My dear friends,
for all of you who are assisting my healing full heartedly right now, I thank you. If you choose… It is story telling time :)… My gift to you.

After I had sent in the manuscript for my first book (that is being published as we speak) this scene immediately entered my mind and so here is the beginning of my second book…. Enjoy :)!

Chapter 1

The moon was full and bright and the desert seemed like it went on forever. Out of the little yurt I could see the fire flickering in front of the little nomad’s hut and make out the silhouette of the tall slim African woman who had taken me in and given me her bed so I could rest and sleep while her seven children shared the other bed. She herself was watching the fire. It had been dark when I got here and I didn’t really know where I was. Somewhere on my way from Nairobi to the Northern part of Kenya close to the Ethiopian border we had come across a tiny village in the middle of absolutely nowhere. I did not know any of these people and was traveling by myself but I had never felt so safe and taken care of as by this people and this family in particular. I did not worry about my safety at all in the middle of a country that I had wanted to spend the next three months.

My thoughts went to my parents at home. They must be so worried about me! I should have arrived at my great uncles by now looking at the travel schedule they had given me. It all went completely different than I had expected and our European mind could foresee.

I had boarded the plane in Frankfurt, Germany, four days ago. I remembered the pilot asking me, as he walked through the boarding zone, if I was sure that I was on the right flight as this plane was going to Nairobi, Africa, and I seemed to be traveling by myself at nineteen years of age. I guess he had a point. I had always loved traveling and what a great opportunity this was! My great uncles had been living in Kenya for more than 25 years as missionaries in the desert close to the Ethiopian border and had invited me to spend my semester break at University with them. I was thankful as I needed to get clear on what I wanted from life. I had enrolled into University but really was not sure if my heart was into becoming an elementary teacher. I had wanted to stay in England where I lived for one year being a nanny, taking care of the young children of the family and the horses when I had enough of the kids. The family was really nice and we had lots of fun together. We were going to horse shows on the weekends or yachting on the weekends we did not go to horse shows and I was probably partying a bit too much. The English are such a fun loving people. Reality caught up with me when I had a bad skiing accident on a vacation with my friends in France and I had to undergo multiple surgeries. While I was healing my parents thought it was the perfect time to come back to Germany and start my studies as I was accepted into the University program and I had completed my first semester. I would have three months to figure it out.

My thoughts went back to my parents. I was supposed to arrive in Nairobi, stay there over night and catch a bus that would take me to a little town where I would catch another bus that would take me all the way to the Northern border of Kenya where I would meet my uncles right in their village. Well, when I got to Nairobi and looked for the bus station I was able to make the first bus trip but the second bus route did not exist any longer. Neither did the plane that my mom and I had taken two years ago when we visited my uncles here for two weeks. It was not like I could pick up a phone and let anybody know about the travel changes. I had no idea where to make an international call and my uncles had one of the few telephones in their village but it had to go through an operator who would have to first find my uncles and tell them that I was on the phone. This could take a while depending on where they were in the village. Most people did not speak English and I would not be able to leave a message for them either.

I got stuck in the little town over night where the first bus route stopped as I was told that the second bus route was no longer in existence and I had missed the trucks as they only were allowed to go in caravans and had to enter the route by noon at the latest. I found myself a little hotel room and was immediately spotted by a traveling sales man in the same hotel who wanted to ask me out. I have always had pretty good intuition and immediately knew that this guy was up to no good with his intentions. Being blond and white I caused a lot of attention. I had to get used to this. People wanted to touch my hair and my skin and I was not used to this much closeness! I skipped dinner and decided I would leave before dark to find transportation to my end destination so I could get rid of this guy. I did. I left around 4 a.m. and found my way to the truck station. People had told me that the trucks would have to go in caravans of six trucks at a time as the area was dangerous to pass through and trucks and people had been robbed many times on this route. This is why they had stopped the bus route. Of course, my uncles did not know this since they had their own car and did not take the bus! This whole trip was not supposed to take longer than two days maximum.

