Textbooks for Education in Kenya

Two years ago on our last trip to Kenya, Tanya and I, along with three other Explorers—Fred Kurtz, Jim Heywood, and Ed Charbonneau—decided to start a textbook fund for Kenya school kids. You can read the original post here. All four of us each kicked in $250 to buy as many textbooks as we could with our total of $1000. It was a big hit, and just the beginning it turns out.

Photo from January 20, 2013. Daniel Cox, Ed Charbonneau, Henry Miwani, Fred Kurtz, and Jim Heywood pose for a photo in the textbook store they visited to purchase textbooks for a Maasai school in Kenya.

This year we reached out to our Explorers once again—those on our two 2015 Kenya photo tours—and amazingly, this time we raised $3200. $3200! Wow, I couldn’t believe it. We really do travel with some very generous people.

Over 16 people donated to the Kenya textbook fund. Myself, Sue Wolfe, and Henry Miwani did the shopping for the textbooks at the Nairobi Text Book Centre in Nairobi, Kenya. Lumix LX100

So, on our last day in Kenya, Explorer Sue Wolfe, me, and my dear friend Henry Miwani—the guy I affectionately refer to as Super Maasai—made our way to the local textbook store to purchase new books. This year we selected a different Maasai school than the one from two years ago, and prior to purchasing the books, we received a list of the exact titles they needed.

Nairobi Text Book store clerk with Henry Miwani searches the many thousands of books to gather the titles we need for the Natural Exposures Textbook Project. Nairobi, Kenya, Lumix LX100

Our total order was over 1,000 books. It took several hours for the bookstore clerks to get our order put together, but Henry and I stayed with them until it was completely finished.

Henry checks each title and ticks them off as they are run through the purchase process. Kenya, Lumix LX100

Henry counted each and every book as the cashier rang them up and placed them in their boxes.

Henry Miwani stands over the cashier checking each book is added to the list with no errors. Kenya, Lumix LX100

It was a long afternoon with about one hour to spare before our flight for home took off, but we successfully purchased and packaged the entire order. This week Henry delivered them to the school and sent us pictures which you can see in a slideshow at the end of this post.

The books make their way out the door on their way to the school.

What a great day! Thank you to all of our incredibly generous Explorers and to Henry for the time and effort he put into this project. Without Henry, we would never know for sure if our generous efforts were really getting to the people we all desperately want to help.

Henry Miwani, the man I affectionately call Super Maasai, is in the middle of this group—the really tall guy with a black suit. Couldn’t have done any of this without him and his wife.

Education is Africa’s only hope and thanks to the generous individuals who travel with us, we’re all helping to make a difference. Thank you to the generous Explorers below.

Judy Edgar
Fred Kurtz
Linda Neumann
Dave and Shiela Glatz
Whitney Hellman and Dave Beré
Judy Leclerc
Dave Easton
Sue Wolfe
Mike and Cindy Spain
Sue Roehl
Libby Candler
Pam and Jim Cote
John and Suzy Onysko
Carrie Hohl
Ken Pettapiece
Judy Preston

Here’s a slideshow with a few more pictures.