I never knew I could make something so nice.

I'm came to Kisumu this weekend to enjoy a weekend of creature comforts - running water and electricity. Kisumu is a city on the edge of Lake Victoria, and I'm traveling with the new co-ordinator for GEWLS, Christine. I was so excited to see running water when we arrived that I immediately tried to take a shower. Water dribbled out and then stopped altogether. The hotel was out of water! Fortunately the hotel staff were already on it and had ordered a tanker, and by evening I had a real shower.

My stomach is slowly catching on to Kenyan foods. Kenyans have very different ideas about foods that are easy to digest. I asked for plain, light foods last week to help settle my stomach and deal with a bad bout of diarrhea that followed the vomitting, and was given green corn, cabbage, and beans... I'll save you the details! Finally by the end of the week they understood and I have been eating bowls of rice and potatoes since. I tried to buy a belt at the craft market to hold up my pants but the nice ones were all too big... I've been working on it though, and instead just found an excellent bakery here in Kisumu that should do the trick!

Teaching was great this week - the girls learned quickly and made a pile of 'table mats' (trivets or coasters, as we call them). They were eager to see if they could sell them at the tourist craft market so Christine and I brought some to Kisumu, which has the biggest craft market in this part of Kenya. Unfortunately none of the vendors were able to buy right now, as the market is very slow around Christmas, but a number of them have placed orders for January. Now Christine has the contacts and they've told her the designs and sizes they want, so we just have to get hooking more mats! The vendors are also asking to see what else the girls will make, and once crochet classes begin we'll be turning out lacey skull-caps. The girls are especially excited about them, and I think they'll sell well to non-tourists too.

Joseph has been sick with Malaria this week, but is as ambitious as ever. He donated some land to the GEWLS project and has already partially put up 3 classrooms. Classes will need to move from the rented church in January since it is also used to teach school children (the schools are on a month-long break right now). The big thing that was missing was 6 doors, so I placed an order for them this week - they were only $20 each! Having a permanent school will give so much to the program. The girls will be able to store their equipment (the supplies I brought plus 2 sewing machines Joseph donated) and have a safe place to meet and work. Since they are not charged tuition we are working hard to find markets for the items the girls make so the program will sustain itself. The girls have decided that all proceeds from sales of anything they make during class will be split with 50% going to the GEWLS program to replenish supplies and 50% going to the girl who made the item. I can already see the difference an opportunity like this makes. I've bought a mat from Myriam (and from many of the other girls too), a shy girls who sits in the corner. It's green with a yellow and pink butterfly, and I paid her $5 for it - a high price in Kenyan standards but pennies to us; I don't want to artificially inflate the market price too much and create an unstainable market, but I also want to support the project. The $2.50 she will receive for her work (approx. 3 hours) is more than a 'good' wage here, which is around 63 cents per hour (a total of $1.90). The $2.50 that goes to GEWLS will buy enough supplies to teach another girl the trade. When she finished making the mat she sat looking at it and said quietly "I never knew I could make something so nice." Indeed. Neither did I.