Chris Loehmer Kincaid's Blog, page 36

Ripoi School

When my friend Denise and I were in Kenya three years ago, we visited Ripoi School on our way to the Masa Mara.

Back around 2015, our friend Izzo was driving out to the Mara one day, when he saw a group of children and an adult under a tree in the middle of nowhere. Turns out the adult was trying to teach the boys and girls in this outdoor classroom with no supplies whatsoever. Being the guy he is, Izzo started raising funds and awareness to build a regular school for those kids.

Thus, Ripoi School was born.

When we were there in 2019, four classrooms had been built, and some of the rooms were busting at the corners with kids wanting to learn. 

This year, when we returned to the school, it had doubled in size. The number of students had more than doubled. And more importantly, they were happy and were thriving. 

It’s a reminder that there is still good out there. 

 

The Beautiful Rift Valley

     After those two flights and that 14-hour layover in Istanbul, we arrived in Kenya at five am Wednesday morning and immediately fell into bed for several hours. That thin, hard mattress felt amazing, and the shower after those few hours of sleep felt amazing as well. I’ll share pictures later of the volunteer house, which acted as home base. Today, though, I’m going to tell you about the next morning, Thursday, when we drove out to our real home in Kenya – the Mara in the Rift Valley.

Here's our first view of the Rift Valley. Yes, on every trip, I take the exact same picture. But it never gets old. Never.

None of the views in the Rift Valley get old for me. Especially, when a few zebras sneak into the scenery.

A Maasai market somewhere along the way.

The wonderful road we take to get to the safari camp is always interesting, but it does get old after the first few hours.

Wishing they would replace the bridge across this riverbed someday. 

But we did see some Egyptian geese just after crossing the river. 

And some more zebras further along.

But in general, these are the sites I could gaze upon all day.

I’m so thankful to be able to experience God’s beauty in faraway places.

Which reminds me. Whenever I travel to a new country, I ask one of the locals to teach me how to say “thank you” in their language. When we were in Istanbul, we asked our Uber driver how to say “thank you” in Turkish. It is “teşekkürler”, which we couldn’t pronounce without making it sound like “testicular”.

Istanbul

     Okay, I’m ready to do this – share stories from my latest trip to Africa. I want to open with the disclaimer I’ve been sharing in the fine print any time I talk about this trip: we did not do any volunteering, this was strictly vacation.

With that in mind, we thought we’d start vacation before even getting to Kenya. When we booked our flights, we purposely chose one with a long layover on the way over, so we could take a couple hours to tour a city we might not otherwise visit.  

I’d never thought of Istanbul, Turkey, as a place to tour. It just worked out that we would be there for fourteen hours and that my friend who went with has been there twice before. It was a bit of a whirlwind. And we didn’t see all that much, but I thought it was still super cool. But you know me; I’m content to just wander around or even sit in one place and watch life walk by.

We had to take an Uber to the area my friend thought we should see. Unfortunately, that meant zooming by some other cool places. Like what I think is called the Marble Tower. Information I found about it on the internet confused me, so I’m not going to share any more about it.

 I was actually more fascinated by the ships out on the sea. Unfortunately, there we were still zooming down the highway, and our Uber driver didn’t even speak English, so it wasn’t like he could plop his tour guide hat on his head.

Istanbul is the largest city in Turkey and reportedly the seventh largest city in the world. Also one of the oldest.

Though the area has been inhabited since 3000 B.C., it wasn’t until sometime in 700 B.C. that the Greek’s established the city of Byzantium. A thousand years later, the Romans took over and renamed it Constantinople.

Lots of stuff happened – wars and takeovers and it was too much for me to study after that. But at some point, in the twentieth century, the city acquired its current name. 

Inside the Sultan Ahmet Tomb, which contains the tomb of Sultan Ahmet and 36 of his family members. 

The bodies are buried under the floor and the tombs are just decorative. Quite decorative. 
Sultan Ahmet park.

The Blue Mosque, which was being renovated. We went inside, but there was too much scaffolding to get any good pictures.  

Hagia Sophia. This complex has really a lot of history.  

Also, a lot of people wanted to get inside. We were wandering the area for several hours and the line was never shorter than probably three city blocks. We just didn’t have the time for that.  

A nice park and the weather was nice. I haven’t figured out the name of it. 

Just three Wisconsin girls making the most of our stay in this exotic city. 

Give Thanks to the Lord

        Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good! His faithful love endures forever. Has the Lord redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell others he has redeemed you from your enemies. For he has gathered the exiles from many lands, from east and west, from north and south.

Some wandered in the wilderness, lost and homeless. Hungry and thirsty, they nearly died. “Lord, help!” they cried in their trouble, and he rescued them from their distress.

He led them straight to safety, to a city where they could live. For he satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things. (Psalm 107:1-9, New Living Translation)

Monday night, I returned from my sixth trip to Kenya. I’m sorry that this is my first blog post, but I am still decompressing. Every time I come back home, it seems to take me longer to get over the jetlag, catch up on laundry, and get my head back on straight.

As with every trip, there were many highs and lows. I’m not going to lie – this was one of the more stressful ones. Lots of long stories, and I’ll share most of them here soon.

But today’s takeaway is that no matter what we are struggling with, God is only a prayer away. If we take our every worry and stress to Him in prayer, He will answer us. Maybe the answer isn’t always the one we want to hear, but we can rest in the peace that our Lord and Savior knows more than we do and the answer is the right one for us.

Let me praise the Lord for His great love and for the wonderful things He has done for me. 

