The International Writers Magazine: Africa

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Her Shoes Had No Laces • Bruce Bailey "Póle, póle (slowly, slowly)," our African guide calls out softly in Swahili as we trudge upward, the star-lit night sky at our backs. It is a familiar mantra we have been hearing the past three days as we climb the broad shoulders of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

It is 12:05 a.m. on Thursday morning, and our group of twelve climbers has just begun the final leg upward towards the 19,340 foot summit. We are now over 15,000 feet, after a 3,200 foot climb during the day on Wednesday. After forcing down our food at dinner, we had a fitful five hour nap at Kibo Hut, the highest sleeping quarters on the mountain. We plan to reach the summit by sunrise. The night is cold and breezy, but clear. I already feel cold, so I open my pack and pull out my red fleece, and add it to the three layers I already wear under my shell.

Our Tanzanian guide is named Theo, but prefers his nickname "Colorado." He is a large, thick-bodied man with a broad easy grin who has made this climb over one hundred times. He takes the lead, followed by our two female climbers. The other guides and porters are positioned within the group, keeping close watch on us. Faustine, the assistant guide and Theo’s brother-in-law, brings up the rear. We move forward in the slow "póle, póle" step we have learned over the past three days. Our 15,400 foot starting point for this final effort will, God willing, bring us all to the 19,340 Uhuru Peak in seven to eight hours. Headlamps lit, we continue upward. Four or five other groups have gone before us, and several others are behind. Slowly the bobbing lights zig-zag up the dark mountain towards a goal that cannot yet be seen. The slow pace quickly becomes monotonous, and my thoughts drift back to Nairobi, six days earlier.

It’s our first day in Kenya, and we are meeting the kids at the orphanage for the first time. Most are quick to smile, but some do not, as if the pain of where they’ve come from is still too close. I am kneeling in the dirt in front of a little Kenyan girl, about five years old. She wears the uniform of the Jubilee Children’s Center – dark green sweater and plaid skirt. Her clothes are clean but have numerous tears and holes. She wears a yellow paper cross around her neck that has her name spelled across it. I try to coax a smile, but she is not ready. I look down and see that her shoes have no laces.

The moon has yet to rise. Clusters and swirls of bright stars populate the dark sky in quantities rarely seen back home. We move slowly to minimize the effects of altitude. Altitude sickness has already forced one member of our group to drop out at 12,000 feet. The first hour goes fine, but I am a little cold, and worry about the wind higher up. Everyone seems okay, though there is little conversation. We must stay focused on the climber directly ahead, and watch our feet shuffle carefully forward. The porters sing, cajole, and joke back and forth. One sings a line, and the others joyfully respond from all over the mountainside, much like the "lining out" style of Southern black churches in the nineteenth century. The singing helps keep our spirits up as we move onward.

Inside a classroom the kids perform a beautiful welcoming song in Swahili, and then in English sing "In Your Presence, I Am Content." Next the children perform a skit, acting out the story of one of the young orphaned girls, and how she arrived at Jubilee. Her mother died of AIDS, and then her father disappears. Next she is taken in by her aunt, who beats her and makes her beg on the streets. She then moves in with her grandmother, who is too poor to support her. Finally she is given the chance to live at the Jubilee Children’s Center. It is an emotional experience for us, and everyone in the room is deeply affected. We are here to raise money for the orphanage by climbing a mountain. Now it starts to hit home – the size of the mountain these children have to climb.

"No sleep Papa!" our guides gently warn, which means pay attention and don’t fall asleep on your feet. It is 2:00 a.m., and the moon finally rises, the color of the mango fruit we had at dinner nine hours ago. I take a quick glance backward whenever possible to gaze at the stars, moon, and the climbers behind. With headlamps blazing like halos they march upward, as if on a crusade to reach the star-filled heavens above. We stop about once an hour for five minutes. Shortly after our second stop Kim is sick and Theo takes her pack. We pass her by not knowing if she will continue. I want to keep moving because I am cold. The pace is too slow for me to heat up, and I have no more clothes in my pack. I feel fine in every other way, but am afraid the cold will wear me down.

We open the 40-foot container that was shipped from South Carolina a year and a half ago. Red tape with Kenyan Customs delayed delivery for over six months, so it had not arrived when last year’s mission team was here. The climbing team will be here only two days, so our task is to assemble playground equipment for the kids. They will soon have two swing sets, monkey bars, slides, volleyball, basketball, and soccer goals. Anything would be an improvement, as they now have nothing but a dirt field and a soccer ball. The work is slow because tools are scarce, and we have to share back and forth. The generators that were shipped have been in storage too long, and we have difficulty getting them started. Finally we succeed, and have power tools to complete the work. The kids seem fascinated by all the activity. At the end of each work day they help us carry parts and tools to a storage building. Anything left outside will be gone by morning.

