Mt Kili Marathon Part One

We know we have been MIA on the blog scene over the past couple of months so in our last days here we hope to play a lil catch up. To start things off...I'll fill you in on our Tanzanian marathon adventure:

We walked (or rather staggered) through the gate into Tumaini last night around 11p.m. and were welcomed by lighted windows filled with smiling faces and waving hands. The kids all crowded around their windows in their dorm rooms to wave and shout down questions about our trip. After an exhausting 11-hour bus ride including a sketchy trek through nairobi at 9pm at night - this was the best welcome ever! It felt really good to be home...

3 Days and 20 Hours Earlier - We jump onto the matatu at 3am Friday morning with two kids, two coaches, a manager and one talented and beautiful videographer. YUP, just TWO freakin kids. Let me just say that our plans for the marathon got royally douched on. it was a real big fat bummer! the manager was not able (after jumping through many hoops) to get border passes for the kids, SO that meant that out of the 20+ kids that trained with us for four months on many grueling long runs, we were only able to get two of them passes into Tanzania. You can imagine our heart break and discouragement. Plus, ALL of the girls were not able to come so I was extra bummed out! poop on a stinkin cracker! Thankfully, the kids had a more balanced and mature perspective on the whole disaster [side note - i realized that unfortunately that was probably due to the fact that they are more used to things not working out and being let down...which totally sucks that we were contributing to that theme in their life...that was probably killing me the most]. They were obviously discouraged but handled the news with incredible grace and understanding.

The whole thing was hanging by a thread but we decided to not pull the plug completely and continue on as planned with the two kids that were able to get passes. Most of this was because both were Form Four leavers (graduated high schoolers - ie. last chance for this opportunity) and one was James Karicho (a faithful, committed, and freakin fast runner who basically acts as captain and has been putting his whole heart into training for the marathon).

With that in mind, we decided to go for it and boarded the early morning matatu with heavy hearts, tense pre-marathon nerves, and tired eyelids.

To Be Continued...