For many individuals, it’s enough to have one fulfilling, satisfying career. Not so for Reola Phelps and Kent Boesdorfer, two committed humanitarians with a finely honed sense of adventure and the desire to make a difference.

When Reola married Kent, she had not one but two careers under her belt: She had already worked with Outward Bound as an instructor and program director, and then started her own company, Headwaters Leadership Group, helping organizations develop strong leaders and teams. Her new husband’s work as an international consultant in business development paralleled hers, and they were often separated by oceans.

At an age when many Boomers retire, Kent took a position in Africa with the nonprofit World Vision, a development and relief organization. In charge of organizational development and change management, he was also responsible for helping to stabilize existing programs so they could be self-sustaining.

Reola also had a passion for improving the living conditions in Africa. She serves on the board of Africa Bridge in Tanzania, launched in 2000 to help the local people improve the lives of children orphaned and made vulnerable by HIV/AIDS. Her son, Scott McLeod, had worked as a volunteer at Africa Bridge, and so had Reola, working directly with the women and children. Thus it came as no surprise when, offered an opportunity to work with her husband and the African people she loved, Reola joined Kent as a consultant to World Vision.

She arrived in Nairobi, Kenya in December of 2007 to begin a steep learning curve: driving on the left, kilometers, different currencies, thick accents of all kinds that took concentration to understand. Most African countries were British colonies, and the predominant language is the Queen’s English—not American-accented English.

Today, Reola and Kent live in an apartment in the treetops of Nairobi, with 40-foot blooming cacti growing in their gardens. As they enjoy morning coffee on their patio, they are serenaded with birdsong. Then they descend from the peace of their aerie for the drive on Ngong Road to the World Vision offices near Karen (for Karen Blixen of Out of Africa fame). Ngong Road has no stoplights, murderous potholes, a cacophony of horns from the many cars and trucks, people walking, goats, roadside stands, pollution and hundreds of small buses (matatus)—the sights, smells and sounds of Africa.

Unfortunately, the sights, smells and sounds of Africa also include war, riots and their horrific aftermath. Early in 2008, there was a great deal of post-election mayhem in Kenya. Nearly half a million people were displaced and over 1,000 killed in a country the size of Colorado. One morning, after a member of Parliament was murdered, Reola and Kent drove through a gathering mob on the way to work. To them, a “demonstration” evoked images of sitting on the grass and singing Kumbaya. Here were groups of young men, all armed with long staves to which machetes had been tied. Needless to say, relief organizations such as World Vision have a great deal of work ahead of them to stabilize the situation and help to bring about peace.

Kent and Reola have also been working in northern Uganda, where civil war raged for 20 years. Children were abducted to serve as warriors and prostitutes, and many people had to move to refugee camps. When the war ended, World Vision needed to create peace-based relief programs to help return the displaced child warriors, child mothers and other individuals to their homes—not an easy task.

Reola writes, “We are not working directly with the children that WV serves, but are one level removed to the people running the organization. I had felt like this was a little distant from the problems, but I’ve come to see it as probably the most sustainable thing we can be doing. It feels like it is the essence of working to reduce poverty and create a bit more justice in the world. It is a delight to work with these mostly young Africans who care so about their jobs and their countries. We feel our work for years led us to this place where we can provide fast and effective processes addressing some of society’s toughest issues. In Ghana and Uganda we are running programs we have done for private companies worldwide. It is amazing to see this in Uganda with such primitive meeting rooms.”

As dedicated as Reola and Kent are to their work, they also value spending time together, exploring their new home. At Christmas, they followed a week in Cape Town with a safari on the Okavango Delta in Botswana, where the huge Okavango River empties into the sands of the Kalahari Desert and eventually disappears. They did game drives and walks and went through the waterways in mokoros, small dugout canoes, where they saw a python swallow an impala it had just strangled.

At Easter, they drove through the countryside to Mt. Kenya, a 17,000-ft. volcano, and stayed at Treetops, an exotic lodge beside a watering hole with salty soil where animals come during the night to drink. From Treetops, Reola and Kent did a hike on Mt. Kenya, round trip 19 kms (almost 10 miles) and 2,500 vertical feet to the first hut on the climbing route. Reola’s comment: “Oh, my aching knees!”

She goes on, “Time seems softer here, quieter. We have been apart so much the last few years that the world has a very different feel to it with our being together and working together. Though we are busy with challenging projects, the circle of things we do is smaller and thus more real and peaceful.

“When I get frustrated with the slow pace of things, the Internet, phone or traffic, I remember that I’m here to learn patience and to take things as they come. So every morning the sun comes up on the beautiful tropical plants, the birds sing, people sweep the pavement with brooms made from branch ends tied together—the true sound of Africa. The temperature is perfect, it only seems to rain at night and the nights are deliciously cool, the fruits and vegetables are fresh from the farms and sold at open air markets on the roads, the cut flowers on Valentine’s Day were out of this world, the people are smiling and everyone says ‘karibu’—welcome.”

Reola and Kent have projects coming up in the Congo, Mozambique, Kenya and Rwanda. They hope to visit Lamu, off the Indian Ocean shoreline of Kenya, part of an archipelago with the original Swahili culture.

Of the people she has met, Reola writes, “Each meeting ends with prayer and often has singing—the call and response of African hymns. Sometimes I pinch myself to imagine that I am actually here and a part of it. I have never heard people pray like this. With all of their suffering and tribulations they have developed a unique sensibility and it feels like they are truly speaking to God. It is personal and direct and moving. What great fortune to have this experience.”

Each day, Reola and Kent add another chapter to their book. They may never retire.