The first truck caravan would leave around 5:30 a.m. at dawn. Someone brought me some tea as I waited. Everyone threw their luggage on top of this huge truck and people found their place between the luggage on top of the whole fully loaded truck. So did I. It was sort of comfortable. People watched me and were curious what I was up to. I am not sure if white people ever traveled this route like I did. Given a choice I probably would not have either but it was pointless to think about this since this was my only way to get where I wanted to go. As the sun came up and the full moon disappeared I realized that there would not be any shade for us to hide in and the desert was hot! We traveled for about six hours, the road had turned into sand roads and the going was very slow. We had just come out of the dangerous zone where trucks were only allowed in caravans when we stopped for a break. I was getting hungry as I had not planned for this trip taking this long and had skipped lunch and dinner the day before and breakfast that day. People were chatting and having a good time, probably exchanging stories of their relatives and life in general. They all spoke no English and just smiled at me. I smiled back. Someone would always bring me tea, which I really appreciated as the hot sun and the dry desert air were drying me out completely.

The break extended several hours and no one seemed to be in any rush. We had just gotten back on the truck and I had surrendered to the fact that time was ticking differently than I was used to from Germany when the men on my truck started yelling and the driver stopped, the men climbed and jumped off and ran with their spears after a gazelle making noises of hunting and war! Were this people out of their minds and really thought they could hunt down one of the fastest animals in the world?! Everyone was watching. Somehow they were successful! They speared the gazelle and brought it back. It was put on the truck with everything else. This had taken some time and the sun was getting lower until it was dark. In the far distance I could make out several little fires and nomad huts. We made it to a village where people started to skin the animal and a fire was prepared and not too long after this the animal was roasting in the fire. There went the next day and the next night… People were singing and clapping hands and dancing and talking and laughing. It was really amazing for me to watch these people. What an amazing bond they had. Did they all know each other? Where there different families and clans? Where these just people traveling through? Did they live here? I had so many questions! Since I was part of the truck people handed me some tea, some white rice and some of the best meat I have ever tasted my entire life. It was tender and the flavor was incredible. What an amazing way to live!

Late at night someone took me to a little nomad’s tent where the woman and her seven children took me in. It was dark, the full moon was shining and I could make out faces in the dark. I laid there on the simple small bed that the woman had kindly offered me. My mind was spinning as I thought that my parents and my uncles must we worried about me so badly since I should have arrived two nights ago! There was absolutely nothing I could do except to just go with the flow. I was no longer worried about my safety. These village people took care of each other and in a strange sort of way they had taken me in and I felt part of their clan.

The next morning no one was in a rush. No one seemed in a rush to get anywhere ever. When the truck was ready to leave people told me and then it still took hours for the truck to finally roll off into the desert. We had left civilization behind. There were no roads any longer or anything for me to figure out how these people knew where to go. All looked the same to me: sand to the horizon wherever I looked. I had used my uncles’ names and the village they lived in, North Horr, since my arrival in Nairobi and it had worked all this way. Now the smiles became bigger when people heard my uncles names. Father Francis and Father Richard. We had not passed a car since we stopped for the men to hunt down the gazelle. Out here obviously everyone knew each other. These people were nomads and they traveled around, helped together during the hard times and celebrated the good times – this became clear to me. The closer we got to the village of my uncles the more the people smiled and laughed with me – we had formed a bond. A woman had given me her Sarong that she told me to put over my face and disappear in it so that only my eyes were visible. She pointed to my red skin and the burnt lips I had from being on the truck for days and no shade around for miles and miles. Even though I understood not Kisuaheli or the language the Gabra spoke we had a fantastic time! The Gabra are beautiful people, tall, slim, shiny brown skin, dark hair and dark eyes, a proud people who could sing and dance beyond anyone’s wildest imaginations! Their songs put me at ease, they spoke to my soul and it felt like I went back in time, my soul remembered ancient knowledge and wisdom, my heart was wide open. I had taken these people into my heart! What an amazing beginning to my journey!

The next morning many people stayed behind in the village and the handful of people that jumped on the truck were mostly familiar faces to me. The truck stopped at several places where there were a few yurts and finally around 4 p.m. or so drove into the village my uncles lived in. Oh my goodness. What a relief! My uncles were happy to see me when someone from the village showed me the way. They had announced our arrival and my uncles were headed my way. We hugged and talked and laughed, called my parents who had called several times over the last few days and the operator knew that they were all waiting for me! They were all happy I was safe and had finally arrived. I brought news from home and told them about their sister, my grandmother, Rosa. I told them about my parents and my brother, about my journey of course until it was time for dinner, which was beyond delicious especially considering having had only one real meal this entire time.

