Ma Barker Lives! (In Kenya)

Today I met with one of my Young Women from church. I thought I was there to help her prepare a talk for church this Sunday. We did a bit of that, but mostly she wanted my advice on what she could say to comfort her grandmother. Here's the story:

Five years ago, her (granny's) son had a wife. A pregnant wife. Said wife went to the hospital one day to deliver her baby, and then later came back without said baby. She told everyone that the baby had been premature, and had to stay at the hospital. Apparently here its like in Romania, where only the mother of a hospitalized child gets to actually see the child in hospital. After a while, when the baby still didn't appear, the family began to wonder where it was, and then the mother said that it had died. Dad, as you can imagine, was none too happy about this, and wanted to see the body. Finally, the mother confessed that she had sold the baby for ksh 80,000 ($1000).

Dad and grandma were very upset, as you can imagine. Soon thereafter, grandma and the aunt of my Young Woman--I'm assuming this aunt is the baby's mother--went and took back the baby. The next day they awoke to find cops all over the place, and granny found out that they were looking for her. She turned herself in, and was arrested, and spent several days in jail before her family could raise bail.

Over the course of the ensuing five years, trial was set, and dna tests ordered. The father was advised NOT to do the dna test, as it was already known that he was the father. However, he did anyway, and apparently the baby purchasers bribed a doctor or two, and the blood sample was switched. Also, the father was poisoned, and subsequently died.

Grandma has been paying her lawyer with every shilling sent from her daughter living in Dubai, and with the dowery money she received a couple of weeks ago for her daughter's marriage a quarter of a century ago. But that's another story. The trial has been postponed several times, and this week the final judgment was due. Postponed again, presumably through bribery from the other side. The latest date is May 6.

The good news is that granny is officially too old to to to prison. But a hefty fine could be in order. This is the nicest sweetest old lady you'd ever want to meet. We have been to her home in the slums on more than one occasion. Humble isn't the word for it. But its home, and she deserves to be there, without all this worry.
This photo is of a
pot, yes, but in the
background is granny's
humble home.

The King of Multi-Tasking

Joseph has a bedtime routine. There are certain things that he must do every night. These things include putting on pajamas, brushing teeth, and reading scriptures. The other night I popped into his room while he was getting ready for bed. I found him sitting on his bed in his underwear, with a toothbrush in his mouth and scriptures in his lap.

Princess Please Give Me Something Worthwhile to Do!

Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess. This princess, however, didn't live in a castle. Her father, the king, had fallen on hard times, and the family was forced to make some changes. Accordingly, the royal family had sold the castle to a foreign corporation and moved into a modest three bedroom home in the suburbs.

The princess, whose name was Arabella, enrolled in the local high school, where she found that her fellow students were unaware of her heritage. They were not interested at all in Arabella's past life, but spent their time (free and otherwise) texting one another and hanging out at the mall. Arabella found this behavior puzzling, but, wanting to fit in, went to the mall to look for a cell phone. She figured that if she was seen hanging out at the mall with a cell phone, the friends would come.

That's all I've got. I just started typing and the story came to me. At least this much. I've got nothing more. I'm sure that eventually Arabella found some friends; she probably even found popularity. She was beautiful, after all. But maybe not. I really don't know. Perhaps she found her new life to be extremely lonely. Not that she had more friends when she lived in the castle. Just that now she knew what she was missing. Isn't that what its all about? We're fine, until we see what we've been missing, and then suddenly, with the same as we've always had, or sometimes even more, we are no longer fine. Anyway, Arabella may have made a better queen for her experience. Or maybe not. Maybe she started amassing uzis and grenades and killed everyone in her school, thus bringing democracy to her country. I really don't know. I just wanted to type something so that when my housekeeper came into the room she would think that I've been extremely busy, rather than knowing the truth--I was playing games, bored out of my mind while trying to stay out of her way.