Earlier this year I was blessed to become friends with Emily Keese. I met her last year when she came on one of the short term teams, but this year she came for a whole three months - she was here for all three medical clinics and we had an absolute blast working together in the pharmacy. We have a very similar sense of humor!
While she was here, Emily gave me one of the greatest gifts I've ever received. As you know, we lost baby Ian and baby Obadiah earlier this year, shortly before I came back to the US. Before I left I planted flowers at the grave sites, but it was the dry season and when I came back everything had died and the cemetery was overgrown with waist high grass and weeds. I made plans to go work on it but weeks went by and I just absorbed myself in working with the teams.
Emily heard me mention the cemetery and she went looking for it one Saturday between teams. It's tucked away in an untraveled corner of the village property, overlooking the river. She spent the next week getting up early in the morning slashing grass and digging weeds. The plot was fenced with barbed wire, and she salvaged scrap wood from the dairy and built a gate, then piled a rock wall all the way around the inside perimeter. Just before she left, the headstones that were ordered in April finally came, and she moved them down also.
I can't really convey how much it meant to me that she put in all the time and effort she did. Once she was finished, the ground was ready for plants and flowers, and the place looks worlds better than it did. I bought more plants in town and then the rainy season continued more than a month past it's usual time - so everything was thoroughly watered and is growing well!
Emily has an incredible testimony, which she shared at our medical clinics and again when she returned home after Kenya. Watch the video here - http://vimeo.com/49615777
Emily - thank you, thank you, thank you for everything!! You are an amazing person and very great friend! Hurry back to Kenya soon. =)
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