"Give me your bag... I give you lots of things!!"

Oy Vey! It has been so long! My apologies. The internet has been pretty faulty. But here I am!!

On Thursday afternoon I had the chance to meet with Mary. She is on full time staff with the Navigators here in Nairobi. It was a really awesome opportunity to sit down and talk with her being that there is only one other girl on the trip and no female staffers. I am actually going to get to meet with her every Thursday to debrief and talk about quiet times and the struggles I am facing here in Kenya. What a blessing! I am so excited for those meetings. Mary is extremely intentional and I know that I am going to grow from my meetings with her. Having a lack of women was definitely something that I was worried about going into the trip. I knew it was going to be tough not having a circle of godly women at my fingertips like I do at home in State College. But, the Lord is good and meeting with Mary is going to be really great.

Thursday night we went to Kenyatta University to sit in on Zembi (a girl involved in University of Nairobi Navs) 's bible study. She is a medical student so she is at that campus. She leads a study of other medical students in her building. It took us over an hour to get there because the traffic was absurd! (by the way it took us 15 min to get home haha) . Hiliary and I were both blown away by the depth of the study. We talked about Romans 8:31-39 and how nothing, absolutley nothing can separate us from the love of the Lord. Zembi prepared the questions and I was really impressed with the input and application of all of the girls. Going to Kenya, we were told by a few people that a lot of the bible studies were simply question and answer and there was no real discussion or application of it. On the contrary, Zembi's girls really took the scripture and applied it to their lives many times. It was a great experience for both Hiliary and I and I think we were both greatly encouraged.

On Friday, Greg, Brett, Hiliary and I ventured to the City Market...dun dun dun... We had heard from previous teams that the vendors at the market places were very pushy and persistent especially to mzungos (white people). Regardless, I dont think we were prepared for how intense it was. The title of my blog comes from this day. One man asked me multiple times if he could buy my timbuk2 bag and told me he would give me lots of things if I gave it to him. They were waving their hands in our faces, and grabbing onto our clothes. Props to Brett and Greg because they did a great job at making both Hiliary and I feel protected and safe. We didnt buy anything but I am excited to try my hand at bargaining. It took me only like 10 seconds to get one guy to cut his price in half. Its crazy to think that some people fall for paying 4 times what they should be paying!

Friday night was The Journey. It is a Christian outreach gathering on campus. They sang some pretty cool songs (some of which we want to bring back to PSU), and had a message on how we dont have to fear because the Lord is with us. It was not very in depth at all but it was a good way to reach non-christians. Afterward we went with Arnold (a student at UON) to talk with some non-christian guys. I was a bit nervous to say the least. He put me in a chair next to this guy named Melvin and right off the bat it was a little weird. He tried to pull my chair closer but I moved it away. In short, he asked for my number, e-mail address, asked to visit me in the states, and started talking about how to get a green card he needed to get married... AHH!! I promptly got up and darted for the bathroom. I dont think we will be doing that again (at least not the girls).

Saturday we went on a Safari walk...aka the zoo haha. But get this... I PET A CHEETAH! How crazy! We saw some cool animals and I wish I could upload the pics but this computer is wayyy too slow for that. Coming back from the Safari walk was just as crazy. We saw a fight between two matatu(taxi) drivers over who would get to take us. THEN we got stopped by the police for having too many people in the matatu. And to top it off the whole ride we listened to hard core gangster rap... my favorite (psyychhh!)


Saturday night, Hiliary and I went to Diane (a woman on part time staff with Nav's)'s house to make dinner for the Nav sleepover that night. We learned how to make traditional food and had some fun times with the ladies. The boys arrived later and we all ate and played tons! of games as a group. We were laughing about it later because though we played like 7 different games they were all pretty much the same game with a very slight variation haha...ohhh Kenya! Our whole team was really really tired but the Kenyan students had so much energy. We stayed up until after two (well Greg fell asleep like 4 times on the couch) and then went to sleep for about 5 hours (Ay yay Ay!) Morning came and we were all like zombies. We took a matatu back to town and grabbed lunch and then went back to the YMCA. Hiliary and I passed out for about 4 hours (talk about a hard core nap) and then we played cards with the boys for a while. It was really fun to spend that time as a team and laugh together (a lot!) about the crazy things that happen here in Kenya.

As for my quiet times I have finished reading through Joshua. I am amazed at Joshua's obedience to the Lords commands. I was also really encouraged at the end of the book when Joshua is reflecting back on all that the Lord did for Israel. He reminds them that the Lord has kept all of his promises and not one has failed. How amazing! Next, I am going to read back further in the Old Testament and learn more about God's promises to his people. I am learning to remember that God keeps his promises in everything and those promises apply to me as well because I have been adopted as a child of God through Christ.

Today (monday) is our day off! Phew! We need it! We are off to have a quiet time at the Java House and then venture back to the City Market haha.

I would love to hear how all of you are doing E-mail me!! I miss you guys so much!! Thanks for reading and praying!

-Sacha