Dwelling On Africa, Day Three

I love reading Davids take on Kitale and the kids. Ignore the typos and such. He is sending this to me via text.

Here’s David Day  3 and if you missed 1& 2, read here.

Day 3: slept great last night. Got a little hot, but my iPhone sound machine made it easy to fall asleep and stay asleep. Woke up about 7:30, showered (basically sprinkled myself with water) ate a light breakfast and headed to the school and feeding center. Drove thru town and past the slums. Hard to describe such poverty.

Arrived to the school to singing in the courtyard just like I suspected. Very moving as they sang the “I’m so Happy, so very Happy” song. Saw the raising of the Kenyan flag by two students, was introduced to each teacher and worker, and then the mad rush of kids. Denise W said it may take a while for the kids to warm up to us men. It took 10 seconds. Nate, with his curly hair, fuzzy beard, and glassed was by far the most popular, but everyone had a swarm of kids around them holding their hands, begging to be picked up, just wanting to touch you and look at you. Three little ones took a liking to me (David, Ben, and Rebecca). But David easily earned the title of “my shadow”.  Wherever i was, he found me, held my hand and walked with me. i think he really liked it that we shared the same name. Even when the adults were eating lunch in Rebecca’s office, David stood outside and everytime he saw me in there he’d wave and say “Hi David”….but I’m getting ahead of myself…..

After introductions we took a tour of the school. The classrooms, teacher offices, library, nurses room, text books, and notebooks were all unbelievable. Makes all of us back home look like spoiled little brats going to target during back to school time and stocking up on pencils and folders and notebooks and book covers,….Makes any teacher back home who has more than just a desk and a chair in a small 6×6 room look like a President.

After the tour, we went to the feeding room and witnessed dancing and singing and prayer. Took me a while to spot Brian but I did. But didn’t have a chance to talk to him or even meet him until later tonight at the orphanage. After all of the dancing and singing, we hung out with the kids until lunch. David and others were all over me. They were fascinated with my phone and eventually I had to put it away and tell them it was broke. They also loved my hair and kept rubbing it and laughing and saying “big hair”. They loved my scruffy face. It was funny how they compete with each other just for the chance to hold your hand. A little pushing and shoving trying to get that chance. They were also fascinated with my passport lanyard once they realized I had money it. You could only see the money if you looked at it sideways because I kept it inside my passport, but gosh it was like word had spread that I had money in there and every kid wanted to get a sideways glimpse at it.

I spent some time in David’s classroom with his classmates. They wanted to read every single poster hanging in their room with me. Posters with vocabulary words, pictures showing body parts, posters with counting, …. You name it. Every single poster we read through together. At one point out in the playground I asked Jenny V to take a picture of me and David. I squatted down with him and was instantly mobbed by 10+ kids. Not sure if Jenny was able to get the pic or not.

Then lunch time. Cornmeal and water and some sort of green mushy vegetable. I think it’s the same thing every day. When I saw it I realized just how poor these kids are and that they literally would be starving to death if it weren’t for this school. Served in a small metal dish for each one and absolutely no utensils. Eat with your hands.

After lunch we did our “stations”. Scott’s Hula Hoops were the biggest hit. I was in a group with Doug and Nate in charge of “music”. Thank goodness for Nate. He lead the whole thing. We did songs like B-I-N-G-O, hokey pokey, heads shoulders knees and toes. We also did rythmic clapping and some silly thing pretending it was raining by snapping our fingers, clapping our hands, stomping our feet. Nate was hilarious!! The last group of kids in our rotation were the youngest and it was hard to teach them anything. So finally Nate just decided to clap and he would do a little chant and we would all repeat it back to him. It had no rhyme or reason and was the funniest sounding thing but the little kids loved it and were even chanting on the way back to their classrooms.

Rest of the day at the school was kind of a blur between lifting kids up and down, letting them hang from the basketball rim, getting my hair patted, and hearing my name called over and over again. I was a little surprised that the kids didn’t speak more English. I felt like most of them didn’t understand much of what I was saying.

We left the school and went to the orphanage. Took a tour and saw the gardens, the greenhouse, the cows and chickens, the talapia ponds. Saw amazing progress on the new orphanage and a group of workers that were amazing. Holy cow. Talk about hard workers!

After the tour we went into the orphanage and were greeted by yet even more songs. Led by young Pastor Eric, one of the teenage boys. Favorite song was the one containing the lyrics “to be happy, make someone happy”.

Then spent about an hour and a half hearing Helen speak and thank us. Very touching. Their belief in God is amazing. Every good things that happens is because of God. Every speech begins with “Praise God. Praise God again”. Helen was unbelievable, very teary eyed and so very thankful that God brought us halfway around the world to visit. Many of the kids during this time were exhausted and falling asleep. We learned that they had just taken their malaria vaccination and that one of the side effects was exhaustion.

Mark also spoke to the group of kids and told them that they are always thanking us and thanking God for us, but all of us who came to visit feel the same way about them and that they don’t need to thank us, but instead we should be thanking them for the joy they shared with us.

After that Helen asked me to stand up and had all of the teenagers form a circle around me and prayed for about 3 or 4 minutes thanking God for bringing you and MJC into their lives. It was very moving and I could have easily cried, but didn’t. I had no idea until tonight that Mark had pretty much given up on raising the $150k for the orphanage and that Helen had decided that she was not going to send out an email campaign because she just didnt think it was possible….and then you called and their prayers were answered.

Things wrapped up and it was decided that we would hear all of the testimonies tomorrow due to the exhaustion of the kids. We did hear Nicholos’s story because he was not going to be there tomorrow about how he was left to care for his brother (and maybe sister) when he was very young (maybe 4 years old).

Once the kids were dismissed, Helen brought over Bryan and Clinton and Nancy and I got to meet them. Clinton maybe said two words to me but Bryan and Nancy didn’t say anything. Tomorrow I will give them all of the stuff I brought over and will show them pictures of our family and let them keep them.

Very exhausting day. Everyone is beat! Showered up and heading to bed. Major head trauma.