Lessons in loving life from Kenyans
Julie Gilbert • Published 2 Nov 2011 10:00
WHAT we can learn from Kenya will be top of the agenda when a community group visits the African country.
The impoverished town of Yatta may not have easy access to essential basics, but the residents have very low stress levels.
They also have a close knit community and incorporate music and dancing into their every-day lives.
A group from Yatta have already visited the area to learn about how we live and Audrey Jamieson, who is the minister at St Mark's Church in Drumchapel, is looking forward to visiting them and finding out about their culture.
Audrey said: "They said by African standards Drumchapel looked quite a well-off place to them.
"They said it was beautiful and thought the houses were lovely.
"For everybody to have electricity and running water is a big thing for them.
"Their first impression was 'you have a lot, why are you calling yourselves a poor area'.
"Their idea of poverty is not having the basic necessities of life - having food, water, shelter and electricity.
"But maybe they have riches that we don't have in their community living and in their love of arts and things like that."
Audrey believes the aim of her visit will be to learn about how their community works and how that could be brought back to Scotland.
She said: "We have got so much stress here and there are different ways of coping with stress in Kenya.
"We also want to explore how they use the arts as they dance and sing a lot.
"When the group came over here, everywhere they visited they were very happy to sing and dance."
This article appeared in Clydebank Post 02 Nov 11
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