A game of two halves

Tonight I’m back in Kenya after an unplanned, extended stay in the UK. 2012 was a challenging year and I’m glad it’s finished. My wife Judi is now well into recovering from breast cancer after chemotherapy and surgery. She has fifteen days of radiotherapy starting on January 29^th and will then be done with treatment. We will both be very relieved and are very grateful that we live in the UK. Those of you of the praying persuasion might like to pray for Judi as she starts this last leg of what has been a very long journey.

Travelling out to Kenya has been a ‘game of two halves’. (I hope you will forgive the footballisms – Africa is in the grip of the Africa Cup of Nations football competition at the moment). The first leg of my flight, from Birmingham in the UK to Dubai, was great. I live in hopes of benefiting from the, probably apocryphal, free upgrade from Economy to First Class one day but the flight out to Dubai came pretty close. Having struggled to find a decent seat during on line check in (and assuming that the flight was packed as there were very few seats to choose from) I was made up to discover I was the only occupant of my row of three seats. This gave me the luxury of choosing the best seat for the movies and an opportunity to multi-screen the in-flight information.

Despite the comfortable seats I still found it hard to sleep on the flight so was tired when we reached Dubai at 7:02 am local time this morning. I’m sure Ronald McDonald didn't have ambitions to conquer the world when the big M first got going but I’m grateful for McDonalds in Dubai. The trek to the restaurant has become the first part of my Dubai ritual. Cheeseburger, fries and coke sets you up for a good walk round the terminal as part of operation ‘Stay Awake and don’t miss the next flight’. As it turned out I needn't have worried. The second half of my journey kicked off with a ninety minute delay to the flight to Nairobi, culminating in missing my flight to Kisumu, (the penultimate part of my journey to our place in Kosele). I’m spending the night in Nairobi at our good friend Sam’s guest house. I’m holed up in one of the apartments he has built recently so, despite the unplanned stopover, have managed to get upgraded accommodation as well! Sam is a really nice guy. It’s always good to see him. On our way to the guest house (The Rusam Villa) Sam told me that he’s finished adding rooms to the business now and is looking forward to taking some time spending the money that his hard work and canny expansion have brought him, starting with a trip to Dubai. He's certainly earned it.

There’s a lot to do over here, as usual, and I can’t wait to get started. I’m on an early flight to Kisumu in the morning and am really looking forward to seeing everybody again. January tends to be a month for new resolutions and fresh starts. I haven’t made any specific resolutions for 2013 as, like most people, I find it hard to stick to them. I do have a very keen sense of anticipation about the year ahead and thank God that Judi and I are both still here and have work to do.  Joshua said “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord”. So will we.