Last Saturday we were able to take some Kenyan children to the game park. We were very fortunate to have Mrs. Yuka, who along with her husband have a music school here in Nakuru, and her daughters, Aisha and Rei. They, along with Sylvestar, Clement, and Gloria had a BLAST!
It is hard to believe that many Kenyans live their whole lives just minutes away from an animal park, yet never are able to see the animals like the lions, hippos, rhinos, water buffaloes, water bucks, impalas, warthogs, flamingos, gazelles, giraffes, zebras, and many more.
2 weeks ago, Wesley went to the bottom of our road to wait for Gloria, Clement and Sylvestar to get home from school. As he was sitting there in the grass, a 50 year old man named John came along. He sat down beside him on the grass, and they started talking. They talked for over an hour and a half. As they were talking, he asked him what was the most money he had ever made in his life. He told Wesley that he had a college degree in Electrical Engineering. After, thinking for several minutes, he said that the most he ever made was when he worked as an Electrical Engineer for the city here making $30 dollars a week and working 6 days a week. Then he told him that for the last 5 years, he has made about half that a week.
The average Kenyan earns about $5 bucks a day, working an 10-12 hour day. YES, YOU READ THAT RIGHT!! 5 BUCKS!!
While the entrance fee for the game park is very affordable by American standards, in Kenya, with Kenyans earning 5 bucks a day, the entrance fee of @9 bucks for adults and @2 bucks for kids is just not something that they can afford when they have rent and school fees to pay and food to buy for their families.
Several months ago, while looking for land, we met a young man by the name of Alex, who was in his late twenties. He rode with us to show us a plot of land. The plot of land was beside the Masaai Mara game park. While driving around the piece of land, there were several giraffes that we were forced to drive around because they refused to move! Alex got very, very excited and started taking pictures of the giraffes on his phone. Then he told us that it was the very first time in his life that he had ever seen a live giraffe. I could not believe it! To be an African in Kenya and be in your late 20’s and never had seen a live giraffe. He told us that he had seen thousands of zebras and water buffaloes but never a giraffe.
