On the theme of FEAR

Dandora slum youth group

Are you one of those blessed souls that slip instantly and easily into lala-land each night when you hit the pillow and then makes it through the recommended 8 hours in a state of unconscious bliss, waking refreshed and bright eyes to the new morrow? 

Or, are you one prone to bouts of ceiling gazing and fretfulness? 

....that would be me 

So, I'm curious...what is it about 3am that makes the mind think it can behave with such blatant disregard for ones mental health and decide to take one up onto the high wire of worry in the wee small hours?

When the night-vultures come to perch on the high-rise buildings of your inner life, they seem impossible to scare away. And even when you ask them what the heck they are doing trespassing at such an ungodly hour, they just hunch their shoulders further and dig their claws deeper for better purchase.

Worries come in a variety of disguises and some don't bother dressing up at all, they just shout in your face. But the weird thing is they all think it's ok to swoop in and hassle you when you're well off your guard and obviously undefended. Why don't they gang up on you some other time when you're more prepared and have mates and lovers around to playfully distract you. But oh no, they come to rob you of sleep, wobble your heart and generally get you all flustered up....it's just not cricket.

And now I'm ready to mention my theme word....FEAR. My mother told me it was a sin to worry and be fearful. But it didn't stop her being one of the biggest worrier I ever met.

So, I've been asking myself today, how do we get worry under control?

I can worry myself sick about global warming or no end of issues, great or small. My mind is an awesome bit of kit which loves to be overactive, just because it can, but it only serves me well if I keep it at peace and under control. It needs to be helped to slow down and learn to be at rest.

I was once amazed by a 5 year old girl I was working with in play therapy when she stopped one day and said, 'My head is like a tree full of noisy monkeys and sometimes I just have to yell at them and tell them to shut-up and stop. And then I can get some rest'

Two days ago we arrived back in Kenya, this time for a whole year. And there is much to do. The needs are great wherever you look and we have to learn to use our time well; to be an asset not a hindrance. We will be working on farms and in slums, with tea pickers, rose pickers and those living in extreme poverty on less than 1$ a day.

Dandora slum is built alongside Nairobi's City rubbish dump!

Two young entrepreneurs 

The needs here could cripple your very soul.....60% of Nairobi's population of approx 4 million live in slums that cover only 1.5% of the city's available land; 94% of all these slum dwellers do not have access to toilets or fresh water; child mortality rates in the slums is 15% (150 out of every 1,000 children die in the slums) this is compared to a shocking 6 in every 1,000 in the rest of Nairobi. In Kibera, Kenya's largest slum, there are 250 houses per hectare, home to an estimated population of 500,000 people.




Enough to keep one awake at night? But what use is fear if it isn't used as fuel for the journey. The journey towards hope and prosperity of body, mind and spirit.

And that's what the work of Emerging Leaders is all about. We're here to bring HOPE in any way we can. Change doesn't come about through tears, worry or forelock tugging. It calls for action.

Braam Malherb, the extreme adventurer says, "Live a purpose driven life. Train yourself to dream. Focus on Gratitude and DO LOVE"

...Love is an action word

- JB

One Maasai lady gets into action making & selling her bags

Hardwired for Compassion

Yesterday, whilst enjoying a dreamy half hour in the most delicious bookshop in a Cotswold town, I came across of book entitled 

The Compassionate Mind by Paul Gilbert (...wow, heavy stuff, I hear you say). 

But on the back sleeve I read these words...'Develop your feelings of Compassion and increase your sense of well-being'. Gilbert says that our brains are actually hardwired to respond to kindness and compassion but that our society has encouraged us to compete with each other so much that we have begun to see compassion as weakness; we've stopped training ourselves in compassion. To my amazement I read that 'developing kindness and compassion for ourselves and others builds our confidence, helps us create meaningful, caring relationships and promotes physical and mental health...it even builds resilience and keeps us from depression and anxiety'.

This morning I've been mulling on what Compassion means,... like, in plain english. How would you describe Compassion in a sentence? What does it mean to be a compassionate person? I thought immediately of the bible story about the Good Samaritan. How the chap in the story actually allowed himself to be shocked by what he saw lying by the side of the road that day, and how he'd actually stopped his horse, got his hands bloody, manhandled the unpleasant-looking, mugged stranger onto his mode of transport, and gone out of his way to get him to A&E. And I thought to myself, what was the hardest bit of all for Samaritan-man? What do you think? Was it that he didn't have latex gloves to hand, or that he'd miss his tennis match by not going straight home...or was it that he was basically scared shitless that he'd put himself in danger or would get too emotionally involved?

