End of the school year

The Form 4 students finished their exams (the A level equivalent) a couple of weeks ago and now will have to wait until February to find out their results and discover whether their are able to continue their education at a university. In the meantime they have left Motherly Care to stay with their relatives.

I am not sure if I mentioned this before but Motherly Care is not just an orphanage - we help poor families to educate their children - the secondary schools are not free in Kenya and therefore many families cannot afford it.

This week also remaining classes finished the end of year exams and on Thursday was the last day of school. Most of the children with relatives have left and wil return in January when the new school year begins.

This was a very busy week for me - first I had to go to the immigration office and extend my visa... I did not go to plan and as a result I am flying back to London this morning just for a few days so I can return on a new visa... On Tuesday I went with Juliet (the latest arrival at Motherly Care) to St. Teresa's School where one of my friends (and a former streetboy) was holding an event for children showing documentaries about children's rights. Juliet was rescued a couple of months ago and she has been through a lot, there is a documentary being produced based on her story. She now wants to help other children to avoid what happened to her... On Wednesday we went back to St. Teresa's but this time with a group of 19 MCCH children as they were performing during the event - singing, dancing, etc... It was a really good day, the kids really enjoyed themselves but I was exhausted at the end of it... And then on Thursday I had to be back in town with Juliet again as we were going to work on the documentary with the Alessandra, who is putting it all together. It took us over 4 hrs to return back to Ruai and we arrived after it was already dark - sthg that I really try to avoid but this time we had no choice... I did arrange for 2 boys to come and meet us as soon as we got off the matatu though as it would be dangerous for us to walk alone in the dark - it is about 30 min walk, there is no lights on the way and we had no torch... Luckily we arrived home safely.

On Friday I finally managed to meet with Maria - it has been a very long time since I saw as she is always working... We spent quite a few hours talking and catching up on everything. She is going to Switzerland in feb next year to volunteer there (working with old and disabled people) so she was in town sorting out her visa etc...

And now I am at the airport waiting for my flight to London...

The trip

The trip to the coast was really good although it did have some challenges, first one being the severe rains that delayed our arrival in Mombasa by more than 8 hrs... I like travelling on the train but being stuck on it for almost 24hrs and in very hot and humid conditions is not fun even for such train lover as I am...

While at the coast, I visited 2 projects - a children's home in Bamburi and a school in Kilifi. The projects are really well run and I was very impressed by the way they work with and support the communities. It gave me even more ideas of what can be done when there is enough money coming in and good management in place with people devoted to what they are doing, I hope one day Motherly Care can become a great project like this also...

Mombasa was very very hot and so busy and polluted that only thing to differentiate it from Nairobi was the heat and the ocean near by. And the ocean was great - the beach and the water fantastic.

I made new friends and was very happy staying there. However, the trips to town were an experience of its own - the matatu drivers are even more crazy than those in Nairobi, the conductors try to squeeze 20 people in the vehicle designed for only 14... travelling was not a nice experience.

I went to see Fort Jesus and was surprised to find a tribute to Polish soldiers there...

I was originally planning to fly back to Nairobi but to save money I went back on the bus instead... And it was not bad at all - I paid for the luxury coach (which was only £5 more than the normal coach - £15 for the trip) and it had air conditioning, a loo and some snacks during the journey. We arrived back in Nairobi on time which was also great as I wanted to be back before it gets dark...

What like the most about returning back home is the welcome I get from the children.

Sonja & Justin

Last week we hosted Sonja & Justin at Motherly Care - a couple from UK. It was very nice to have visitors here for a week - especially that they are a great couple and they did some great work here. Justin, with a help of local person (whom he named Charlie - as a much easier name to remember than what he was actually called LOL), built a new chicken coop for our chicken project - currently we have 1500 chickens here (they start the slaughtering tonight so the first batch can be sold in the morning...) - this is the initiative to help us get money for the staff salaries as we are still struggling with that). Sonja is a huge animal lover so apart from spending her time with the children she was also helping with the goats and feeding the chickens :)
It was also nice for me to have them here - it was great to have someone to talk to from the same background and culture. Dont get me wrong - I am at least half Kenyan now but it is always nice to have someone who understands your way of thinking :)

I was playing a tour guide on 2 trips to town. Thanks to that I got a chance to finally go and see the elephants :) On the way back to Ruai after the 1st trip, while we waited for the taxi to pick us up, I started talking to two street boys - one was 8 and the other 12 years old. I shared some food with them and they really wanted me to take them to Motherly Care with me (they told me that they live on the streets and sleep under a car...). I really wanted to take them with me but unfortunately it is not just as easy as that. You cannot bring a child from the street and mix in with the children from the orphanage. Luckily, I have recently met someone who is rescuing children from the streets and he promised to help me find them and take them to a rescue centre (they would need to stay there first and then we would find an orphange that could take them in). This makes me feel much better as I was really sad just leaving them there. And it was then when I decided I wanted to learn more about what can be done to help children, especially those ones forced to live on the streets. Hopefully I can succeed in my mission to help as many children as possible.

