Baseball4Africa 2

Baseball 4 Africa is well underway here in Kenya. We have visited and taught at 3 different high schools; Kiongwani, Mukaa, and Kilungu. I remember all of these schools from 5 years ago when we first introduced baseball to Africa.

When we go to a school we are met and greeted by the principals and deputy principles and the games masters who preside over all the sports. Then we share Kenya tea (tea with lots of milk and sugar) or Kenya coffee (instant with lots of sugar) before waiting for the boys to finish class and head to the field.

There has been a huge shift of personnel this year and many of the gamesmasters have been promoted to deputy principles at other schools. This means that the baseball knowledge has moved with them so we are having to work hard to get these teams ready for the tournament on Oct 9th. You can tell that they have a much better understanding of the game than when we first started. No one is running the bases backwards (although missing second base and heading into the outfield happens on occasion), batters let bad pitches go by without swinging, and gloves are put on the correct hand. The natural talent of the players is really shining through.

We have 11 school in all that we will visit and invite to the tournament. So we are going to stay pretty busy if we visit the schools more than once. A twelfth school will be added after the tournament and we have also brought supplies to teach softball to a few of the girls schools.

Joseph Wambua, pictured in the yellow games master jersey, is the original games master from Kiongwani 5 years ago. Every year he has traveled to the different schools with Jim learning baseball and becoming Baseball4Africa's official baseball expert.