I don't have the answer and maybe I should hold fire trying to sound wise 'til I've read the book. But hey, here's my thoughts for what they are worth. I think Compassion, in essence, is about 'standing with' another person and allowing their hardship, pain and struggle to impact you; allowing yourself to feel their helplessness and fear even though you can't be the fixer. Standing with them, being there, being alongside them and walking awhile with them while you search your heart to see if you can do something for this fellow human being. And in standing with them you are telling them the most important thing of all, 'You are not alone'. 

I wondered where we learn to become compassionate (how about putting it on the school curriculum!?), and how do we keep ourselves in the practice of doing it, because in essence that's what it's all about. WE ACTUALLY HAVE TO PRACTICE COMPASSION, SO IT CAN STICK and becomes a part of who we are, otherwise we will not train our brains to seek out ways to actively grow a Compassionate mind; literally laying down compassionate neural pathways, according to PG.

The Jambo Toto children, standing on the new plot of rented land, where their little classrooms will be built.

So, enough of all that - what's this blog all about? Just this....my heart was filled with Compassion when I saw the children and their mum's confined to almost a life sentence of oppression and misery in the stone Quarry on the outskirts of Nairobi. It was hard to witness the grim reality of their lives; it hurt. 

I see compassion as the only way we can bring change to the lives of the hundreds who work there; compassion that brings about action. I could not walk by... and yet I feel very alone in this quest to raise £3,500 to help Charles and Rose build a small 3 class-roomed building, for the children and the mothers.

So we have organised a Fundraising evening on the 5th March, out in a sweet village near Banbury, organised by dear friend Jane Meyler. For many of you it's not going to be ideal to come .... in fact no date or time will be ideal for any of us. The call to compassion never comes at a convenient time, there will ALWAYS be voices calling to us. Calling us to 'get home', 'play tennis', 'stay warm' and 'leave it to another passer by'. 

The tin shack where they have nursery care from Rose.

But, dear friends, I feel sure if you had been there, it would be you writing this letter and urging your friend and family to practice compassion, get involved, feel the pain and let the act of being a part of this project grow you in ways you never imagined.

.....So, come and join us, if you can. 

Stand with us, so we can stand with Charles&Rose at Jambo Toto, so they can stand with the mothers of the quarry and they can have a chance to offer their children a life without shame.

Our fundraising Evening event: 

Rose&Charles care for over 100 children from the quarry.

Wednesday 5th March, 6.30-8.30

@ Sibford Village Hall

Sibford Gower

Nr Banbury

OX15 5RW

or

Go to "Donate" at www.emerging-leaders.net   Quote "Quarry project"

- JB

'Living on borrowed time' - Peggy's Story

Cley-next-the-Sea

“I’m living on borrowed time”. She must have said it three times in the space of a few brief conversations. Peggy is 81 years old and we met her at Cley Windmill in Norfolk. Peggy was staying in the room at the very top of the Windmill and the only way you can reach those rooms is up flights of open wooden ladders that are as steep as you can imagine, with a trap door that needs lowering at night so you don’t fall down if you sleep walk!
“I love fast cars” she said. “I want an Audi TT next. I did hot air ballooning last month” she continued.
Jane ventured to ask, “So, what are you going to try next?”
Without missing a beat she said, “Go kart racing”

Peggy is truly living on borrowed time. She has a full blood transfusion every month to keep her alive. For the first week she feels awful. For the second week she feels wonderful….and then its downhill again until her next transfusion. She is living life to the full in between. And, oh yes, Peggy has a toy boy! True. Her words not mine.





Dawna Markova says in her life affirming poem “I will not die an unlived life, I will not live in fear of……..” (Fill in your own gap). So, in the spirit of Peggy, we are going back to Africa, for a year. To continue what I started 8 years ago and to continue to ensure a legacy that outlives us, which we began last autumn.

Cley isn’t just famous for its Windmill. The North Sea went on the rampage again around Christmas time with a massive tidal surge. We are walking around the devastation. Houses swamped, sea wall broken, whole beaches rearranged upside down from how they looked when we saw them last summer, boats sitting on top of sea walls or in fields or just in pieces. Life is full of the unexpected, the unplanned for. Fragility.







