Things have slowed down significantly since the girls went to school... After all this running around in the couple of weeks preceding the start of their 1st term it was a welcome change.
I had a little more time to plan the new project. I have started the research for the location and have been offered a place for (almost) free... I just need to arrange for the deeds which will cost me around £300 which is around 10 times cheaper than buying the land already owned by someone... I just have to keep things on the quiet side as I don't want someone to suddenly start creating problems for me - since I'm white people might think that they could get some money by threatening to create problems with the land... Things are moving really slowly (as most of the time they are in Kenya...) and my patience is being really tested at the moment but since I do not have lots of money to spend I have to just put up with it...
In the meantime I still have my 3 kids to look after :) And also - as soon as the girls' fees are settled - there is another girl in a great need of help, she is 11 years old I think, quite sick and not attending school for quite a long time... She is being looked after by her relatives (the grandfather and the rest of his family) and they have been asking us for help for quite some time now but I do not want to take on yet another child until the 3 kids in our care are all settled with what they need.
I went to visit the school for Hamza and got the list of things he will need whilst there - I will be bringing him over after the midterm - he should arrive at the new school in w/c 6th of March. I am going to Nairobi next week to collect him. I believe going to a school at the coast will be much better for him as he comes from Mombasa and is finding it quite hard around Nairobi as the culture there is very different from what he knows... It will also be easier for us to ensure that he keeps in touch with his relatives (which all leave in the Coast province) and he will be able to visit his mother during school holidays. It is very important to ensure that the child keeps the bond with the parents (especially in Hamza's case, having already lost his father when he was very young) and the rest of his family. After all, my main aim is to ensure that he is looked after well and attends school, which was not happening while he was staying with relatives. He is very bright and I am sure he will do very well once there is more stability in his life. When we moved him to Nairobi, after only one term he was already number 4 in his class... Hamza missed out on a few years of schooling and this is also an issue when looking for a school for him as not everyone would accept a child that is older than the rest of the students in the class... Luckily for us, The Arid Zone Primary School did not cause us any problems because of his age.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Alison for sponsoring Hamza's school fees for this year and Stephen & Janet for donating money to ensure I can purchase the uniform and other necessities Hamza will need for school. The response & support I have been receiving recently has been absolutely amazing and motivates me to work even harder to help more children.
This is where the new project will become very useful as, apart from providing help to the local community, I will be able to have a small rescue centre where the children we rescued from difficult situation will be able to stay while we are arranging schools for them - at the moment this is quite a challenge as the children's homes are not as helpful with this as they could be... Also, the children that we deal with are not necessarily orphans so putting them in children's homes is not really benefiting them. This is why we chose to send the 3 children to boarding schools - while they have a place to stay, they are also in an environment which is encouraging them to study and also teaches them how to be independent at the same time.
A couple of weeks ago I finally spoke to Juliet - I was very excited about the phone call and even though we only had 15 minutes to talk, it was really great to hear how the girls were doing (Evelyne was not able to come to talk as she was in the middle of washing her clothes but Juliet passed on the msg from her).
Juliet told me that they were both doing well and they liked the school, even Evelyne - normally very quiet - was being much livlier lately. They joined some clubs within the school, one of them being a reading club, which makes me very happy as I was really trying to encourage them to read more, now they are asking if I can get them more books :) Juliet was telling me that the maths in Form 1 is very difficult and she is really struggling with it - which did not surprise me at all, actually I knew she was going to say that as maths was her weakest subject in primary school... There are 20 students in their class which is pretty good as normally there are many more students per class in Kenyan schools... One thing I was not aware of when I took them to school 3 weeks ago was that they were supposed to be given pocket money to purchase some snacks every morning to have with their tea... For some reason nobody told me that and the matron did not call me either when she realised that the girls had no money with them... Now I know about it I sent them some money to last them until Thursday (around £1 a week each is enough for them to buy sthg small every day) when the mid term begins. I am very excited about seeing them - I am going to Nairobi on Wednesday so I can go and collect them from school on Thursday :)
The main issue that I am still left with is the school fees for the girls - they still remain unpaid and until this is settled I cannot help any more children... We have applied for help from government for Juliet (we were only allowed to put through just 1 application...) but haven't had the decision on that yet... I am worried that when I go to collect the girls next week, I will have some problems with the school management... I should be able to give them around 5000ksh but that's not even a quarter of what needs to be paid... the total fees for both girls are Ksh33,000 in total which adds to around £300 for the first term... for term 2 & 3 the fees are £250 per term (for both girls - £125 each per term)... If anyone reading this is able to help me in my struggle to educate the 2 girls, please do get in touch - anything you can afford helps as it all adds up eventually to the amount that we need.
I will try to post some photos of the girls in their uniforms next week when I see them.
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