Cross-Cultural Ministry in Kenya, Part Three
In the USA we used to say, "a man's home is his castle." In Africa, a woman's home is her kingdom. The house is completely the domain of the woman.
When you visit, they have a saying that "you can't leave with the same mouth you came with." In other words, you must eat something. You can't leave until the woman of the home releases you, either. To do so is the height of rudeness.
This makes doing many home visits in one day very difficult. While we were in the rural, we tried to make as many home visits as possible to assess the orphan situation. Under the customs of Kenya, the preparation of food for the visitor is always a must. When a visitor is fed, the home is blessed. To refuse to eat is to bring a curse on the home.
In one situation, we had to leave to get home for lunch that Mary had prepared. When David explained the situation to our host, she sent us on our way, each with an egg, and made us promise that we would eat it with our lunch so her home would be blessed. It makes you feel guilty because these rural people are so poor that the 5 eggs she sent with us might have been her only food besides ugali, but to refuse is highly insulting.
We visited 2 schools while in the rural. As we were walking to the schools, we passed by an old ladies house and she called us over to ask David to pray with her. We went into her small hut and said a prayer together. She is a very old woman who is bent over and walks with a stick.
Her hut is falling down and her sons want to build her a new one but she refuses. She says she is old and won't live that much longer so why bother with a new home. After prayer, we continued on our way. Shortly, we ran into a mean dog that charged us growling with his teeth showing. Jamie jumped between Sean and me and we all froze in our tracks. It was a stand off with the dog daring us to take another step. Suddenly we heard something crashing down the path behind us.
It was the old lady. She was screaming and swinging her stick at the dog. The dog turned and ran in the other direction. The old lady was a force he did not want to reckon with. We thanked her and continued on our way.
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