Kenya or Bust!

Well the journey to Kenya was interesting to say the least. It all started around 2:30pm on Friday, March 23^rd. We arrived at the Kampala Coach Bus Station waiting for our bus that was supposed to arrive at 4pm. Of course while sitting there, the bus workers handed us a brochure about the Kampala Coach, which spoke of it’s free meals, 46 inch tvs, and how we were about to ride in Luxury.. LIES!! The bus arrives not so promptly around 6pm. We get on to find that there is not even enough seats for us even though we paid for 13. So for the first 2 hours, I sat in the aisle of the bus. There were no Tv’s and no free food but we were not too shocked about this. After our 1^st stop about 2 hours in, I was able to get a seat, but it wasn’t much of a step up. The bus had horrible shocks and we were in the back, so we literally bolted 1 feet up from our seat about every 2 minutes.. Doesn’t make for easy sleep when you are driving through the night.
    We reached the Kenyan border at around 1am to get our visas. The lady writing the visas was taking her sweet little time and we ended up being there for 2 hours. In this process, our bus driver had the "white people" cut in front of some others waiting so our bus could leave. This of course did not make people very happy, especially a very angry Canadian because his Bus left him, and all his stuff was on the bus. So needless to say, the border was a not wonderful experience!
    As we got back on the bus and proceeded to leave, we heard a loud popping sound and air shooting out of one of the tires. Yep, we had a flat tire. So ½ hour later, we finally got back on the road. Not long into the drive, we pull over again, apparently there was a problem with the axel. So we sat on the bus for around 2 hours, when they announced that another bus was coming, and we could get on. As the bus arrived, they pointed at us muzungus and said, "you will go on the other bus". Apparently there was only room for us, so no one else from our bus got to transfer busses. Again this was extremely awkward, as we walk off the bus ,and many Africans are angry because they are late to conferences and what nots.
     We got back on the next bus around 5am. We proceeded to fly around in our seats for the next several hours without getting any sleep of course. We finally reached Nairobi at 1pm (our original arrival time was supposed to be between 6am-8am, that didn’t happen).
    So the bus ride was probably one of the worst traveling experiences I’ve ever had, the only good part was seeing Zebras on the drive when we were in Kenya!
    The rest of the trip though was much better. We got to go to a giraffe park and feed giraffes which was great! We got to eat at Javahouse, an amazing restaurant with really good milkshakes and quesadillas. We went to a really nice mall, saw a movie, and got frozen yogurt. And we were able to get some souvenirs at a Masaii market, some of which we regretted buying once we realized how much we actually spent. The Kenyan exchange rate is really confusing and you don't realize how much money you are spending. Overall though, It was a very nice break, and I had a lot of fun with my team.
    Thankfully the ride home was 100% better! The Bus was on time, the bus had shocks, and we were able to sleep most of the ride home. So the 16 hour journey home as nothing in comparison to the 22 hour journey there.
    We were all ready to get back though and get back to ministry. We only have 5 short weeks left here in Uganda and we are excited to see what God does during this time. I’m very excited to go home and see all my friends and family but I will be so sad to leave this place I have called home for 4 months.