MX Publishing In Kenya - High School, Trees and More Trees

Here's our fourth and final update from Kenya and Happy Life (you can read the first here , the second here and the third here. We head back to the UK in a couple of days.

It's been an incredible trip and our thanks go out to all our authors and fans whose support of MX Publishing makes our backing of these programs possible.

You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok (pretty new there...).

If you've enjoyed the updates, please consider reading more about the Happy Life Story - 2nd Edition.

Days 10-12 - High School, trees and more trees

The newest location for Happy Life Mission is the high school which began construction just before the pandemic. It's located about two miles outside the town of Juja along the newly laid tarmac road - about one mile off into the bush. The plot was carefully chosen alongside one bought by a major telco as a place they will build a booster station and staff housing - so whilst as you will see there is virtually nothing for a mile surrounding the plot today, within a couple of years it will no doubt turn into a vibrant new community.

The new building is larger and more impressive than we had expected - especially as its only about a quarter of its final size. It will spread out to the sides and back with more classrooms, accommodation and sports facilities.

There's still a lot of construction going on and as it is the holiday the kids are back at Happy Life Juja Farm so we're shown around the facility by the contractor leading the construction.

There are classrooms on one floor and boys and girls accommodation on the top two floors. The building sits on the front of a four acre plot and behind is the impressive vegetable garden and trees. 

The speed of growth of the trees is remarkable. The contractor tells us the banana trees were "the size of a phone" a year ago and many are now more than eight feet tall. There are about 120 of them along the perimeter here. Along the back there and down the sides there are ferns which will grow nice and tall and there are some local Blue Gum trees which spread wider and have thick leaves for a lot of shade and some variety.

Everything produced here will be consumed by the children and staff. Vegetables and fruit include cabbage, kale, tomatoes, bell peppers, avocados, passion fruit, mangoes and many more. 

We also saw hundreds of trees from the #bookstotrees project over at Juja Farm as well and took the opportunity to ask Bishop Peter to say a few words about the trees:  

We've been hugely impressed by the new High School. As with the Jessie Kay Hospital, which is one of the best facilities in the region, the new school is set to be one of the best in Kenya and beyond.

We are so glad to have been able to visit it in its current peaceful, tranquil setting - as the contractor says, within a few years it will be within the growing town of Juja. With the space around the building and the hundreds of trees we're confident it will remain a green oasis long into the future.

MX Publishing is a social enterprise, with a share of the proceeds from every book purchased on this site going to projects like Happy Life and Undershaw.