the election

i got up at 4 a.m. today to watch the live debate with obama and mccain. i wanted to be informed. other kenyans in the house also got up to watch the tail end of it. peter woke up for the last debate, and that made me think, you know he's not even american but he cares so much. how much more should i care since it's my country? we were discussing how people will react here if obama loses. peter said people might not treat me very nicely for a while b/c they would assume i was voting for mccain. even though neither of the candidates have spectacular views on education, i really like what obama said about parents having to take some of the responsibility. and even if america isn't churning out the most intelligent kids in the world (as was mentioned in the debate), i have seen from my experience here that american education is very good. we are creating creative learners who can think outside the box. and ultimately, that could be what makes them able to do great things down the road. i think a lot of the problems with kenyan education is that it limits kids from being creative. most of what they're taught is a regurgitation of answers. they have no vision about other jobs and ideas besides what is already there, which massively hurts their idea. this isn't true of everyone of course, but definitely for many people. others, like sam are visionaries. did i mention how we went to this fair and a girl was selling a burner that runs on sugarcane ethanol. he was telling her that she should be cooking food to market her product. she didn't understand. he kept saying, "can you get eggs and cook them." i think she thought he wanted to eat eggs or something. but the truth was, we didn't really know if her product worked b/c she wasn't showing us. sam is creative and knows how to help business people become profitable. by the way, he was educated in malawi...does that make a difference?

with part of the money you all raised, i'm using it to sponsor Popo going to college. i went with him today to pay the first semester (by the way, tuition is majorly cheap here). i've never seen anyone so excited about a receipt before. he's been waiting to tell his mom and brother until he had a receipt. he truly has a gift of leading. i've seen his passion for christ, and i think helping him to get an education will allow him to be used even more for God.

did i mention that amie is having her baby next wednesday? i'm excited, but also a little nervous about living with a new baby. they told me that baraka was a cholic baby :)