Day one: zebra, zebra, lion!

So I arrived in Nairobi and all is well. We have a home, check, we are in a secure area, check, we have food, semi check, we have hot water and electricity, semi check… BUT we are here to make a difference, and we will.

Didn’t really get to sleep last night. I think too much was going on in my head, as I was getting ready for going into the slum today…

Got up, got ready, and got picked up for our first day of camp. There are really honestly no words to describe how it feels when you drive through the slum. It is dire. All through the day we were told stories about these kids and what they go through. Even though the slum is in the middle of Nairobi, most of them have never set foot outside of the slum. Nairobi is a distant dream.

We played games with them — a Kenyan version of duck duck goose called zebra zebra lion, but none of these kids have seen these animals, even though they live like less than 5 miles from Nairobi National park! As we drove to a school in the back of van, a little baby, I guess about one and a half,  who fit the classic picture you’ve seen in magazines of a dirty child running through the dirt with only a top on and nothing else ran behind the van shouting at us “How are you, how are you” and I couldn’t handle it. I just burst into tears. His sister was running behind waving in a pink top, and then we drove through the gates to the school, where these beautiful kids were locked out from, as they couldn’t afford uniforms. I literally cried so much, I think the other volunteers thought I was totally nuts.

Not all bad, though 🙂 We had an amazing time with about 400 kids in the school running a craft class. I so needed all the pencils I could get. They were flying through them! We made paper chains, where each child had to write their hopes and dreams for the future. The amount of teachers, doctors and pilots coming out of Mashimoni Squatters School, I tell you, was crazy! Christa and I had a brilliant time! They loved her as she is from the ‘United states where Obama is from’. It flew by and then it was one o’clock and we were on our way to the Jonathan Gloag acacdemy. We spent the afternoon playing games in the sunshine and doing some more crafts. At about four though, we were all so tired. We got home at five am about to light a bbq and sit outside and enjoy the Kenya ‘Winter’, which is really like a London summers day, on a good day!

It’s great, but it’s tough — I can tell you that! I will write again soon!