It's Election Day! After campaigns that seem to have lasted
5 years (i.e. since the last election), today is the first round. If no
candidate gets 50% + 1, then there will be a runoff likely in April. At stake
is the Presidency, parliament, governorships, and a few other offices.
I won't bore you with details, but the two top candidates and their VP running mates are quite the, uh, (how do I put this diplomatically?) interesting characters. Two are on trial at the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity for their role in the violence after the last election. Ironically, the two are on the same ticket this time but were on opposite sides in 2007.
Everyone is praying for peace this time around, and I hope you will pray for us, too. Turnout is high and Kenyan has progressed tremendously in the last decade. Don't forget that when America was 60 years old (Kenya turns 50 this year), we were fighting a bloody 5-year-long civil war. So Kenya is doing well, I'd say!
On a personal level, Wanjiru and Adili and I are doing well. The biggest news is that we have been building a new house on a property about 20km from downtown Nairobi. Building started in November, and we will be ready to move in next week! It is very exciting. Wanjiru and I spent a few days at the Kenyan coast. Adili had his first sports day, and is learning to play soccer a bit (although thankfully he still prefers basketball). We have harvested our first crop (corn) from our new house, even before the house is ready for us to move in.
Plus, Akili Dada had a tremendous success - an Akili Dada scholar (Patricia) was ranked the number 2 girl in the country by KCSE scores! KCSE is the exam that students take as a senior in high school, and it determines where they will go to college. There were 195,000 girls taking the exam, and Patricia was #2 overall - it's truly an amazing success story for Patricia and for Akili Dada.
Pictures for this installment of the Adventure are linked here.
We hope you are all well!
Isaac
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