The headlamps of the climbers above us traverse the mountain in a zig-zag pattern up towards Gillman’s Point, a sobering reminder of how far we have to go. At one point I am not sure where the line of headlamps ends and the stars in the night sky begin. At 17,000 feet we stop for a quick break. Glenn has been sick and is having trouble coordinating his legs. A porter takes his pack, and Theo encourages him to try a while longer. At 17,200 feet Glenn tells Theo he is having more trouble. He will have to go down. A porter helps him descend towards Kibo Hut. The altitude is affecting nearly everyone now, but I have yet to have even a headache. We are now eleven in number.

I have been looking for little David Mwangi all day, but nobody seems to know where he is. My friends Barbara and Dave back in Charlotte have been sponsoring him and asked that we have our picture taken together. One of the teachers asks a group of kids about David, but they don’t seem to know. Finally another teacher comes up and explains that David is gone. About one week ago his uncles came and demanded that he be returned to them. After his parents died, he lived with his grandmother for awhile, but she could not afford to feed and care for him. He had been doing well at Jubilee, and was a sweet boy, but they had no choice but to turn him over to his uncles. He is now back in the Nairobi ghetto. The teacher explains that this is not unusual, and does not always happen for the right reasons. There are still plenty of children that need sponsorship, so we make a new arrangement for my Charlotte friends. We find a shy four-year-old also named David, who cautiously poses for a picture with me.

Our next break is at 4:30 a.m. I am really cold and ask the group if anyone has an extra layer in their pack that they are sure they will not need. Jim offers an extra vest, in an altitude-induced drunken slur. Others also offer, but Theo without hesitation pops off his shell, and hands me his large warm fleece. I protest weakly that he will be cold, but he insists and is ready to move on. The extra layer is all I need, and soon I am fairly comfortable. A hint of light glows in the east as I look behind me. The sun is coming, which gives us a little boost. We finally reach 18,000 feet, which is a big milestone. Some in the group are really laboring now. It is colder and the wind is stronger. We need to be careful about water freezing. I have my Camelbak plus another one liter bottle in my pack. Each time I draw water through my hydration tube, I blow back gently to clear it. The water is very cold, but still flowing.

For two days we have been watching a young Kenyan woman dig a long trench around the large field that will soon be a vegetable garden for the children. She works non-stop through the day in the hot African sun. Her name is Alice, and she tells us she is fortunate to have this work, so she can feed her children. The trench will be filled with irrigation pipes, so the orphanage will someday have a reliable supply of fresh vegetables. We also meet a man named Jack, who is from a town outside of Seattle. He oversees the installation of the irrigation system. They have been trying to get the system up and running reliably for several years. He pressures up part of the system to check for leaks. Water sprays out in several unintended places. Jack’s efforts are hampered by a lack of parts, so he tries to patch together a system that will make it through the season. The two year drought here makes irrigation even more crucial. There is not enough grass for the orphanage’s six cows to graze. Milk production is down by two thirds. Without water, the already fragile systems quickly break down.

The next milestone will be Gillman’s Point, elevation 18,640 feet. I am now climbing behind Monique, the leader of our group and the founder of the Kenya Orphanage Project charity. The guides have nicknamed her "Mama Simba" or "Mother Lion." She is an avid runner, and has completed two marathons. Altitude sickness can bring down anyone, however, and she is really struggling. Theo takes her pack, and pulls her on ahead. I stay close behind. Several others are in similar shape, and have fallen back. Climbing over the large boulders below Gillman’s Point is a difficult test. Most of us are winded now. Negotiating through the large boulders is more strenuous. Monique is very shaky, and Theo gives her short breaks, but continues to push his "Mama Simba." He knows how badly she wants to do this, but she is close to the edge physically. She has the guts to keep going, as do the others who are suffering.

It is just before lunch on our second day at the orphanage when Jim and Mac return from a visit to one of the Nairobi ghettos. A staff member at the orphanage had arranged the visit with the permission of a local tribal chieftan. He provided two heavily armed guards to escort them through one of the smaller ghettos where 300,000 people live. Other ghetto areas around Nairobi are two to three times this size, in a city of three million. Back home, Jim and Mac work for a local newspaper, and they want to find out where most of these orphans come from. The grim looks on their faces tell the story, as they appear sickened by the experience. I can tell it is hard for them to describe what they have seen – the pitiful housing, illness, and open sewers, with children standing in the filth, trying to get water. They interviewed a woman named Mary who is dying of AIDS. Her children will soon be orphans. According to UNICEF, there are over 50,000 orphans living in the streets and ghettos of Nairobi.

