Advertisement
Published: November 12th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Boston Children's Centre
The 70 kids that attend Boston Children's Centre. As we prepare to head to Amsterdam tomorrow one of experiences that strikes me the most about Kenya is how so many people have so little.
The experience that brings this most to light is when we visited the Boston Children's Centre in a place called Kayole.
I sponsor four children in Kayole, a large slum that sits across from a rock Quarry. It sits on sheer rock and there's no grass for miles around. It's dusty, and dirty and any structures that exist are made out of metal sheets. There is a community-based school in Quarry called the Boston Children's Centre, and they have about 70 students.
To attend the Boston Children's Centre, it costs approximately $200 dollars a year, which pays the teachers, provides pencils, paper, school books, a uniform, including a new pair of shoes that the kids desperately need (especially when you live in a rock quarry). Most importantly, it provides the kids with lunch--usually the only meal they get each day. It also keeps them off the street, and out of harms way from people who pray on children.
While I have been sponsoring these children for almost a year now and seen their pictures, meeting
these kids in person is such a life-changing experience because you learn first-hand just how bad it can be. Most, if not all of these kids were orphaned by AIDS and are barely surviving. Many are caring for their younger siblings and when you're a world apart, it's easy to put this in a place in the back of you mind behind the daily grind and your own life.
However, when you meet these kids, you realize these are real kids with distinct personalities and each child has a story that's equally as horrible as the next.
We visited some of their homes, all of which are made of iron sheets less than 8 by 8 feet. And some are as young as 11 years old caring for their younger siblings.
What's worse is that these kids are very aware of how horrible their lives are. They sing songs about how AIDs has taken their parents from them and one of the letters I am taking back to mail to one of the children's sponsors that actually says "you have given me hope." They are keenly aware that if they can't attend school, they can't eat, can't learn, and have
Rock Quarry
This is the rock quarry directly opposite of the school. no future.
We visited the centre twice, the first time on Monday. On that day, one of the sponsored children was killed when he fell off of a truck and was run over. This is the second time a child from this class of 70 has died. Stephen, one of the teachers at the school, explained that children go out searching for food in the dump and often die when they eat food that has been poisoned and left out to kill rats.
As we sit half a world away, we can't imagine something so horrible. But when you meet these kids, when they introduce themselves to you and tell you that they are going to grow up and be a teacher, it's hard not to look at everything in your life and think about what that would mean for even one kid.
Another thing I forgot to mention is that besides having no power, and no electricty, there is no water. There are pipes, but the pipes are turned on only once every 3-4 days and the water must be captured in bottles. So every child's small shelter has as many juice bottles as they manage to fill them
with water. For as little as $300 they could have a water tank big enough to store water at the school until the next time the water is turned on for bathing.
Anyway, sorry to be on my soapbox--but it's just so real and so haunting.
As we left, we visted Stephen's home, a one-room concrete bunker that costs 2,500 shillings a month. When they have enough money, the teachers are paid 3,000 shilings a month (about $45). Unfortunately, the teachers often have to volunteer most of the time but they're so patient with kids and are the only role models in their lives. Before we left, we bought bananas for the kids, groceries for Stephen, and made a committment that we would do everything we could to make their lives a little less horrible.
We took video of all the kids that need sponsors and are going to see what it would take to start some sort of nonprofit so that more people would be willing to sponsor these kids, and the kids at the Rafiki Caring Home.
If anyone that I haven't already bullied into sponsoring a child might be interested, even $100 will pay their school fees
up until June and I can assure you that your money is doing exatly what it's supposed to do, save a life.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.158s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 5; qc: 45; dbt: 0.1063s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb