Warning: Some of the events of this day may cause vexation and/or disbelief. Read at your own risk.

With that preamble out of the way, let me just say, “what a day!” It began with our team arriving in Paris around 8 am local time. We had a 3 hour layover in the Paris airport. I would like to briefly note a few things I found interesting while at the airport.

(1) Some of the urinals in the men’s bathroom seemed to be made for 7 foot 8 inch French men, not a 5 foot 8 inch Frank man. I literally had to stand on my tippy toes.

(2) I found the French people I met quite friendly, especially the women. One of them, Lois Perrot, was heading to Kenya by herself to bike around the country. The best to Lois.

(3) Bruce and I met and talked with some Chabad-Lubavitch Parisian Jews who were heading to New York. These are Ultra-Orthodox Jews who wear a small box on their head to show their devotion to God (the box is actually a tefillin that contains Torah verses).

(4) The croissants are indeed very tasty

(5) The Parisian coffee is good. However, be careful how you order it or you may receive something like I received. I told the French Barista I wanted 2 coffees and 1 espresso. One of the coffees was to be black and the other with milk (see picture of the receipt for how he rang up the order).

Around 11 a.m. we loaded the plane for our connecting flight to Nairobi. My dad (David Lasslett) sat next to a Christian man named Patrick. This muscular man was American and was in the special forces. He was traveling to Kenya to help train the Kenyan military. Dad had a very long conversation with him. It sounded interesting, but I couldn’t hear much from where I was sitting.

After this long flight, where everyone but Jacque caught a few hours of sleep, we finally arrived at the Jomo Kenyatta airport. We were initially greeted warmly (pun intended) as the night air romanced us with its 60 + degree temperature. However, any warm greetings ceased after experiencing Kenya’s clumsy and corrupt customs’ agents.

After putting our bags on the custom’s conveyor belt multiple times (due to the bags getting stuck and needing to be pulled back out), a custom’s agent marked a few of our checked bags with Xs. She then demanded to open and search them.

What king of heinous contraband were we hauling?

Coloring books, Charles Spurgeon Commemorative coins, some mugs, uninflated soccer balls, theological books, Bibles, books, books, and more books (admittedly we had hundreds of pounds of books divided amongst our many check in bags).

The custom lady said, “if you are bringing these into the country you must pay a tax.”

“How much is the tax?” My dad and I asked.

“Not much,” she replied.

When she finally told us how much “not much” was we could have died. I am actually too embarrassed to mention the number here. Let’s just say her “not much” was 4 times more than what we expected “not much” to mean. (The kenyan dictionary meaning of “not much” apparently does not match the Oxford English Dictionary meaning).

My dad and I finally negotiated her “not much” down a little. However, I am confident that is what she expected us to do. So, she began with a terribly excessive number and ended up agreeing to a simply excessive number.

Never in all my times of flying with Grandpa, or even flying in 2023 to Kenya with Tyler and Karen (where we always had many books), were we ever charged a “tax.”

With the perspective of hindsight, perhaps I should have filmed the incident on my phone. Maybe this would have helped us, as perhaps the customs agents would have not wanted to be filmed asking for such a “tax/bribe.”

Anyway, what do you think, readers? Is my vexing over this custom “tax” fruitless or wrong? What would you have done? Have you experienced any such thing in your travels?

For now I would like to write about better things.

Now…the better things:

(1) I am sitting in Kenya in 80 degree weather and am feeling grateful to God (as is the rest of the team).

(2) We are all healthy, safe, and ready to do some good works in the name of Jesus (thank you for your prayers)

(3) We arrived to nice beds and great food in the Openhand Children’s home hospitality house (fresh cabbage, rice, fresh potato stew, fresh mangos [picked off a tree just outside of our rooms], and fresh pineapple.

Thank you Alice Mukui (openhand children’s home director), Jennifer, the 2 Esther’s, James (our driver), and Benson for your wonderful hospitality. You made us feel welcome. Asante sana.