It has always been Sherri’s dream to go to Africa, so she was ecstatic when we realized we would be in South Africa during her birthday! We had just returned to Cape Town after a whirlwind road trip so we started her birthday off right with a stroll down to the waterfront where we enjoyed a lovely brunch with a bottle of pink champagne! Following a great meal we spent the afternoon at a spa treating ourselves to massages! That evening we had a fabulous dinner and then headed out for a night on the town which of course included dancing and maybe a shot or two!

South Africa is well known for its incredible wine. And we were prepared to try them all…however the Robertson Wine Valley has over 50 wineries and most of them offer free wine tasting! Trying to narrow it down to which ones to visit was a tough choice, but since The Rosendal Winery also had a full service day spa, using products made from local wine grapes, the choice was easy! Wine and cheese tasting followed by an wonderful massage…it was a perfect combination! The Rosendal Winery also has a nice restaurant and accommodations…the perfect place for a wine weekend getaway!

We also checked out the Robertson winery & Rietvallei winery in Robertson before heading to Stellenbosch. We enjoyed the spectacular scenery along the way and stopped at a few wineries in the Stellenbosch area as well. The wine lands of South Africa are definitely worth a visit! We tasted some amazing wines…most of the wineries each had their own Pinotage, a signature South African red wine.

While staying in Cape Town, South Africa we took a lovely day trip down along the coast. We stopped at Boulders Beach where there is a colony of over 3000 African penguins. They were sooooo cute that we spent hours just watching them and snapping a ridiculous amount of photos!!! We ended the day at the Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve where we watched the sunset from high atop the cliffs overlooking the spectacular scenery.

We were so excited to arrive in Kenya and meet the children at the Galilee Primary School and Lorna Waddington High School, who had received the first distribution of mosquito nets. The schools are located in the Kayole-Soweto slum area of Nairobi, Kenya. Over 1700 students attend school on the campus. Many of these children are orphans, all live in poverty.

Upon arriving we were greeted by the school’s director, Fanuel Okwaro. He took us around to every classroom where we were introduced to the teachers and welcomed by the students (classes start at “Baby Class” level pre-K3, moving into Nursery School, then Pre-Unit, like our kindergarten in the US, and then grades one, two, and so forth through 8th grade. Students then take the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education exam to determine if they are eligible to attend high school, which goes from Form 1 through Form 4) . Each class had a poem or song that they performed, it was awesome! While touring the school we also got to see the kitchen which is located where the Galilee Primary school started in 1997, in a simple building with two small rooms and dirt floors. At lunchtime we went to the library, which also doubles as the teachers lounge, where we met the principal & several more teachers. Thanks to the organization Feed The Children, a hot lunch is provided to students every day school is in session (Monday thru Saturday). Lunch consists of beans & rice or beans & maize…for many children this may be the only meal they get that day.

We spent the afternoon typing exams on 2 of the schools 3 computers. They only had hard copies of most of the exams which makes it very difficult to update and/or make changes…with the exams saved into the computers teachers can modify the tests as they see fit. At the end of the day we got to play with the children and then Fanuel gave us a ride back to the Rusam Guesthouse, where we had dinner & passed out early.

On our 2nd day we headed to downtown Nairobi with Duncan (Fanuel’s assistant) to do some shopping for the school. In addition to the mosquito nets we purchased (thanks to the donations from our friends and families) we also bought school supplies. Notebooks, pencils, pens, paper, crayons for the little ones and many other necessary supplies…we even got a few fun items! Two new soccer balls and a table tennis set. Back at the school we spent the rest of the day inputing more exam data into the computers. In the late afternoon when the children were out of class we went out into the dirt courtyard in the center of the school to teach the kids how to play ping pong. We borrowed 2 square tables from the classrooms and as we were setting up the net, a crowd of children quickly gathered around. Sherri & I demonstrated (as best we could) how to rally the ball back and forth. The kids were gathered so tightly around us that someone always caught the ball if we happened to miss it. We took turns rallying with the children trying to give each of them a turn. Once they had the basic concept down we stepped aside…even some of the teachers got involved and the older kids tried to explain the rules to the younger ones, who were much more interested in just hitting the ball back and forth.  It was so much fun…by the end of the day our cheeks hurt from smiling!

That evening we were invited to one of the classrooms to watch the choir practice. They put on a full performance including song, poetry and dance. They really have some talented students and they will be competing against other schools later this year.

We really enjoyed our time at the school! We especially loved the time we got to spend with the children playing games and taking pictures! The kids loved seeing themselves on our digital cameras…we’d snap a couple pictures and then show it to them and they would just laugh and laugh!

We also taught some of the children to play Bocce Ball thanks to Jeff Kelley and our friends at Sanuk who gave us a soft bocce ball set to take with us on our trip…we left it at the school for the kids!

The children in the orphanage had already received nets from a shipment sent earlier in the year. From wear and tear, some of the nets had small holes in them which could allow the mosquitos to get in, so we spent one afternoon sewing these holes so that the children would still be protected.

Thanks to our friends, family and Netting Nations that helped make this part of our world trip one of the most amazing experiences!!!

Watoto Centre School was the 5th school we went to and was located next door to the Galilee school.  This was the largest school we visited, with over 1,200 students and 120 orphans at their 3 orphanages.  The orphanages were actually quite nice with cheerful drawings painted on the walls.  The last one we went to even had a garden and a cute kitchen.  We helped the children put the nets on their beds, which was a lot of fun and kind of reminded me of how we used to build forts with sheets and blankets when we were little.

