Visit to an orphanage
Yesterday I was taken to visit a boy’s orphanage in Thika, a town north of Nairobi. I think even Dickens would have been appalled. I first visited the archaic kitchen, which seemed not to have a scrap of food in it, presided over by Thela, an enormous woman with a toothless smile. Adjacent to the kitchen was largish room, once a dining area, now housing a few logs for firewood. I asked where the boys now ate, “Oh, just standing up”. Outside several boys were sorting corn and beans, which, along with a little cabbage, was their constant and only diet.
Boys were housed in dark dormitories crammed with bunk beds and when I entered a dorm about a dozen, ages 10 to 18 were watching a porno flick on the TV, which they quickly turned off. The oldest, John Minor had lived there since he was nine years old. They all smiled shyly at me and posed for my camera.
My host, John Cook, now a teacher and aspiring businessman had, himself, grown up in the very same orphanage and he continued to visit regularly to inspire the boys. John pointed out the tree he had planted, now 30 meters high, in what had once been a garden, now a neglected area where rubble had been allowed to collect. He spoke about the decline in the orphanage since he had lived there. Run by the municipality, the manager of John’s childhood had taken an interest in the boys and insisted they plant a garden and maintain the place. He had checked their homework and the boys had known a strict but caring regime. The current manager obviously had no such interest and I wondered if he ever visited the place and if he did how he could walk past the stinking latrines, the former garden which now contained one forlorn banana plant, the broken windows, the unused dining area, without intense shame and consternation.
John drove me back to Nairobi and spoke to me about his childhood. He had been abandoned by his mother at the age of five and had lived each day looking for food in garbage bins and ditches. At the age of eight he had been taken into the orphanage. He had done well at school and his teachers had encouraged him. He said that, at the age of ten, he had decided how he was going to live his life and that it was going to be a good one. He had imagined the family that he would have and the life that he would lead. Now he has two sons and lives a productive life. He runs a soccer club, encouraging boys of 15 to 25 to learn the sport and feel pride and accomplishment. He tries to help the boys get an education so that they can escape the poverty trap and get good jobs or start a business. He mentioned five boys who were waiting for funds ($400 USD/ year) to be able to go to college and by the time we had reached Nairobi, I had decided to pay for one of the boys to do so.
John Cook standing beside the bed that once was was his.