Full Passport

Hello from the Amsterdam airport,( which by the way, is definitely my favorite airport around the world. I love that the airport has business stations, reclining chairs, a prayer room, chair massages, a casino, a museum, shops, etc) - on my way to Kenya again!

This journey to Kenya was a little bit more stressful than most because I realized (a bit last minute) that I was out of passport visa pages. I can't believe I've traveled enough to fill the book - which is very exciting - but I also can't believe that I was stupid enough to leave it till the day of departure to try to get extra pages - which is a stressful experience. After sitting at the Passport Agency in Washington DC for four hours, they called my name (feeling like I'd won the lottery), I grabbed my passport, hopped into the cab and drove straight to the airport to make it just in time for my international flight. Ugh, that was too close.

This trip to Kenya will be with Barry Simmons, a friend who has been doing the International Reporting Fellowship through Johns Hopkins University SAIS. We used to go to the Waffle House (aka Wa Ho) every Friday morning in the fall to dream up a documentary that would cover the water crisis in Kenya. He ended up being selected as one of six for the fellowship to be trained and then funded to do this documentary. Barry will be highlighting some of our Blood:Water communities and then we will also be given the raw footage to use for our organization. Along with Barry will be Iain, a videographer, and Milton, our Kenyan friend who is a medical student at Vanderbilt.

I went to Milton's village last June and am so excited to return. My favorite part about being out there is playing soccer with the kids every afternoon and sitting around a table with Milton's family to learn from them about their history, their struggles, their worldviews, their faith and their hopes for the future.

I'm still wrestling right now with a lot of big questions about the direction and function of Blood:Water. It's been a rough couple of days, but I'm thankful that God is taking me back out to be with the people I desire to know and to serve better. I am praying for discernment in God's timing and that I can be more gracious to myself and others in the process.

I'll do what I can to post while I am gone. I'll be back on the 7th of March.

Jena

ps. you can check out Barry's blog site that will include videos from us at www.kenyadiaries.typepad.com