Day 13

A reflective peace from our team leader of the trip, Mark

So we wend our way back from Kisumu towards a date with a flight back to England, the smiles and best wishes from the hotel staff sending us happily on our way. A touch of humility as we say goodbye to whirlwind local coach George, who got up early for to travel cross town for this five minutes of hand shaking and hugging over hopeful promises to return one day. Why wouldn’t we want to? 7000 children seen, all of whom caught or threw or hit a ball whilst carrying the broadest smiles. New knowledge gained about a fascinating country and culture, all relayed with dignity over home cooked meals in welcoming family homes. Friendships forged under the burning African sun and over cold drinks on ink black African nights. Laughter ringing in our ears as we recount the bon mots and eccentricities of eight strangers with only a love of cricket in common. Well that was before the shared memories.
As I reflect on the bus which memories stand out? Were the best sessions the most numerous, the noisiest, the cheekiest, the best behaved? Yes probably. Or what about the ones with the spectacular settings, the ones that required mountain goat agility to access, or the ones with cows at cow corner and at cover point? Yes probably those ones too. And of course there were the ones with vibrant blue and yellow and purple uniforms, the ones where little children couldn’t rest touching and stroking to check if we were real, the ones who knew their HIV awareness, the one whospoke clear English but couldn’t understand the term ‘straight line please.’ Yes they stick in the mind. What about the bright eyed poppets with the plaited hair, or the bare footed grubby toddler who strode around as if they owned the ground, or the too cool for school teenagers who simply had to smile when thanking you for coming. Yes I’ll remember them, just when I’m sitting down and counting the teachers who have their heart felt thanks for us simply turning up for an hour at their often overlooked school. And of course we played a couple of matches, remaining undefeated and…. well there’s a lot of them and if past experience is anything to go by some will only pop up on a cold wet January morning. Eight of us took the plunge and applied. If you want join the family and have your British winters warmed up… you know what to do.