Hello everyone Yesterday we went to a neighbouring shanty town; Mtopanga to visit a school there which has been set up by the manager of the children's home in partnership with an english sponsor. The sponsor pays the rent and Mr Samwel and his brother George (the headteacher there) have employed teachers in training as volunteers. This obviously means that learning is FREE! The 50 or so students who attend the school are all from very humble backgrounds and would not otherwise get any form of education. It was an inspiring day and serves as a wonderful testiment to Mr Samwel and to others like him who are working tirelessly to improve the lives of the local children and give them opportunities to learn that they could not have previously thought possible. The equipment and facilities at the school are modest, but are growing all the time and i am confident it will prove to be an asset to the community for years to come.

When we first arrived we did lots of singing and jumping around with some of the very excited children from the school and have lots of lovely photos to post up here!

Whilst there at Mtopanga we also distributed some of the clothes which have been donated by everyone over there at home! You would not believe the excitement! Within half an hour of opening the cases we had a crowd of more than 50 children crowding around outside who had heard of what was happening and run to see if there would be any clothes for them.

As we left we handed out some balloons and soaps to the village children which was a huge success. We left happy in the knowledge that a few more children would be walking around Mtopanga fully clothed with shoes on their feet.

Thank-you so much to everyone who donated. Every item was so valuable and will be loved and well used for many years to come by the children we gave them to, as well as all their family, friends and neighbours.

All in all a conservative estimate comes to 168 different individual children who received clothes or shoes, not including the other children who were outside and received balloons and soaps, and there were at left 100 of them! Congratulations to everyone back home for making such a difference to so many childrens' lives!

Hello everyone! First we are sorry for not having written for so long, we are however in the process of trying to prepare some video so we can post that if it is any consolation!  Since we last wrote we have been swept off our feet with bits and bobs to do. We have been fundi again, fixing the hinges on the last broken desks and still none have fallen apart yet, so good news! 

We are also working with the school and some of the parents to identify children who are falling behind in their classes and meeting them individually for some one-on-one tuition to help them improve and increase their confidence. We have also been taking small revision groups as well as full lessons with the eldest class, Standard 8, who are currently preparing for their KCPE exams at the end of this term. 

We did an assembly this morning with a drama and a song based around the theme of working together which the children loved (especially since some of them got to be in it and got a lollipop as a reward!!).

We also took a whole school photo today, which is something the director was really hoping we would be able to do.

Thanks once again for reading and supporting us!

Amy

 

We thought you might be chomping at the bit for more information about the first four sponsored boys on the programme, so we thought we would give you a bit of background to them and why they are sponsored now.

When we first met Charo, Safari, Kaingu and Emmanuel they were four brothers in a family of 11 children, all staying in a dilapidated mud hut in a rural village called Takaungu; about 40 minutes north along the coastline from Mtwapa. The family consisted of 7 girls and 4 boys, their (estimated) ages ranging between the eldest at 15 years and the youngest at 2 years.  The ages are all estimates since the children don't know their dates of birth and because they were not born in hospitals but in the village they do not have formal birth notification cards! 

The boy's father had recently passed away, and his three wives, the mothers of the children, had all abandoned them. They had one uncle who was attempting to help them with food and clothing, but who was also struggling to feed his own family. Consequently, they were living alone. The boys were working in a local quarry making bricks to earn a small amount of money for food, but the family were struggling to make ends meet. The house they were sleeping in was impossibly small, with almost no furniture and all four walls were in a state of severe disrepair; it was clear they could not remain in this situation any longer.

We began to look for alternative accomodation for all the children, hoping to find them stable places to live where they would recieve food, water and access to education. The chief of the village and the district childrens officer along with some relatives of the children we traced in Takaungu all suggested children's homes to be the best option and the search began!

After finding many homes full to the rafters we came across Riziki Children's Home, and New Light Boys Home. The guardians at these homes were happy to accept the 8 youngest children and so four of the girls are now staying in Riziki and attending school there. The eldest 3 girls are now living in the village with their uncle, but without the babies to look after, are able to go to school and feed themselves more easily.

1 year on, Charo, Safari, Kaingu and Emmanuel are now fully settled into the New Light Children's Home in Mtwapa and are firm friends with many of the other boys living there. They are also now attending Mtwapa Academy, one of the best schools in the area, and are newly sponsored as part of Milele.

We are intending to help New Light and Riziki Childrens Homes in their respective endeavours to begin a regular connection and link the boys and girls together again. We also hope to instigate visits between the boys hometown of Takaungu where the eldest sisters are staying and the two homes so the connection between them does not weaken.

Over the next few days we are hoping to post some individual profiles of the boys so you will get to know them with us!

Hello All, Today we went into Mtomondoni, this a village which is inside the Mtwapa area and near where new light children's home is located. We visited a few old friends and made some new ones! Mtomondoni is a very poor area and a large proportion of the houses are made of wood and mud although there are some concrete buildings popping up here and there!

We attracted quite a big crowd of children who decided to follow us around the village singing and laughing. The children were fascinated by the cameras and loved to see themselves on the screen.

The area is mainly residential with only a few people working there. Those who do work in the area are often farming maize which they dry (see photo below) and pound to make flour, or selling fruits, veg and other foods at small stalls called 'duka'. 

We also managed to visit the Government school for the area, 'Mtomondoni Primary'. At Government schools tuition is provided free of charge and the pupils are required to buy uniforms and their school lunches. However the class sizes are huge a typical class size can range from 50 to 200 students. The buildings in the school are generally of a comparatively good standard but they lack any basic facilities, this includes books, desks and chairs. This means that the quality of education is very low and children often fail to reach their true potentials. 

We have also inserted a photo of a traditional 'Giriama' building, with it's low roof and wood and mud construction. The Giriama are a local tribe originating from the coastal region of Kenya, so there are many Giriama people in this area. There are many different tribes around Mtwapa and Mtomondoni who all now live together. Each tribe has their own language which is often spoken in the homes alongside Kiswahili. Children therefore already know how to speak and write in two separate languages, and those children who attend school will add English to this number at the age of 5.