It was such an awesome day!  We felt like we had seen thousands of children (which we had).  We are so thankful that we were able to have this wonderful experience and help all of these children.  We’ll definitely never forget it!  Thank you from the bottom of our hearts to everyone who helped make this possible.  For anyone who is looking to help, there are still many children who need nets! Visit the Netting Nations website to find out what you can do to help!

The 4th school we went to was the Candle Light school, which was run by Pastor Afwai and had about 300 students and 42 orphans.  When we arrived at the school we met Afwai in his office, which is also the sewing room.  A little boy was working diligently on a sewing machine making a beautiful hand bag.  The school teaches the children how to sew, so that they acquire a useful skill and then they also sell the items the children make to raise funds for the school.  Rana bought an apron and I bought the hand bag that the little boy had just finished making.  This school was the smallest one we went to and was located in the heart of the slums.  Since we still had to make it to the 5th school, we took a quick tour of the campus, met some of the students and then gave Pastor Afwai 42 nets for all of the orphans.

The 3rd school we went to was the Boston School, where Fanuel’s brother was the director.  There are 323 students from preschool to eighth grade.  Those who finished the eighth grade then moved on to Fanuel’s school.  After visiting the classrooms, we handed out nets to some of the students and then got together for a big group photo.

The second school we went to was the Humble Hearts school.  The school was started in 2004 and there are 350 students total, of which 40 are deaf.  This is one of the only schools in Nairobi that teach the deaf and they teach all their students sign language.  They also teach the parents sign language once a month and on Thursdays the entire school uses sign language to communicate.  This was one of our favorite schools as the children gave us a very warm welcome.  As our car pulled up to the school, we were rushed by a sea of adorable children wearing purple uniforms.  When we got out of the car they swarmed around us laughing and smiling and reaching out to hold our hand and give us high fives.  The were so cute and happy, we loved it!

After touring the school, Beatrice, the Director of the school, took us to her parents house where there was temporary housing behind their house, where 35 deaf students who were orphans lived.  We gave her nets for the 20 beds, as most of the children had to share a bed.

The first school we went to and distributed the mosquito nets was the Brightstar school.  We were so excited to meet the children. The Director of the school, Andrah, and his wife, Jacqueline, were very welcoming and appreciative that we were bringing them nets. They explained to us that having malaria nets was a luxury that they could not afford but really needed.

At the school there was approximately 500 students with about 90 orphans living on campus.  Andrah and Jacqueline showed us around the school and introduced us to each classroom. When we entered each classroom the students would stand up and greet us and recite a poem or song for us. They were all so adorable and incredibly sweet that it made me wish we could do more for them.

After the tour of the school we went to both the boys and the girls dorm rooms and handed out the malaria nets.  The children were so excited and immediately tore open the bags and began to put the nets over their beds.  The boys even made up a song on the spot, which went something like this “we are so happy, we are so happy, we are so happy today.  No more mosquito bites, no more mosquito bites, no more mosquito bites today”.  It was so cute and we were very touched!  Unfortunately, we were only able to give out nets to all of the orphans who lived at the school, but the other 400 students still need nets. It was hard to realize that we were only making a small dent in the problem, but every bit does help! If you would like to purchase malaria nets for these adorable children, please go to Netting Nations

Talk about culture shock…India is like another world!  You would never believe how different it is until you actually experience it yourself!  We arrived late at night and luckily had arranged for our hotel to pick us up.  On the drive there it was astonishing to see how many people were sleeping in the trash covered streets.  We were eager to arrive to the safety of our hotel.  The last Lonely Planet writer to visit the hotel had described it as “sparkling clean”, however, they must have a different idea of what is sparkling clean or they never went past the lobby.  The walls of our room were covered with dirty foot and hand prints, the curtains had a thick layer of dust, the sheets were definitely dirty (we slept in our sleep sacks) and the water barely trickled out of the shower head.  When we asked the guy at the front desk for two bottled waters, he gave us bottles with caps that had been opened.  When I told him that we could not drink the water if they had already been opened, he said that they were filled with filtered water.  We decided to not take any chances and finally used the water filter my Dad had given me.  Welcome to India!

India during the day was even more overwhelming than at night.  We had heard that the men in India will stare at you, but we weren’t prepared for the full on staring contest with every man we passed. We were on the defensive because we had also heard that Indian men were known for groping women in public, which made me want to shoot every guy a “don’t even think about it” look, but apparently women in India don’t look men in the eye unless they’re prostitutes. So I was a little torn between looking them in the eye and not looking them in the eye, because I didn’t want them to think I wasn’t paying attention in case they wanted to try something, but I also didn’t want them thinking that I was a prostitute. I usually went for the “looking them in the eye” tactic…it made me feel safer and most easterners have a view of western women being “easy” anyways. You would not believe how many men asked us if we were married…we heard it almost as often as “hello” because in their culture it is rare for a woman to be seen without a man. We didn’t talk to many women because there were never any around. Almost every job was performed by a man and walking down the street you saw about 95% men. It was so weird, almost like they were all in hiding.

We stayed in Kolkata 3 different times while in India. The first time we only stayed on day and then made a quick trip to Varanasi and back before my brother, David, arrived. The next day after he arrived we took the night train north to Darjeeling. Then after traveling around for about 2 weeks, we came back to Kolkata to fly to our next destination, Kenya. This time we stayed in a nice luxury hotel, thanks to our friend who works for a hotel chain and was able to get us a great discount. It was a wonderful way to end our stay in smelly, loud, dirty, scamming, intense India!