We can now see the sign marking Gillman’s Point above us. The last five hundred feet is very tough on some members of our group. At 6:35 a.m. we finally reach Gillman’s, and the group collapses on the rocks to rest and refresh with energy bars and water. Porters and guides give warm hugs to all who have made it this far. My water tube is frozen, so it takes a few twists to break up the ice, and cold water flows again. The sun is now rising quickly, and the light alone seems to warm our spirits, if not our bodies. Theo walks around turning off our headlamps. I can tell he is cold as he rocks back and forth on his feet. He and Faustine check each climber’s condition to determine who can go on and who should call it a day. Six of us get the green light to go on to Uhuru Peak. The remaining five, including Monique, must go down. It will be another hour and a half and about eight hundred feet to the peak, along the rim of the huge crater.
Faustine will lead the six of us to Uhuru. There is some confusion at Gillman’s as we fail to get organized for our group picture with the KOP banner. We are anxious to move on to the summit, and others are anxious to get down the mountain to relieve their nausea. Monique starts to follow us towards Uhuru, but the others get her turned around and pointed in the right direction. Jeff and Kim make sure she gets safely down to Kibo Hut.

The six of us plus guides leave the others behind. Faustine wants to pick up the pace, so we move quickly up the trail towards the summit. We can see other climbers stretched out along the rim that rises up to Uhuru Peak. The morning sun is now warming the rocks, countering the strong cold breeze. Some people are now descending, squeezing past on the narrow path. Soon we come over a ridge and get our first close-up view of the south-facing glacier. It lies on the southern flank of the mountain, as white and glossy as new porcelain.

At Stella Point we take a short rest. There are twenty to thirty others here. Our guides continue to check on us. Coming down the rim we see Big Dave, the large black Englishman we met at Horumbu Hut. He shouts "Hey Bruce – I knew you’d make it, Mate!" We slap hands as he passes. Up the final few hundred feet, we now see the glaciers on both sides of us. The glacier on the north side is much more massive but not as visible to us.

At 19,000 feet the altitude is finally starting to affect me. I have been very lucky so far, but now some of my coordination is starting to go, and I stumble a few times. Mac, like a trooper, is hurting but determined to get his photos at the top for his newspaper. Joe, Tor, John, and Cameron are moving steadily, with no apparent problems.

Finally, there it is -- the sign marking Uhuru Peak, at 19,340 feet, the highest spot on the continent of Africa. Again our guides give hugs to all, with the typical warmth and sincerity we have come to expect from our new African friends. We drop our packs and fumble for cameras in dazed confusion. Thought processes have slowed. I have trouble getting my camera on the right setting. We finally get organized enough to get some group pictures. I try to get a solo picture, but a Korean group has moved in with multiple banners and cameras. Faustine is urging us off the summit, as we have been there too long. I grab my pack to begin the descent.

In the late afternoon as we are finishing up our work on the playground, we pause to join the kids for their annual birthday party. We all assemble outside in the space between the dormitories for fruit juice and birthday cake. All of us brought an extra suitcase filled with toys, socks, underwear and shoes. The women have assembled everything into plastic containers for the boys and girls. As each child’s name is called, he or she comes up to receive his gift, to the enthusiastic applause of the rest of the kids. Many of them don’t know their birth dates, so this group event gives everyone a day to remember, and all receive a comparable gift. The satisfaction of watching them smile, sing, laugh, and share is the gift they give back to us.

We move quickly down the trail. I am feeling a little dizzy and unsteady. Reaching the summit is only half of a mountain climb. Getting down has another set of challenges. We make a few very brief stops on the way back to Gillman’s Point. I try to eat a Power Bar that is frozen hard as a rock. We arrive back at Gillman’s in less than one hour and stop to rest and hydrate. I’m feeling normal again.

We pick our way through the boulders, down the steep trail below. As we go lower we get into lots of loose rock or scree, and the footing is more difficult. As we draw closer to Kibo Hut, the larger scree fields make for some good fun as we "ski the scree." We can slide down the mountainside turning left and right between the larger rocks. With our trekking poles extended we look like alpine skiers moving through a slalom course. It’s good fun but it takes a toll on my knees which are tight and sore by the time we near Kibo Hut. The last mile is hot and tiring. We reach Kibo at 11:15 a.m.

At Kibo Hut we find several of our group sick and lying in their bunks. There’s no time to celebrate, as we need to get gear packed, have lunch, and descend another 3,200 feet to Horombo Hut today. Besides, we’re all too tired to think about a celebration. After a quick lunch, we again don our packs and head downward. Most of the others have already gone ahead, trying to escape the effects of altitude sickness. I feel fine descending the first 1,500 feet to Horombo, but then my knees begin to hurt, and I must slow down. I finally hobble into camp at 3:15 p.m. with some serious pain in both knees. After signing the register, I dump my pack in a four-man hut I’ll share with Rich, Joe, and Cameron. I’m afraid if I lie down I will not get up until morning. Kim, Joe, and I get together with a few others and have a quiet celebration. After dinner, we all head directly for our bunks, and fall into a deep sleep. In the past 32 hours we have climbed over 7,150 feet and descended back down again.

