By Fr Ken Asaba
Well done! Well done! This I believe is the most appropriate way to express my gratitude to the Mission Group from Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Lesmurdie that has returned from its Mission experience in my home Village in Kenya just over four weeks ago.
I am very grateful to each and everyone in the group for their time and money, but above all for their love and patience, which they put into this wonderful experience.
I am very proud of the two young girls, Catherine (16 year old) and Isabella (11 year old) who were part of the crew, for their resilience in facing all the challenges of the experience, with love and courage.
They would have easily chosen to remain back in Perth for their school holidays, but they chose voluntarily to spend part of it in one of the remotest parts of Kenya, and to experience what it means to be in a third world country, with no hot showers, proper toilets, fridge and cooking facilities.
They never complained that their hair was not washed properly or that they had no access to the internet. This is the miracle, and the best part.
And it just goes to show that anyone can do such an experience. It doesn’t have to be only in Kenya, but any other place or country that will make us realize how blessed we are to live in Australia.
They say that you can’t choose where to be born, but you can choose where to live.
However, this is not always true as most people in Kenya would have chosen to live in a country like Australia, with almost free education and free medical care.
One of the most common questions we encountered from young people as we visited the local schools was: How can I come to Australia? And I can assure you the answer was not that simple. We had to leave Carrie to deal with that one as she works with the Immigration Department here in Perth. The point is that, there are so many needs in Kenya as in any third world country.
But the fact of having seven ‘wasungus’ (white people) visiting one of the country’s villages, mingling with the people and sharing with them almost everything – food, culture, music, education etc, was a great source of hope and encouragement.
In this sense, I would say that our Mission has been accomplished.
Cultural exchange and learning from each other was actually the main reason why the Mission Group was formed.
I am sure each one in the group had the opportunity to assume both learning and teaching roles throughout our experience.
However, Kerrian Bresser and Jennifer Stone seem to have particularly loved the classroom experience as they are both teachers here in Perth.
Terry Hackett was also a great joy and inspiration for the kids in all the schools we visited.
She also managed to learn a few local dance moves and ‘shakes’ from both the students and teachers.
Music and dancing is in our blood. You could be at Sunday Mass for almost two hours and you couldn’t realize that the Mass was long.
Apart from the spiritual and cultural exchange, we managed to give some practical assistance to all the places we visited, thanks to our generous friends in Lesmurdie Parish and around Perth who helped us raise over 10,000 AUD from the fundraising Dinner Dance in October last year.
In summary, we gave:100,000Ksh (1,400AUD) to Lwanaswa Primary School for School equipments, but the gate was a major hazard, so they used it to fix the school gate; 100,000Ksh to Eregi Primary School for text books in the school library; 100,000Ksh to the Eregi Health Centre to buy a water-tank (plus 30 to 40 kilos of baby clothes and jumpers); 70,000Ksh (950 AUD) to Eregi Parish to train a Catechist for three years; 50,000Ksh (700AUD) to Eregi Parish for the Youth Activities and Projects; 50,000Ksh to Eregi Parish Women’s Group (CWA) for their income generating projects; 50,000Ksh to Shijiko Primary School for their School Feeding Program; 50,000Ksh to Imalaba Primary School for School Feeding Program and special support to orphaned students; 50,000Ksh to Imalaba Secondary School to help with their Science Lab and special support to orphaned students; 10 Laptops to Eregi Girls High School (donated by Corpus Christi College).
We couldn’t get all the computers over due to limited weight allowance on the flight. Some 2,000AUD went into Car hires for transport and other smaller donations to institutions, individuals and families who helped in various ways for the success of the Mission experience.
On behalf of the people of Eregi and all the schools that we visited, I would like to thank each and everyone who generously supported this Mission.