Collecting plastic bottles to sell for minimal profit.
It all started one night at Savannah. We were sitting around our picnic table enjoying the sunset. I was thinking how grateful I was to be able to enjoy time with so many incredible people from all over the world. We talked of many things; our projects, the highs and lows of Kenya, and the cultural differences from our respective homes. Eventually the conversation turned to projects we hope to start one day and without hesitation my roommate and brilliant work partner, Benjamin, mentioned that he would like to start a program to help the street boys in Ngong. He explained his hopes briefly and shortly the conversation was dropped and we headed to watch the Barcelona V Bayern Munich game.
At this point maybe I should give a bit of background on The Boys. There has been a group of about 15 boys who hang out at the edge of Marthare (Ngong’s roughest slum) and have been huffing glue and causing a ruckus for a long time now. Their “thuggish” attitudes towards the community have caused them to have an overwhelming social stigma. They have been branded as petty thieves and a general social disruption with little hope of reintegration into proper society.
With my generally forgiving, and striving to see the best in everyone nature I had hope for the boys. With each hassling call and every spotting of a glue bottle I would hope that there would be a time where they on their way to getting clean and had pride and hope in themselves.
Glue.
For a few days after that night at Savannah the conversation weighed on my mind. The thought of a rehabilitation center for these boys was something that really appealed to me. Is this something we are just going to mention once and then let it slip away? I pondered and pondered this, until one night over dinner I looked at Ben and just said “why not?” Why are we just talking about it? What’s stopping us? We considered the prospect of actually starting this program within the next year. We decided on a game plan, and mapped out a few first steps to take to make this vision a reality.
Our vision is to start a small home where the boys could come and take a meal a day and have a place to clean their clothes, and perhaps a few beds to give them a place to rest. We will not force them to be there, but will not allow glue to into the center; this way if they want to get clean and get sober they will have a healthy environment in which to do so.
Step one to making this a reality, we decided, was to get some photos/video of the boys and get to know some of their stories. This way we could see what their biggest problems were and how we could help. So one day, the week before Benjamin left we headed down to Mathare... At first the boys just hassled us for food and money, but after we started asking questions about their lives they really started to participate. After about an hour of photos and talking a man walked up and the boys went wild. “This is our Street Father!” they shouted. “He coaches us and cares for us!” they said.
The man introduced himself to us as Joseph, and told us these boys were his mentees. He explained that he has been informally looking after the boys for about a year now and that he has high hopes for them all. Then the most miraculous thing happened… The man began to explain a project he hoped to start. A project word for word like the one Ben and I spoke of. He said he wanted a place where the boys could rest and take a meal and get clean without pressure. The boys gathered around while he spoke and Benjamin and I listened with matching shocked and giddy expressions. This man wanted exactly what we did, he has the contacts, and the knowledge; all he was lacking was support.
The Boys do incredible acrobatics!
We listened to the man’s hopes and watched the way the boys admired him, and before we left them we asked Joseph if we could take him to lunch to speak more about our plans. He said he would love to meet, but told us he wasn’t coming to lunch without his boys. We could hardly say no to that and made plans to see him the following Saturday afternoon.
When we met on Saturday Joseph had 16 very hungry boys with him and we went to a small café and enjoyed a simple but hearty lunch. It was our first time really getting to know the boys and it was such a pleasure. They were gracious and just as curious about us as we were of them. After lunch we decided to have a proper meeting with Joseph and were headed to his office to sit and talk. Along the way we ran into two other people and Joseph greeted them warmly. He explained to us that he had met them in the course of the week and that they too shared our vision. They explained to us that they wanted to start a feeding program for the boys. We had a small meeting and all shared our ideas, and by the end of that very day we’d managed to find a small room for the boys to sleep in and the other two people had agreed to provide one meal a day. Once again Ben and I came home and sat in our living room in complete shock. Things are pretty much never easy in Kenya, but this project was/is just falling into place so easily.
I met with Joseph by happen stance walking through Ngong one day, and he expressed to me, “Portia, I worry about the boys, they only have one set of clothes each and winter is coming. This should be our next goal.” Within mere hours a friend and fellow volunteer from another children’s home texted me and said “We have some big bags of clothes, you know anyone who needs them?” That’s how this whole project has been. It’s been miracle after miracle. I am lacking words to express how strongly I feel that this project is going to be a success.
Now, three weeks later, the boys are happily staying at the center and eating once a day. The boys have dramatically cut down the use of glue, and I am so humbled to say I’ve only caught 3 bottles in the last three weeks. I have been visiting the center about three times a week to spend time with the boys and get to know them better. They have even started giving me Kiswahili lessons!! I am so much enjoying getting to learn from these boys, and I have to say they are great teachers! Every single time I leave them I feel rejuvenated and full of hope. I am grateful to say I can see the hope building in the center too. They want so badly to show their self-worth that they are making some big changes in their lifestyles.
The Boys on our first day of Kiswahili lessons
Our next step is to begin informal teaching at the center. We’ve acquired a large black board and would like the boys to start having lessons about two hours each day in basic school subjects as well as life-skills. We are hoping to get some books for the center to give the boys something to do in the day so that they are less likely to wander out and back onto the streets. In the long term we would like to help these boys find sponsors and either make it back into form school or perhaps technical schools for skills like carpentry or electrical engineering.
I am so excited to be around for the initiation of this project and cannot wait to see where it goes. They are incredible boys and I am so grateful to get to know each of them. Our areas of stress right now are as follows, if you have any interest in helping out please feel free to contact me directly or donate here.
- Underwear [$1.20*] (many of the boys have none at the moment)
- Washing basins [$2] (now that they have a few clothes they need to be able to wash them!)
- Laundry detergent [$1]
- Books [$2-4]
- Stationary [$.50-4] (Exercise books, chalk, pens)
- Food [$25] (the approximate cost of a meal including meat!)
Teachers.
Thank you all so much for reading this! This project is very dear to my heart and I am so thrilled to keep everyone updated in the coming months. If you have any questions or comments please feel free to contact me as always!
Portia
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This sounds like a wonderful project. What type of books are you looking for? What titles and what language? Good luck! Diane Skelton
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