Wow! Obunga. The slums. Dirt roads. Mud homes with tin roofs. Nasty water in ditches. No sanitation. No running water. Kids everywhere.
And this big church in the midst of it all...
As we walked down the dirt streets to the church, more and more children seemed to appear. From a few 'blocks' away, we could hear joyful music. As we came to the church, they had their speakers blaring Christian, Kenyan music. And there were children EVERYWHERE. At least a hundred children. Everyone had come out to the see the mzungus (white people). We were quite the entertainment.
We went to take pictures of the kids that are sponsored by Ndoto. There are roughly 26 of them, aged 6-28. We had two professional photographers with us. They did an amazing job of capturing the smiles and the faces of these precious children. Allison had budgeted 3-4 days to get all these pictures as well as pictures capturing daily life in Obunga. These great photographers got most of the photos done the first day. But only photographers take pictures. The rest of us were invited to go outside and keep the masses under control.
I have to admit that I bristled to this. 15 minutes of mission work and I've already got an agenda and an opinion. I wanted to help with the picture taking. I wanted someone to admire my camera and ask for my pictures. I wanted to show off my skills...in some shape or form. But instead, I was ushered outside in the blazing Kenyan sun with 2-3 other girls to entertain 100 children.
And so I passed the entire morning. No shade. Hot sun. Surrounded by the masses. I spent hours entertaining the children. Which is fairly hard if you can't communicate. The native language there is Luo. The people of Kisumu are mostly Luo. But they also speak Swahili and English - they learn these in school. Which means that before they get to primary school, they only speak Luo. And I spoke none.
And so we spent the morning. The majority of the kids were less than 7 years old. The little ones just stared at us and held our hands. I am not exaggerating when I state that there were moments where I had 10 little children each content to hold onto a finger and look at my white face. I felt so awkward - with no clue what to do with all these kids looking at me.
At some point a group of middle school girls approached me, and so I met some of my favorite people in Kenya. We began to chat...but names and ages and grades in school only keep the conversation going for so long. Before I knew it, we were out of topics again...
And so I asked a question that changed everything...
"How do you say 'Hello'?" Nang'o!
A game had begun!
The next hour or two passed quickly as I began my first lessons in Luo. The girls were excited to teach me their language...and I enjoyed learning a few things. However, I quickly learned it is hard to learn anything with 5-8 teachers simultaneously teaching you words. But it was fun...and I found a way to connect with these sweet 10-13 year olds.
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