Back from Nairobi

George, Eli and I arrived back from Nairobi today. You might be thinking when did you go to Nairobi?

Well, we had to leave Tanzania for a few days. Until we have our work permits, we have to leave the country every 90 days. This past Tuesday was day 89 so we went to Nairobi. We didn't have the time or funds to go all the way to Kisumu this time. We just planned a quick trip to Nairobi which would allow us to re-enter Tanzania.

It was quite the trip. First challenge... riding a bus with a baby. We were those people. You know the ones... with a crying baby on a plane. That was us on the bus. Eli did pretty well, but had a few moments where he was hungry and tired when he cried. Those moments are so stressful! We scrambled to make him stop crying before we disturbed everyone. Eventually he settled down and so did our blood pressure.

When we got to Nairobi, we headed to the hotel we always stay at. It's cheap and we have befriended the staff members. Then came the second challenge... no ATM card. We don't know where it went, but we knew where it wasn't, in our wallets. We literally had no money. Nothing for the hotel, for food, for phone credit. Nothing. Then came the panic. We were in a big city, with a baby and a no money. YIKES! What do you do when you are stranded? Call mom. Yep... that's what we did. My mom was able to arrange for us to get money from our account through Western Union. We couldn't access it until the next day so George's friend sent us enough for the hotel (although the staff said they would make an exception and let us pay the next day.) and for dinner.

After that was settled and once again our blood pressure decreased, we went about our business in Nairobi - went to the embassy to get my new passport (I am officially Stacie Orwa!), do some lab tests, get supplies for Eli (at half the price of Tanzania prices), etc. The third challenge was getting around Nairobi - taxis are expensive, buses are over crowded and there is tons of traffic. Nairobi is nuts!

We were also able to meet up with our good friend from Sudan, Margaret. She helped us find a place to get the lab tests done and went with us to the embassy. On Thursday, Margaret invited us to her house for lunch. George was in heaven. She made fish, sakuma and ugali.

I miss Margaret so much and am thankful we have kept in touch. We can laugh and talk for hours.

Fourth challenge - entertaining Eli, who was out of his routine, while we toted him around with us. For the most part he did very well. Of course there were times like this...

But mostly, it was like this...

By Friday we were ready to go. Happy to go home... but not happy to be back on the bus! It's an eight hour journey (5 with a private car) which is hard with a 4 1/2 month old who we discovered had come down with a cold. Challenge number five.

By 4:00, we got to Moshi and were happy to be home. Although we had a lot of challenges, we felt God's presence and provision through many ways - help from family and friends when we were in a pinch, kind hotel workers willing to make an exception for us, guidance and hospitality from Margaret, safe journey on the bus, ease at the borders... and so many more.

Hopefully we'll have our permits before the next ninety days is up so we won't have to do that trip again for a while.

There is no place like home...