Kenya days

I feel the call of Kenya, I will be travelling out there next Sunday for 6 days. And true to my form I am both already almost completely packed but also feeling very unready and wishing I had a few more days (for what?) before I go!

The run up to my visit this year has not been easy. Plans have been drawn up for some time for me (and other members of my Uni team) to do some actual teaching in Nairobi. I am very excited about this prospect. But the stuff that has needed to be sorted before this can happen has been all but overwhelming, disheartening and certainly energy sapping for all of us involved. For example the online system of my uni is pretty dense and user unfriendly and the Kenyan ways are not British ways!

A couple of weeks ago I emailed a few close friends who I knew would be willing to pray for this project and whilst there was no immediate miracle there was soon a surprisingly helpful response from one of the admin team - interestingly the one who has had most contact with the Kenyan would-be students.

So I will get my usual chance to do a keynote speech to about 300 black Africans and instead of sharing my latest research and writing obsessions - well they have had 4 years of this so far! - I am going to focus instead on what I have gained from visiting and meeting them.

I think it is worth reflecting on what we give value to and thereby what we don't give value to. Africans don't necessary play the Western game although there are many pressures to do so but maybe the 'games' they do play have something to teach us. Maybe if we had not been so keen to give them Christianity, our diseases and weapons we might have been even more enriched by meeting them.

Even though I aim to meet people as people my meeting with Kenyans is in the context of representing a prestigious British University which many of them would, and do, give so much for to have the chance to gain our certificates. So it feels neo or post colonial. Despite this unequality I try and get along side people and talk and listen.

I'll maybe post my keynote speech here after the even.

Meanwhile best to all,

Bill-not-quite-on-the-plane