Looking back at this experience seems almost unreal but I lived it and what I realized even then was that one of the most outstanding things you can do with your life is to live it and enjoy the experiences along the way, dive into it full heartedly, embrace the challenges and see what good you can take from those challenges. I could have turned around and gone back home, I could have cried or been frustrated, or called my uncles so they pick me up or such but this never crossed my mind. I went with what presented itself in front of me and I made experiences that money cannot buy and no one else could have lived for me. My life has been rich with experiences like this and I am sure of this, will be in the future. It is what we take away from these experiences that will stay with us for the rest of our lives.

Chapter 2

I had rested thoroughly and I was up for my next adventure! I had agreed to fill in by teaching in school for an English teacher who was sick or had left, I am not quite sure. I was given a book and that basically was supposed to tell me what to teach. My first day as a teacher! I stood in front of a class of maybe thirty-five children of different age groups, probably middle school age, dressed in dark blue with white shirts, the girls wearing a uniform dress, the boys wearing uniform shorts. They all sat very quietly at their desks. I could not hear a sound it was so quiet.

I introduced myself and asked the children for their names, which was not the smartest idea as I could not pronounce their names, except the ones that had English names. I started teaching since they did not offer any more information than they were asked to reveal. Someone said something and some children laughed, a boy pointed to a stick that was laying across the teachers desk. Did these kids really think I would beat someone with a stick?! They had hardly done anything at all. I could tell they were used to harsh discipline. Well, that was good it would make my life easy. I taught in school for a few weeks before summer vacation started and the children would go back to their villages and were released from boarding school. I was teaching when it finally rained after seven years of drought and absolutely no drop of rain. All kids just left their chairs and stormed outside to feel the rain and they sang and danced and clapped their hands and were these joyful beings, giving thanks! It was beautiful! The dance went on for three days and even at night we could hear the drums and the songs coming from close by houses where people sat around the fire and gave thanks and praised the lord or whoever they were praying to.

When I did not teach in school I either read, accompanied my uncles on their way to somewhere exciting, helped build solar stoves or processed condensed milk, which was a new thing for the village or I did some other random chores. One of my jobs was to help the nomadic people move who had just lost their donkey or camel which was their way of transportation from one grazing spot to the next. They would put their whole “house” and the few belonging they had on the animal and walk miles and miles to graze their goats. They were their only source for milk and meat once a year when they could afford to slaughter one of the precious animals. That was usually a big ceremony and offering and the whole village would come together and pray and share. I was allowed in one of those ceremonies which usually only men were allowed to attend. I don’t know why but in my life I have been allowed into many ceremonies that usually were tabu for women.

I knew how to drive a stick shift, which was rare around here and so it became my job to move people to different places. Usually a person from the village came with me to show me the way and make sure I would not get lost as there was nothing else but sand as far as I could see. I wasn’t even sure what the goats survived on. Every goat I knew from at home would have not accepted this as grazing at all. Here and there was a little dry stick trying to pop up through the sand. There was no wood, no trees, no grass, and hardly any water. How these goats even survived is beyond my understanding. The first time I moved a whole family I was in for quite a surprise!

We had gotten to a spot where the people had already disassembled their house, rolled up the blankets that went over the skillfully bent and tied branches that made the structure for the yurt. They straightened out the branches and put all of those on the Jeep. They had put the rest in a pile for us to pick up. We loaded all of these belongings including the inside of the house – a few simple mats, dishes, sort of a table and a simple chair onto the Jeep. The teethless grandma had a young boy in her arms and was lifted on top of the already overflowing Jeep. I thought to myself that it would be interesting to keep the balance on this whole load! But we were not done yet! They also lifted a couple of goats and kids on to the Jeep. The man sat in the front with us. We were certainly full. The woman walked with some kids. Wait! Why was the woman walking? I decided to come back and pick her up separately. I am sure you have seen pictures of Jeeps where things were hanging from both sides and on top and behind – that was us! The four-wheel drive could hardly make it. Finally after miles the man pointed to the left, which meant turn here. There was nothing different about this spot then the rest of the desert! How did he know to turn here? It wasn’t like there was a dune in the far distance he was aiming for or anything like that. It was quite amazing to me.

We unloaded everything, kids, goats, grandma, table, chair, mats, dishes, blankets and the branches that would become the structure for the house again. I asked my companion who helped me find my way around if we could pick up the woman with her kids we had left behind. He said she would be fine walking. What??? I insisted, we almost got into a fight over this as the men started to ignore me but I needed help I would hopelessly get lost in the desert. Even if I just made a statement by picking up the woman in the desert and not just transporting the men, kids and goats plus grandma. Finally, after me not giving up on this issue we left in the Jeep to pick up the woman and her kids who were still far away. They would have had to walk through half of the night to make it to the spot. We dropped them off and the house was already standing, these people had done this a few times before! The woman was grateful and shook my hand many many times and smiled at me and kept shaking my hand looking at me with her sparkling eyes. She was so grateful and she had not experienced someone sticking up for her towards the men before, I could tell.

