Dear Family,

Mom and I have been in Kenya now for 6 weeks. However, we still feel that we are only starting to "get our feet on the ground." Nairobi (~ 4-5 million people) is the capitol and largest city in Kenya (estimated population of 40 million people). We live in an apartment complex in Nairobi, along with 5 other older LDS couples. It is guarded and we are required to drive through the guard gate each time we enter and leave the apartment complex. Nairobi is located just below the equator (~ 50-100 miles) so the temperature does not vary significantly during the year. The seasons are reversed from the U.S.- we are currently in summer. There are two rainy seasons in the the year (the heavy one, during March-May and the lighter one, during October-December).

We just returned from a 3 day trip to Mbita near Lake Victoria (2nd largest freshwater lake in the world by surface area after Lake Superior in the U.S.). The lake was named for Queen Victoria of England by the first European to see it, John Hanning Speke. The Lake Victoria region receives more rain than the Southwest portion of the country but the Lake is dirty and contaminated by the thousands of people that live around it. The trip to Mbita was interesting in that it was fraught with politics and negative interactions between the people and some high ranking government officials who live there. So far there have been 3 wells dug in the Lake Victoria region. One of them has a reasonable water output, one a much lower water output and the third was dry.

The Church has drilled or produced approximately 1,000 wells in Kenya over the last 8 years at a cost that runs into the millions of dollars (75 Kenya shillings equals one U.S. dollar if you are interested). One type of well is dug by men and is approximately 4 feet in diameter and up to 60 feet in depth. A second type of well is produced by a drilling machine that can penetrate the earth with a hole that is 3-6 inches in diameter to a depth of 400-500 feet (bore-hole wells). The latter type of well is much more expensive but it rarely goes dry. Most of the 1000 wells are in the Southwest portion of Kenya because it is much more arid there (~ 3-5 inches of rain a year in contrast to Phoenix, AZ which gets 7-10 inches of rain/year).

The humanitarian effort here involves not only obtaining water for the people but also visual health-care, neonatal resuscitation and wheel-chairs for the handicapped in addition to a few more areas that we are less involved with. We are encouraged not to proselyte. The Church does not want people to think the humanitarian aid is tied in anyway to joining the Church.

I am sending the email to everyone. However, although I do have Bob's email address I do not have an email address for Ron or Jim Kniskern. Can someone send these?

You all have an invitation to come visit. Roz and I are discussing how we can help in getting those of you who want to visit a trip over here. We will keep you updated concerning this.

Love ya all,

John (Dad to some of you)