10pm Tuesday Lodwar 9.8.09

Just got into bed after a very long days journey to the lake. It ended well but began quite low and had some bumps along the way.

I woke up this morning feeling a very high level of annoyance, anger and frustration at no one, and everyone. After last nights meeting about the status of Solis, and realizing my status in the group, I woke up with a bug that wouldn't go away. There has been this underlying feeling of hopelessness, powerlessness and sadness when it comes to the Solis work. None of these prospective businesses are anywhere near being viable options for our grants yet we are forces to choose from these groups. They were thrown together and haven't had any mentoring or training so although I sympathize with the director about giving the funds soon because of our two year fiasco, I think we're putting money and energy into a black hole. Fortunately they all saw it that way this morning and got it across toe everyone at the town meeting. They need mentoring, training and imaginative business ideas.

Which reminds me, I'm not letting go of my basket idea. I'm going to have to place a considerable amount of energy into it when I return home. I have aspirations to be able to make this a large exporting business, as well as use the funds for the Unembraced and to sponsor children.

After the meeting we headed to lunch with the pastors and their wives. We gave our gifts and ended up creating a small LA baseball team:) I was given a very pretty bracelet by Consolata, Charles wife. She was so helpful with the translations this morning. One of the biggest surprises is how young all these people are and how old they all look. The heat, hard labor and intense hunger can do that I guess.

So after lunch we took off on our 2 hour drive to Eliye Springs - located at the Southern end of Lake Turkana.