Here is a post from my teammate Stacy about fixing the roof here in Kenya! She wrote it well so I thought I'd repost it 🙂
(You can follow her at stacychew.theworldrace.org)
It's winter in Africa.
I'm serious. Walk around town a bit and you'll see dozens of winter coats. Even some of the ones with fur around the hood. Babies are bundled up in snowsuits and half the people are wearing boots.
It's definitely winter in Africa.
And yet… it's 90 degrees.
"Winter" in Africa means the rainy season. And rain it has. Almost every evening around 6 or 7 the rain comes. And comes. And comes. Rain spills out from the skies drenching the dirt, the rocks, the corn, Kelly's bed…
Yes, you heard correctly, and no, Kelly does not sleep outside. You see, sometimes in Africa, it rains inside as well as outside.
That's because the metal roof on our house was installed over 30 years ago and wear and tear, and a lot of rust, have made it less and less worthy to be called a roof. As far as roofs go in this part of town, it was one of the better ones. There weren't any visible holes… but that's the funny thing about water. It doesn't need to see the hole to find it.
And that's why, every evening between six and seven, Kelly can be seen rushing to her bed with a couple of umbrellas.
After a few weeks of unwanted indoor plumbing, we finally got around to asking Peter (our contact here in Kenya) if we could bless him and his family by paying to fix the roof.
"Fixing the roof" in my mind meant replacing a few of the metal sheets that were leaking, or even doing a little patchwork here and there. "Fixing the roof" in Kenya means taking off the entirety of the current roof and installing a complete set of new metal sheets.
The day the roofers (aka church members) came to fix the roof, we thought we would have a nice peaceful day off.
Wrong.
We were literally kicked out of the house, as our bedrooms became war zones with concrete chunks falling every which way. We were confined to the little courtyard area and the sidewalk just outside. Little by little, the roof was removed and the new one implemented, and little by little, the crowd of spectators grew, wondering what was going on. As we explained the situation to them, we were met with an unexpected response.
"This is a great miracle!" was the overwhelming consensus. The biggest surprise of the day was the landlord, who after continually refusing to repair the roof for Peter and his family, came by to say that he was knocking off five or six months of rent in exchange for the roof repairs.
To say Peter and his family (and Kelly of course) are thrilled is an understatement. It was a great day, and felt so good to bless someone who has spent years blessing the community around him with little time or money to spare for his own home.
So for all of this, I just want to say thank you to all of you back at home. Thank you to everyone who supported me both prayerfully and especially financially. This is where your money is going. Just thought you'd like to see the difference you all are making around the world.