How I Know There is a God

    “But blessed are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence.” (Jeremiah 17:7, New Living Translation)

A week from today, I leave for another trip to Kenya. This will be my seventh trip, and every time, a couple weeks or a month before I’m scheduled to get on that plane, things in my personal life go off the tracks. People get sick, pets get sick, I get sick, people die, plans fall through, I don’t even remember all the dumb or tragic things that have come up. And when it gets to be crunch time – like right now – I question whether or not I should even go.  

But this is how I know that there really is a God in heaven and that His Son, Jesus Christ, is my Savior. Because the devil causes all those bad things to happen, and even though God could stop those things, He knows that then my faith would not grow stronger. As soon as I step off that plane in Africa, my worries, my stresses, my sorrows all melt away. I am where God wants me to be. And no matter what Satan does, God will take care of me and my loved ones.

Thank You, LORD , God, for all that You do for me and those I care about. Be with us as we return to Kenya and bring us safely home. Amen

PS. With that being said, I don’t plan on posting here until I get home after October 17.  I’ll keep you all in my prayers, and I know you will reciprocate. And also, we don't plan on doing much, if any, volunteering this time. It's mostly going to be rest and relaxation. Coz after two and a half years of COVID, I think we deserve it. 

God bless, Chris

Winging it in Port Wing, Pattison Camping Post #5

I will never get over the power of Lake Superior.

I’ll also never get over my fascination with the freighters out on the Great Lake.

But driving back inland a ways up highway 13, we came across the village of Port Wing.

This quaint little town has the distinction of being the first school district in Wisconsin to provide tax-payer-supported transportation to school.

The little memorial park had a few other places of interest.

But of course, it doesn’t take much to interest me. 

Orienteering at Orienta Falls, Pattison Camping post #4

When I think of all the waterfalls I’ve been to in northern Wisconsin and Michigan’s UP, I’m always amazed when I find a new one.

Orienta Falls is actually at the site of the Orienta Dam, south of Hwy 13 and Lake Superior on Orienta Falls Road. There’s a small parking area with an overlook to the falls, but that’s mostly covered by trees.  

A narrow trail lures you into believing you’ll have an easy hike to the bottom of the ravine to view the waterfalls at ground level.

It was a challenge, but there is no challenge too great for me when there is a waterfall involved.

It was a very nice falls and worth the trek down to it.

But, you know me. Though we couldn’t view much of the falls from the parking lot, just across the river, we spied those white things.

Yes, chairs! Oh how cool if I could have gotten to the other side, which I’m pretty sure is privately owned.

 

The Need to Stop Bickering

Some others there wanted to test Jesus. They asked him to do a miracle as a sign from God. But he knew what they were thinking. So he said to them, “Every kingdom that fights against itself will be destroyed. And a family that fights against itself will break apart. So if Satan is fighting against himself, how will his kingdom survive? You say that I use the power of Satan to force out demons. But if I use Satan’s power to force out demons, then what power do your people use when they force out demons? So your own people will prove that you are wrong. But I use the power of God to force out demons. This shows that God’s kingdom has now come to you.

“When a strong man with many weapons guards his own house, the things in his house are safe. But suppose a stronger man comes and defeats him. The stronger man will take away the weapons that the first man trusted to keep his house safe. Then the stronger man will do what he wants with the other man’s things.

“Whoever is not with me is against me. And anyone who does not work with me is working against me.” (Luke 11:16-23, Easy-to-Read Version)

This past Friday, I went on a research trip for the novel I just finished writing. Yes, I know, you should do research before you write the book, but what can I say.

One of my stops was at the Milton House in the small town of Milton, which is only five miles or so north of Janesville, Wisconsin. The Milton House was a stop along the Underground Railroad and has the distinction of being the last certified Underground Railroad Station in Wisconsin that can be toured.

The tour was great but quite overwhelming. Our wonderful tour guide had to pack a lot of information in our one and a half hours in the building. I had thought about taking notes, but I’m sure that would have just muddied everything for me further.

But anyway, I’d already chosen the above Bible verse– Every kingdom that fights against itself will be destroyed – for my novel. And it just seems even more fitting having walked the tunnel which escaped slaves walked.

It also reminds us of how we as a nation will only fall apart if we keep bickering.

God, I know that You will never leave us or forsake us. But I also know that we cannot continue to turn our backs on You. Send Your Holy Spirit into the lives of those who are against You so that they may see Your Good and Perfect Way. Amen. 

Amnicon, not Omicron - Pattison Camping post #3

Just five miles south of Davidson Windmill is Amnicon Falls State Park. It’s also twenty miles southeast of where we camped in August at Pattison State Park.

Unfortunately, the water level was low, but it was still a pretty walk down one side of the Amnicon River and up the other side.

But people were still able to enjoy swimming in the pool below the main falls.

It was a beautiful day, and Hubby and I enjoyed our picnic lunch.
(It's scary how many mornings we look at each other and go, "we're wearing the same color shirt!")

A Little Historic Spot, Pattison Camping post #2

On highway 13, eight miles south east of the city of Superior and two and a half miles straight south of Lake Superior, is a little spot to pull off the road and see something different.

Jacob Davidson, a shoemaker in Finland, came to America in 1884. Two years later, he had bought a homestead in the township of Brule. From 1900 to 1904, he built what would become known as the Davidson Windmill. The grist mill, powered by the windmill, supplied neighbors with flour for their families and grain for their livestock. By 1926, larger mills in Superior provided these necessities, and following the death of Mr. Davidson, the windmill ceased operation.

Sadly, over the years, it fell into disrepair. Thirty years later, descendants of Jacob Davidson restored the windmill. From 2000 on, other repairs took place, but as you can see, time has not been a friend to this beautiful structure.

Also, on the grounds of this relic are the Eskolin Log House 

And the Taylor Bridge. Each of which have their histories as well, which unfortunately, I don’t have time to share today.