The bit before the end...

After school care centre for fruit picker's children in the Western Cape SA

The bit before the end of anything is a fascinating place....

Why?
Because you don't know how it will end: you anticipate a good ending, you fear a bad ending, you want an ending that exceeds your expectations, but you don't want an ending that disappoints.
Life, unlike an Agatha Christie novel, doesn't allow you to flick to the last page to know the ending before the ending arrives.

We are at the bit before the end of our three-month journey in Kenya, with a touch of South Africa and Zambia thrown in. We leave on tomorrow night. We have spent the last few days physically and emotionally recharging after Mugumoini. But we feel a great sense of joy over what we were able to do. We have a lunch today with a few people we want to honour for their role in our time here and who will be key to supporting what could happen in 2014.













As if in harmony with the ending of this trip we recently decamped from our Ngong-Hills-view home to a local hotel that is equally delightful (The staff are unbelievably friendly – every single one of them) and is giving us space to reflect. Reflect on the ending. What have we done? What have we achieved? We spoke to each other this morning about the importance of practicing gratitude and so that’s what we have been doing.




So, what are we thankful for?

.....we have
* Run 5 Leadership for Hopes
* Trained 1335 emerging leaders
* Trained in 2 countries
* Trained 15 new trainers for Africa from 4 countries
* We have established relationships with potential partners
* We have established that the best way to get the trainers for Africa is from the grassroots communities themselves
* We have established that Kenya is genuinely the toughest base from which to work, but we have stuck with it and made good progress
* We have delivered our toughest Leadership for Hope in Mugomoini slum
* We have just heard this morning that we have been granted funding for a whole new adventure in 2014. A few of you know just how hard we have worked & at what cost, to get to this place over the past 8 years
* We have met some amazing people (& some absolute rogues)

Boys at William's orphanage

On top of all that…..
* We have stayed well (until this week)
* We've had such fun together
* We learned each day from the books we're reading to each other & been constantly processing new thoughts, ideas & possibilities
* We loved having our hearts & vision expanded by the visits we made to different schools & orphanages
* We loved waking up and looking out at Mount Kenya
* We saw more rhino’s than you can shake a stick at
* We couldn’t get enough of the peace & beauty of Elsamere (home of 'Born Free' by Lake Naivasha)
* We sat in silence with our friend Archie as the sun set over Table Mountain in Cape Town
* We wept as we returned to the very slum in Lusaka, Zambia, where EL all started 8 years ago






This autumn has been a wonderful chapter and it has given us joy to share it with you

What happens next? What happens after the bit before the end? Kenya beckons, South Africa beckons, Malawi beckons, Sri Lanka is beckoning.
How will the story end?
What is the next chapter?


...such is the bit before the end !

- TW