Yesterday, I went into the slums of Kawangare with Coulson. Rich couldn't go because he had a meeting so I decided it was time for me to go with him. Last trip I went every week with him and then went over to the school to give a flannel graph story while Coulson evangelized. It was amazing to me how nothing has been done there to clean it up like in Kibera. The conditions are worse than I remembered. When we arrived at the church, I had prayer with the pastors and then they left me there with Monica, pastor Jacob's wife. Monica can't speak English so they called the school teacher over to help interpret. When it comes to communicating love we really don't need an interpreter. She and I love each other very much and how she shows it! When she greets me she goes crazy and lifts me in the air with her hugs. But when we want to share things we need an interpeter.
Anyway, Monica has started a new ministry. There are so many orphans in Nairobi, mostly from the aids epidemic. When they are young they go to school and have at least one meal a day there. But, the older ones have no where to go. So they go to the streets, sniff glue and other stuff. They are just filthy dirty because they have no where to clean up. They live on the streets and sleep on the streets at night. They carry their glue and stuff in a bag so before they are allowed to eat there they have to relinguish their bags to Monica. She tells thems "I was an orphan, I know what you do". She then gives their bags back to them when they leave. She now feeds these guys (we call them the street boys) once a week. They range in age from 10-17or older. Yesterday they had around 45 of them come for lunch. Rich said when they first started doing this, they had to go out and round the boys up. But now since they are doing it consistently, they come on their own. They came around 11:00am yesterday and kept coming until it was time to eat. While they are there Jacob talks to them, takes their name and is starting to get information about them. Some of the boys are starting to show up at his church on Sunday. They are sweet and respectfully, but they are so misguided and need to know the love of their heavenly Father.
The process in just making the food is so foreign to us. First Monica has to peel the potatoes and slice the cabbage. Then she has to go buy the meat for the day. The meat consists of about 1/2 lb. of chicken gizzards and another kilo of beef bones with a little meat on them. Then she has to build a charcoal fire by burning a box torn into small pieces placed under the coals. When the fire is hot enough she puts a big pot on it, 2 cups oil, and starts cooking chopped onions, about 8 tomatoes cut up, and about 3 dozen potatoes cut up. When they are soft she adds the meat and puts in a seasoning that they call mchuzi mix(a spicy meat flavoring). Finally she dumps in a waste can size amount of cut cabbage. You add a few pitchers of water and you have a delicious cabbage stew. Then because they only have one large charcoal burner, they switch that stew over to a little burner to stay warm. Then she starts over making rice on the same charcoal stove. She said she wished she could afford to get an electric burner to make the process easier and faster. The she just smiles big and says," but....AFRICA!!!" This costs Chris's ministry 2,000 shillings a day to supply this food. That is about $26.00. Their prayer is that they will be able to feed them every day. The next step is to get them off the streets and they are prayerfully considering how to do that.
Monica doesn't just make this meal but feeds the children in the school they have. On the days she feeds the street boys the children at the school just get juice and bread. The other days she cooks for the school children. When her daughters are off school, they help their mother, but now she is doing it alone. She asked me to pray that her health stays good and that God will give her strength, but most of all that she will be able to get someone to help her on a regular basis. Monica has diabetes and since I have it also, I was very sad to hear she cannot afford to take the medication she needs to manage it, The needs here are just so great. I was so overwhelmed when I came home from being there I couldn't eat or sleep well. May God forgive me when I complain about anything I find not to my liking.
Anyway, Monica has started a new ministry. There are so many orphans in Nairobi, mostly from the aids epidemic. When they are young they go to school and have at least one meal a day there. But, the older ones have no where to go. So they go to the streets, sniff glue and other stuff. They are just filthy dirty because they have no where to clean up. They live on the streets and sleep on the streets at night. They carry their glue and stuff in a bag so before they are allowed to eat there they have to relinguish their bags to Monica. She tells thems "I was an orphan, I know what you do". She then gives their bags back to them when they leave. She now feeds these guys (we call them the street boys) once a week. They range in age from 10-17or older. Yesterday they had around 45 of them come for lunch. Rich said when they first started doing this, they had to go out and round the boys up. But now since they are doing it consistently, they come on their own. They came around 11:00am yesterday and kept coming until it was time to eat. While they are there Jacob talks to them, takes their name and is starting to get information about them. Some of the boys are starting to show up at his church on Sunday. They are sweet and respectfully, but they are so misguided and need to know the love of their heavenly Father.
The process in just making the food is so foreign to us. First Monica has to peel the potatoes and slice the cabbage. Then she has to go buy the meat for the day. The meat consists of about 1/2 lb. of chicken gizzards and another kilo of beef bones with a little meat on them. Then she has to build a charcoal fire by burning a box torn into small pieces placed under the coals. When the fire is hot enough she puts a big pot on it, 2 cups oil, and starts cooking chopped onions, about 8 tomatoes cut up, and about 3 dozen potatoes cut up. When they are soft she adds the meat and puts in a seasoning that they call mchuzi mix(a spicy meat flavoring). Finally she dumps in a waste can size amount of cut cabbage. You add a few pitchers of water and you have a delicious cabbage stew. Then because they only have one large charcoal burner, they switch that stew over to a little burner to stay warm. Then she starts over making rice on the same charcoal stove. She said she wished she could afford to get an electric burner to make the process easier and faster. The she just smiles big and says," but....AFRICA!!!" This costs Chris's ministry 2,000 shillings a day to supply this food. That is about $26.00. Their prayer is that they will be able to feed them every day. The next step is to get them off the streets and they are prayerfully considering how to do that.
Monica doesn't just make this meal but feeds the children in the school they have. On the days she feeds the street boys the children at the school just get juice and bread. The other days she cooks for the school children. When her daughters are off school, they help their mother, but now she is doing it alone. She asked me to pray that her health stays good and that God will give her strength, but most of all that she will be able to get someone to help her on a regular basis. Monica has diabetes and since I have it also, I was very sad to hear she cannot afford to take the medication she needs to manage it, The needs here are just so great. I was so overwhelmed when I came home from being there I couldn't eat or sleep well. May God forgive me when I complain about anything I find not to my liking.
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