I really had to think about this! I was so used to being treated equal to my younger brother and everyone in our family had the same say. When we had to make a decision in our family everyone’s vote counted the same. Of course, there were times when my parents took over as adults but from a very young age I was used to democracy. When I was three years old I told my grandma already that everyone had the same rights. I heard about this one for the rest of her life! Why was it different in some cultures? Why were women considered less or inferior towards men? Who had the right to make this so? Oh, I would have to ask my uncles once I got back home. I was glad I had not upset my companion too much as I really needed him to show me the way! How did these people know their way around? Did they just know the way? Did they go by the sun during the day or the moon at night? Did they have a built in compass? Did they have markers that I did not see? How in the world? Every new day I had more questions than I had answers in my mind.

My uncles were very fun loving people and explained to me a lot of the things I was wondering about and questioning. They told me about the traditions and how things worked here. Not that they agreed but they explained what they were able to change in the minds of people and that really most of their beliefs were so deeply rooted that even when they thought after decades to have accomplished some change, everything was back to square one in certain situations. My uncles had mostly concentrated on bringing health care so that women did not have to die because of some infectious problem when they got circumcised. This brought up more questions in my mind, of course! They wanted to provide a clean water source, teach people about hygiene, give kids an education, teach the people to think ahead for the tough summer months when the goats milk had dried up and the people had hardly anything to survive on at all. So they had built a well but it was difficult because when the people needed screws or metal or any part of the well they would just take it, which would leave the well non-functioning. It was a long way back to Nairobi to get spare parts.

On one of those journeys to get supplies they had gotten a flat tire and there was a problem with the spare. This was about half way on their way back to the Northern border of Kenya after they had gotten their supplies. They saw no other choice than to go back and find a tire. When they came back to their Jeep nothing was left of the supplies or the tires of the truck! It was not like people thought they were stealing. It was not a concept they have. If it is there you can take it. In their language there is no word for the past or the future. This is how much they live in the present! There is also no word for Thank You because if you give you give from your heart! No Thank You necessary! So the supplies were just there and the tires made great soles that could be wrapped around their feet to protect them from the heat of the desert sand! It was all too logical! So my uncles had to learn and get used to the thinking of the people. They were trying to educate them that if they were thinking ahead and they would condense milk they would have some nourishment for the hard months to come. But this living in the present was so engrained in the people! And actually I was fascinated by it! What a fantastic way to live life. Of course, I did see the downside of this as well and I could see how circumcision for women needed to be stopped and if it could not be stopped then at least it needed to be safe for the life of the women! Why did they do this? So that their was no pleasure for the women?! What a concept? Who ruled this world?? Why did women not just get up and say NO?

After I had talked long into the night with my uncles sitting under the moonlight and the stars we would set up our beds outside and strap the mosquito nets over the bed that was designed so you could hang a net up on both ends of it. This is how I slept for three months – under the stars! I had my own room and would hide there during the day away from the sun. I loved my room. It was simple and clean, the walls were a light blue and on the lamp in the middle of the room hung a bat who was my companion. She would be gone at night but came back in the early morning hours and then hang there upside down turning, depending on where the noise came from, with her whole body to check it out. Her little ears would be very alert to any movement or sound. I was fascinated by how precisely she could fly through the smallest crack in the door. I played with her to see how far she could make it through just a small opening in the door. It was no problem for her! She would just turn sideways and fit through the crack. We totally got used to each other and I would always leave the door open for her so she could come and go!

There in the vast desert and the quiet nights only interrupted by the sounds of animals like the high sound of bats or the cry or laughter of a hyena in the distance I was able to let my mind wonder and my heart feel and digest the impressions I got during the day. This culture was so different from what I was used to. I had traveled through European countries and Turkey, I had been to Africa once before but this time I was able to live with these people and hear about their personal stories. Some were joyful, some had hardships to endure, some were working hard and hardly able to survive – I got to see their problems first hand. I saw the waterholes that were drying up and the desert spreading and encroaching upon more and more grasslands from being overgrazed. My heart felt heavy and constricted when I thought about what these people had to endure, what the women had to go through, how many children they raised without being given the chance of education – most of them anyways. My heart felt heavy when I thought about the women who were traded into marriage to some guy that they did not even know! They usually were the only wife unless they could not bear children in which case the man was allowed to take another wife and the first wife helped to raise those children. What a concept survival was here!

