{"id":1963,"date":"2010-05-19T12:58:22","date_gmt":"2010-05-19T11:58:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/?p=1963"},"modified":"2020-10-26T12:54:57","modified_gmt":"2020-10-26T12:54:57","slug":"kenyatta-university","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/blog\/2010\/05\/19\/kenyatta-university\/","title":{"rendered":"Kenyatta University"},"content":{"rendered":"

The traffic enforces our adherence to “Africa-time”. We leave Arthur and Sanna de Leeuw’s house — many thanks for letting us stay with you guys — with Joe Karanga navigating the potholed roads and insane congestion of Nairobi for our first appointment of the day at Kenyatta University.<\/em><\/p>\n

The sun is blazing already as we arrive and are greeted by Peter Wanderi, a university lecturer who introduces us to his colleagues who volunteer with Special Olympics. We are introduced to a large group of parents of athletes, who are huddled in the only shade around, provided by a small tree at the edge of the playing field where their children are getting sports coaching.<\/p>\n

\"Andrew<\/a><\/span>Andrew and Special Olympics family members<\/small><\/div>\n

Andrew speaks to them about The Ball and its mission and we are impressed to learn that they have formed their own support network as a result of showing up along with their children every week. They are supported whole-heartedly by staff and students from the university. This really is an extended family. All are invited to sign The Ball — with the usual condition that they kick or head it first. Headers are delivered in quick succession.<\/p>\n

Then we are mobbed by the children. There are just too may of them to consider going one by one so we devise a solution. An enormous circle is formed, and The Ball is knocked around allowing everyone to have a touch and a turn in the middle. Then a mass signing takes place: five markers and more than a hundred children with Andrew in the middle somewhere.<\/p>\n

\"Mass<\/a><\/span>Mass signing of The Ball in progress<\/small><\/div>\n

The smiles and laughter are testament to the power of The Ball to bring a little light into every situation.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The traffic enforces our adherence to “Africa-time”. We leave Arthur and Sanna de Leeuw’s house — many thanks for letting us stay with you guys — with Joe Karanga navigating the potholed roads and insane congestion of Nairobi for our first appointment of the day at Kenyatta University. The sun is blazing already as we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":1966,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[219,18,232],"tags":[148,154,149,227,38],"class_list":["post-1963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kenya-countries","category-the-ball","category-the-journey","tag-kenya","tag-kenyatta-university","tag-nairobi","tag-project-visit","tag-special-olympics"],"geo":{"latitude":-1.2833333000000000101437080957111902534961700439453125,"longitude":36.81666560000000032459865906275808811187744140625,"description":"Nairobi, Kenya"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2010\/05\/ken_DSC00513.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1963"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3315,"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963\/revisions\/3315"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theball.tv\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}