and ended up in Istanbul. Pastor Kevin always likes missions that are "uneventful" and so do I! Adventures make for great stories afterwards but aren't so much fun at the time.
Our flight from Frankfurt should arrive in Nairobi around 8:20pm and I hope to be at our lodging by around 10:30 or 11pm after going through Immigration and Customs, which will also include Covid checks of our paperwork or rapid tests for some of us.
One of my new team members asked how I entertain myself on these long flights. I mentioned bringing my own movies, music and Kindle books on my smartphone and that newer planes on international flights usually have USB and sometimes power for plugging in laptops, plus an on-demand entertainment system where you can watch a movie and pause it for dinner or a bathroom break. My best option personally though is closing my eyes and dreaming!
That's it for now, I'll try to write another post or two before we depart with more thoughts on travel and what we will be working to accomplish through our clinic in Waithaka. Blessings everybody!
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