It's now 2005, we've been married for 2 years! (Sept 14/05)

Brief highlights:

I am still the regional ICT Manager for Norwegian People's Aid (NPA).. Was consulting with Kenya Commercial Bank until December, but working until midnight every night was taking its toll... Did a more sedately paced consultancy with Safaricom a few months ago. NPA is fantastic - a big international NGO with massive operations in southern Sudan... with over 1000 staff and a $30 million annual budget, the Sudan programme is NPA's largest (they are also in 40 other countries). www.npaid.org

Anthony has been working for MERLIN - Medical Emergency Relief International - www.merlin.or.uk - for around the same time, since April 2004. He was continuously working in Loki for so long.. the first 2.5 years we knew each other, he worked 6 weeks in Loki, 1.5 weeks off.... it was rough. But since April 2005, he's been based in Nairobi as Logistics Officer - he can even walk to work from our new place!

The children have been living with me since last November 2004, when I took them out of their village school since they weren't really learning anything anyways.. Though they only knew the word 'frog' in English, within about 3 months they were chattering away fluently! They are very bright, and I enjoy having them with me - I adjusted rather well to (step) motherhood, remarkably!They go to Horizon Academy, which costs about $600 per term, except the first one which was about double that. It's tough paying for primary education.. I always feel annoyed about that, especially since a good 30% of my salary is taxed.. we get *nothing* for it here! Ahem, sorry about the tirade - the kids pulled themselves up from Ds and Cs to Bs and As, and were both "Most Improved" in their respective classes, so I guess we're doing something right! They are smart & well behaved, and very cute too :) They adjusted extremely well to life in Nairobi, and though they miss "ushago" (the village), they enjoy the modern conveniences and scads of friends too much to be very sad about it.

Speaking of sad, I was blown away by a few unexpected deaths this year... RIP to my favourite adopted little brother Chris Portman, and thanks to all the very good friends who supported my grief from afar. My father-in-law, Josephat, succumbed to bad medical practice in a Kenya district hospital and passed away before his time in April. And my Uncle Denny's cancer got the better of him around the same time. My condolences to all concerned.

On the good side, I have been making friends with a few key Norwegians, and had numerous events & outings around Kenya - will post pictures to explain! Anthony and I went to Canada from July 27-Aug 27, and had a fantastic time.

 

I think I shall add to this at a later time, I have to do some work!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Copyright Johanna Voerman Khisa, 2002-05. Reprinting or reposting without permission is prohibited.