Tomorrow we are travelling together to Mombasa :) It takes about 14-16 hrs on the train but it is much better than the coach and I actually really like that journey. The train goes through Tsavo National Park and if you wake up early enough you can see a really lovely sunrise - and if you are lucky, the elephants...
Whilst in Mombasa I am going to visit 2 more project and I am hoping to get some tips that we can use at Motherly Care. It will also be a nice mental break as lately I have been quite stressed out. I am really looking forward to it. Although I took the train to Mombasa last year, I didn't actually spend any time there as we travelled on to another place. It will be really nice to explore the city :)
However, before I get there I have to get through all the mud around here - it's been raining since last night and although it stopped for a short while (just enough time for me to dry my washing :), it is now raining again... I really dont like the mud, it is so difficult to walk anywhere... On teh other hand - when it does not rain it is unbelievably dusty! LOL

My kids are just so great

I was totally overwhelmed about my kids' reaction to my return to Motherly Care this afternoon. I was only away for 1 night and I definitely did not expect for them to miss me too much but the moment I arrived I was welcomed by so many smiling faces and hand shakes and "So nice you are back" comments... It was so lovely. Samuel - a boy with whom I spend quite a lot of time as he is always around the guest house (where I am staying) feeding chickens and attending to other chores - seemed the most happy with my return - he did not want to leave my side and was very keen on showing how much he missed me - by bringing me some sliced tomatoes with salt (which he prepared on his own), by emptying my bin, even by ensuring that the leftover water which I boiled to make some tea was covered in case I needed it later... And he is only 11... He loves to read so whenever he is free I give him a story book to read in my room.
All this made feel absolutely great and definitely helped me overcome yet another low spell lasting since beginning of last week.

Today, again, we were visited by John Bravo - a scout who is helping us to introduce some more activities at Motherly Care, i.e. working with beads, sports and scouting. He is the one who is currently teaching me and providing a lot of materials about the whole process of rescuing children from child labour and the streets... I am very excited about all of this as I want to be able to reach out to as many children as possible.

John wanted to show our children the "Stolen Childhoods" documentary (we have already seen 2 different videos in previous weeks) so we proceeded to Motherly Care. Again I was greeted by many children running from all sides just to hug me - an absolutely amazing feeling. I spent the entire afternoon with children in my arms and on my lap, by my feet... it was a great end to quite a challenging week. I cannot describe the feeling but I did not want to let go of any of them and was quite sad when they eventually had to go to have their supper...

I brought some banana cake with me today and since there were many children around me this afternoon, it was finished in seconds but my children were so happy with such a small gift... I am now very excited about organising my delayed b'day party for next month - I am definitely bringing a huge cake, there must be hotdogs as children absolutely love it and I am thinking that I should also arrange some ice cream for them... I want this celebration to stay in their memories for a very very long time... :) yes, it is making me feel really good when I can treat my children to sthg they might have not tried before or sthg that they get very rarely and that might be perceived as a selfish reason to be doing that but I love the feeling I get when I see so many happy faces around me. I have been very strict with them lately and since we are so severely underfunded I cannot be doing things like this very often but on this one occasion I am going to spoil them as much as I can :) After that I will have to concentrate all my energy on fundraising and learning all about helping children living on the streets...

Rescuing Emmanuel (Len Morris, 2008): USA

Rescuing Emmanuel (Len Morris, 2008): USA

Form 4s day trip

As our Form 4 students have been working very hard recently revising and preparing for their final exams, I wanted to reward them a little. As very soon they will be leaving Motherly Care I wanted to do sthg with them that they will remember for a long time – they wanted to go on a trip but I knew they didn’t have the funds to do so. I am trying to rally economise while I’m here to make sure that my money can last for a long time but I couldn’t resist paying for the trip for them – it will probably be the last reward that they get from Motherly Care. Obviously we will now be helping them to find work or funds for college but most probably they will not get an opportunity to do sthg as a group.