We are up at 6 a.m. Friday morning for our final breakfast on Kilimanjaro. We leave at 7 a.m. for our descent to Mandara Hut, and finally the Marangu Gate. Most everyone is feeling better and in good spirits. A few in the group are still hurting, but my knees feel a little better.

We have another sunny start as we begin the 3,400 foot descent to Mandara Hut, where we will have lunch. It will then be another 2,500 feet down to the Marangu Gate, and the end of our journey. I lengthen my trekking poles to take the load off my knees. I soon find that I can’t keep up with the lead pack, and hang out in the middle of the group, taking a slower pace. By 10 a.m. I have already exceeded the recommended daily dose of Ibuprofen, which helps for a while.

I watch the porters, still amazed at the loads they carry – huge duffels or woven baskets balanced on their heads plus one to two backpacks or a five-gallon pail hanging to one side. Only twice have I seen a porter sitting down – one for foot problems, and another who was sick yesterday on the way down to Horombo. They race up and down the trail, in heavy clothing while we are hot in our t-shirts and shorts. They never fail to call out their "Jambo, Jambo" greeting.

Finally, I chug into Mandara, just as the rain begins to fall. During lunch, the rain intensifies. It is three more hours to the Marangu Gate. We break out the rain gear and set out on the last leg of our journey. The rain slows to a gentle shower as we leave.

The knees are bad again, so porters and others are passing me. I stay in the middle of our group and am mostly alone for this last leg. Below Mandara, we are back in the rain forest. The huge trees resemble the ancient live oaks of coastal South Carolina. The still gentle rain is filtered by the dense growth overhead. I pull off my hood to hear the peaceful tapping of raindrops, and stop several times to listen. Some occasional distant thunder rumbles. Black and white tailed monkeys now appear, traveling their elevated pathway above seeking their lunch in the thick green foliage. A sudden breeze plays a riff through the wet leaves. I long for these rare moments of solitude, when that rush of wind through the leaves sounds like God breathing new life into the world. The purity of this moment will stay with me always.

I am now getting closer to the Marangu gate. I see a woman with two young boys gathering grass and wood near the trail. Her children follow me down the trail, begging for anything I can offer. I have no cash, and can think of nothing to give them. They are very persistent, so I finally stop and give the larger boy my red fleece. The younger one quietly begs for something else, but I can think of nothing else to give, so he goes back to his mother empty handed. Soon a few men approach out of the jungle selling T-shirts. They are friendly and smiling as I explain that all of my money is back at the hotel. A few minutes later the woman, two boys, and one of the men pass me on the trail. All are carrying bundles of wood on their heads. The older boy is wearing the red fleece and smiles as he goes by. The mother shyly says thank you, and they disappear down the trail.

I have only a kilometer to go. This part of our adventure is drawing to a close. I’m glad now for the knee problems which forced me to slow my pace, and enjoy the last few hours descending from Kilimanjaro. It has given me time to replay our experiences at the orphanage, and on the mountain. "Póle, póle," our guides have been repeating all week. Things change slowly in Africa, and in some ways that is a good thing. The natural beauty and the native cultures are wonderful and should always be preserved. It is when change happens too fast that the suffering starts. In Nairobi where Western and African cultures collide, it seems that the worst aspects of each have flourished. Pollution, corruption, congestion, and AIDS exist beside modern downtown office buildings, while Nairobi’s massive ghettos are the largest in Africa.
As of this writing our Kilimanjaro fund-raiser had brought in over $100,000 to finance secondary education for the children of Jubilee. While the problems here seem overwhelming, we take away firm hope that our little band has made a difference. Of all the beautiful things we have seen on our African adventure, the sight of 94 safe, healthy children at the Jubilee Children’s Center is by far the sweetest.
I now see the Marangu Gate ahead, and the end of my journey. Was it only a week ago that I was kneeling in the dirt at Jubilee? I look down at my $300 hiking boots and remember again.
Her shoes had no laces.

Want to help?
See the www.kenyaorphanageproject.org website, or write to us at:
Kenya Orphanage Project
PO Box 5234
Lake Wylie, SC 29710
(All donations are completely tax-deductible)

About the author: Bruce Bailey resides in Charlotte, NC with his wife, Dee, where he volunteers with the Kenya Orphanage Project and is chairman of the World Outreach Committee at Myers Park United Methodist Church. You may contact him by e-mail at brucehbailey@carolina.rr.com
© Bruce Bailey April 2006

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