Can we even begin to comprehend a life like this?

It's far too easy to romanticize and sugar coat this dream of mine, to work with children in Africa.  To view this trip through rose tinted glasses.  It's easy to get carried away with the notion that I'm off to "do good" to give my time to an orphanage, to volunteer in a school.  Doesn't that sound 'nice'

But at some point, we have to take off to rose tinted glasses and look a little deeper, ask a few tough questions and really listen to the answers.

Why are these children living in the orphanage? and the unsurprisingly the answer to such a simple question isn't a romantic one.

These are people, whose home is the Nakuru rubbish dump, this isn't a lifestyle choice made by a subculture of society that don't want to conform, this isn't a way of life, this is a pure means of survival, these are the families and children of the Gioto Garbage Slum.

This is a community consisting mostly of woman and children.  Woman abandoned because they are widowed or divorced, they bring with them their children and live alongside the children fighting to survive, the children orphaned by AIDS, malaria, pneumonia and other preventable diseases, disease our children never even have to hear about, let alone be a victim of.  It's the harshest reality of life in certain parts of OUR world, that a child should ever have to call the Gioto Garbage Slum of Nakuru 'home.'

For these children, their only means of survival is to scavenge off the scraps and waste thrown away by local cafe's and hotels from the nearby town of Nakuru.  Hotels catering to the needs of tourists visiting the stunning Nakuru National Park, tourists that are quite possibly oblivious to the poverty just around the corner.  They pick through the waste to find plastic, iron, bones, and other items that they sell to water sellers and recyclers.  The rate of malaria in Gioto is high, the rain water stagnates in rubbish and puddles, and becomes an ideal breading ground for mosquitos to carry the killer disease.

Would any child or person choose to live like this? I don't believe so.  Would you? 

So They Can (STC) along with a hand full of other hard working charities and organizations, have recognized the need for aid to be given to these people.  In 2010 STC opened the Holding Hands Children's Home, to date, STC have given fresh hope, to lives of over 70 children, these children moved from the conditions in the picture above to this.  

These children, the future generation, of Kenya are now fed, clothed and housed in a safe, clean, secure environment.  They are cared for and nurtured, and once ready they attend the Aberdare Ranges School on a daily basis.  It's a simple life, but it's a healthy, safe life.

This is why I'm going, this is what drives me to step outside my comfort zone.

Asante

Jacq