I hired a people carrier and we set of to town on Monday morning. We started with the National Museum – from what I could see the students (I keep calling them kids but they are adults already!) really enjoyed it. At the museum we also went to the snake park – this is not sthg that I particularly enjoyed but as they really wanted to go there so I gave in – after all it was a treat for them J

After the museum we were supposed to go to the National’s Park Animal Orphanage but we stopped at Uhuru Gardens on our way so we could have some lunch. It was really nice there and we decided to take some photos with the monument. After only taking a couple of shots we were approached by the park’s security and told that what we are doing is illegal as we are supposed to pay Ksh5000 (that’s sthg like £45)! This was absolutely ridiculous – we argued with the guard by he was not really listening. He asked one of the teachers to follow him to the office. When they returned we were told that indeed, in order to take photos in that place you must pay the fee – everyone was really outraged and we decided to talk to the guard again. For some reason he would not come close enough to us so we could talk it over. I then decided that if he doesn’t want to come to talk to me then I will go to talk to him. When I approached him with one of the teachers I asked why he just doesn’t come and tell me what the problem is (it was pretty obvious that the reason why he was so persistent that we pay the fee was the fact that I was white and he assumed that I had money). I was then told that he cannot speak English but if we give him some cash he will let us go. I was not really shocked – sthg like this is very common here. I did not cave in though and told him if he really insists that we pay the fee then I will just delete the photos that we have taken. I think he realised that he would not get any money out of me that he could use for himself and all of a sudden he let us go without paying the fee or deleting the photos.

As we already finished the snacks that we had, we decided to leave that place before they try to charge us for anything else. We proceeded to the National Park. As usual, because I am a foreigner – regardless to the fact that I am a volunteer not a tourist – I was really ripped off when it came to pay for the tickets – the children paid Ksh50, the teachers Ksh100 and for me? Well – Ksh1240! To be honest in my opinion that place is not worth paying so much money – it is much better to go to the elephant orphanage as you can interact with the animals much more there, but hey, it was the treat for the children and they wanted to go there – and they really enjoyed it.

As we didn’t have any money left in our budget, it was time to go home. However, the children really did not want to go back just yet. Instead we went to do some window shopping at a new shopping mall. It was so funny when I asked them to go up the escalator – they have never seen anything like that and were really afraid ;) the same thing with the lifts – they found it really amazing and we went up and down several times attracting a lot of attention. At least they were dressed in school uniforms so people knew that they were students and not a bunch of crazy adults ;)

I was absolutely shattered when we returned. I just wanted to shower and go to bed – and it was only 7.30pm! But there was another challenge waiting for me: about 20 min after we returned the power went off so I had to shower (and when I say that I mean bathe in a small plastic basin and 1 small bucket of water) just with candle light. The joys of simple life… ;)

Last night the Form 4s stayed up all night praying for good results in their exams – they start tomorrow. I wish them best of luck.

Today is a national day in Kenya – Kenyatta Day. Kenyatta Day is a day celebrating Kenya's freedom, named after their founding president Jomo Kenyatta.

Daily challenges

I cant believe I have been here 7 weeks already, the time is really flying by. I am so glad that I have decided to spend more time here and to get even more involved with day to day running of this place. There are many challenges here, money is always the top one but not the only one. At Motherly Care there are children from many different backgrounds; some of them only come to attend the school during the day, some are staying during the school terms but go back home to their relatives during holidays, the others are orphans or those whose mother’s are prostitutes… Those with relatives are admitted to Motherly Care as otherwise they would not go to school because the families cannot afford it. There are also few children coming from the IDP (Internally Displaced People) Camps.

Just before I arrived in Kenya, a little girl – Rebecca, was brought by the police to Motherly Care – she was found abandoned on someone’s doorstep. She is cared for well here by the staff as well as other children.

Every time the children misbehave I try to talk to those involved and make them understand their mistakes. It is not easy as they are scared that they will get beaten – this is the most common way of disciplining the children in Kenya – especially in schools. I do assure them that I will not beat anyone but I can still see the fear in their eyes… I now have the challenge of coming up with meaningful punishments for the most severe offenders and I can tell you that it is a huge challenge for me.

I am very happy though because I can see that I am getting through to some of the children already – they now started to come to me to share their concerns and to tell me if there is sthg going wrong or someone planning to do sthg wrong. It’s only just the beginning, as some of the children are not so happy about me being here now that they realised that it’s not all just about fun and nice food. I really wish I could just have fun with them every day but ensuring that they are brought up in a proper way and educated well is my top priority. I hope that they will understand it sooner rather than later. I care about all of them very much and I am determined to succeed in making this place better.

I have also decided not to fly back home for Xmas and stay here until April. That will of course depend on whether my visa can be extended by that much. I am quite hopeful as I know that there are many volunteers coming to Kenya for 12 months and they are able to get their visas so I should also be ok :)

Our kids just completed their midterm exams and have the half term holiday for few days… The Form 4 students will start their final exams on Thursday – they have been working very hard revising in last 2 months, preparing for the exams. I hope that they all do very well. We only have 7 students in Form 4 which means that they have to take their exams at another school as there need to be min of 25 students to be counted as the examination centre.

This month we were really lucky - we were very short of money to pay the salaries and just as I was about to start panicking I noticed that there was a substantial sum of money paid into the MCCH bank account in UK. And although we were still short of the full amount needed, it really helped us this month with the expenses - THANK YOU SO MUCH JAY for all your help. I cannot even begin to explain how much your support means to us.