Nevertheless the people seemed very happy. Their eyes sparkled and there was something alive in them that I did not see in Western countries so much at all. When I heard their songs and watched their dances some ancient feeling came over me, something that made my own soul come alive. I would always keep this feeling in my heart that I had there with the tribe of the Gabra and that I would find in some other so called third world countries I would later on travel to.

I loved accompanying anyone to the waterholes where camels laid around, resting, and donkeys and goats were watered on the flat waterholes. My favorite thing was to watch the men bring water up from the deeper wells that were cleaner than were the animals drank and did their business. The men would line up in a row going deep down to where the water was. They would start the most beautiful rhythmic song I ever heard giving thanks to mother earth providing and nourishing them. The deep voices of the men carried up from many feet down below under the surface where the water level was. They used buckets made from the neck of giraffes to carry the water and handed the water to the next person in line who would pass it to the next person until the water reached the top and was added to a canister that sat on a camels or donkeys back. Then the water bucket was handed down to the next person as the next bucket was coming up. Everyone was absolutely in sink with this. If they weren’t the whole rhythm would get disrupted and they had to start over getting back into the rhythm using their beautiful rhythmic song to achieve this. This taught me a lot. I saw it as a metaphor for life and how we all have to be in sink seen in a bigger picture as if we get out of the rhythm of life everything gets disrupted, our flow with life and everyone’s flow with life! I thought about how much disruption there was in the world. The experience here showed me wholeness.

The men only wore some cloth around their waist, a sarong that they tied between their legs to be able to move the way they needed to. Their muscular slim bodies were shiny brown from the sweat as they worked hard, their muscles played in the sunlight as they bent and moved rhythmically to their song carrying the water to the surface of the earth. When I watched them I got entranced and forgot about time and any thoughts and worries I possibly had. I loved just sitting under a palm tree at the oasis and disappearing into timelessness. To the tribe this was one of the most sacred rituals they had and women weren’t usually allowed anywhere near but for some reason they made an exception with me and I sat quietly and pulled my energy in so I would not disturb anything and was allowed to keep coming here to sooth my heart and soul. I do believe today, as I have seen this happen over and over again in different ancient cultures around the globe, that these people recognize me as a very old soul being old souls themselves and know who I am on some level, a frequency holder of the earth, one of the Indigo children with a very clear mission. I have always looked for the truth in the broader sense of the word not just my own personal truth and had several questions in my mind from the time I can remember and as far as I can think back. Why are we here? Who are we? Where are we going? What happens when we die?

I do believe and feel that I can answer these questions today. I have studied many different cultures, scriptures and people and have been guided in the right direction in my endless quest to find answers. One of the most interesting times in my life in this quest was the time I spend reading my father-in-law’s manuscript that was tightly hand written in very small hand writing and alphabetically organized.

My father-in-law, Alfred Mardel, was a very interesting character and a total genius. He was the Chief of Jet propulsion at NASA and as an engineer responsible for putting the first man on the moon. The reason he wanted to achieve this was that he wanted to broaden people’s horizon. I never met him in person but I feel I know him intimately as I have heard so many stories about him and I have studied what he wrote about for many years having to lay down and digest the high frequency information every three pages or so.

Alfred Mardel had been told by the doctors one day that he had three months to live. As the scientist that he was he looked at this time frame given to him very matter of fact and was mathematically calculating time. He decided he had one month to finish his projects at NASA, he had one month to finish his projects at home and he had one month to figure out what happens after we die. When he had read the Bible he came to the conclusion that there were no answers to the questions he had. He knew eleven languages, some of them ancient languages, and started translating ancient scriptures from the original texts and realized that important information had been taken out of the Bible.

Today all this revealed knowledge is a bit more mainstream and more widely accepted but when he wrote all this down at first many years ago no one would have believed him. He talked about floods, the sinking of Lemuria and Atlantis, about traces that could be found to prove that there actually had been several pole shifts that wiped out everything on the Earth. He talked about a lot of the ancient scriptures and religions, what they had in common, he talked about the tree of life and the different versions of the Kabbalah and he deciphered codes that are known today as the Bible Codes. It was incredible information. A lot of it rang true and made me remember things from our past as a human race. I shall come back to this.