Nasim Taleb said in his important book that the opposite of fragility is not resilience. Peggy isn’t just resilient. The opposite of fragility is….anti-fragility; the ability to take the mess and the blows and the pains and the confusions and use them to
grow into someone bigger than we were before.

What are we doing in Africa? We are making our own small, attempt to build ‘anti-fragile’ lives and anti-fragile communities. It is, as it always was, an adventure. We are in the process of sorting out arrangements in the UK and Kenya and South Africa and are heading out around 20th March. We aren’t in Peggy’s position but we do feel the challenge of the ‘borrowed time’ of the years passing by and we are just enjoying our version of rooms at the top of Windmills (daring), Audi TT’s (exhilarating), hot air ballooning (perspective on life) and GoKarting (a crazy whirl wind of a ride).

We would love you to come with us on the next chapter of our story...

- TW

The bit before the end...

After school care centre for fruit picker's children in the Western Cape SA

The bit before the end of anything is a fascinating place....

Why?
Because you don't know how it will end: you anticipate a good ending, you fear a bad ending, you want an ending that exceeds your expectations, but you don't want an ending that disappoints.
Life, unlike an Agatha Christie novel, doesn't allow you to flick to the last page to know the ending before the ending arrives.

We are at the bit before the end of our three-month journey in Kenya, with a touch of South Africa and Zambia thrown in. We leave on tomorrow night. We have spent the last few days physically and emotionally recharging after Mugumoini. But we feel a great sense of joy over what we were able to do. We have a lunch today with a few people we want to honour for their role in our time here and who will be key to supporting what could happen in 2014.













As if in harmony with the ending of this trip we recently decamped from our Ngong-Hills-view home to a local hotel that is equally delightful (The staff are unbelievably friendly – every single one of them) and is giving us space to reflect. Reflect on the ending. What have we done? What have we achieved? We spoke to each other this morning about the importance of practicing gratitude and so that’s what we have been doing.




So, what are we thankful for?

.....we have
* Run 5 Leadership for Hopes
* Trained 1335 emerging leaders
* Trained in 2 countries
* Trained 15 new trainers for Africa from 4 countries
* We have established relationships with potential partners
* We have established that the best way to get the trainers for Africa is from the grassroots communities themselves
* We have established that Kenya is genuinely the toughest base from which to work, but we have stuck with it and made good progress
* We have delivered our toughest Leadership for Hope in Mugomoini slum
* We have just heard this morning that we have been granted funding for a whole new adventure in 2014. A few of you know just how hard we have worked & at what cost, to get to this place over the past 8 years
* We have met some amazing people (& some absolute rogues)

Boys at William's orphanage

On top of all that…..
* We have stayed well (until this week)
* We've had such fun together
* We learned each day from the books we're reading to each other & been constantly processing new thoughts, ideas & possibilities
* We loved having our hearts & vision expanded by the visits we made to different schools & orphanages
* We loved waking up and looking out at Mount Kenya
* We saw more rhino’s than you can shake a stick at
* We couldn’t get enough of the peace & beauty of Elsamere (home of 'Born Free' by Lake Naivasha)
* We sat in silence with our friend Archie as the sun set over Table Mountain in Cape Town
* We wept as we returned to the very slum in Lusaka, Zambia, where EL all started 8 years ago






This autumn has been a wonderful chapter and it has given us joy to share it with you

What happens next? What happens after the bit before the end? Kenya beckons, South Africa beckons, Malawi beckons, Sri Lanka is beckoning.
How will the story end?
What is the next chapter?


...such is the bit before the end !

- TW

Nairobi Half Life

JANE:
Before you read our latest Blog, please take a moment to click on the link below and orientate yourself to where we have been this week, running the last Leadership for Hope event before we fly home on Sunday 8th Dec.

The photo's you'll see were all taken by the photo-journalist Georgina Goodwin. It was she who implored us to come to Mugumoni before returning to the UK. Some weeks ago she took us into this desperate slum, on the edge of Kibera, to witness for ourselves the realities of Hopelessness and the living hell where 20,000 people dwell. This week we partnered with her and our tiny team, to host the event ourselves.

Have a look now:   http://www.lightstalkers.org/images/show/1382834

Running this event posed huge logistical challenges for us. We had no partner organisation within the slum to liaise with (there are no NGO's or government organisations working in the small area of 'Southlands' where we decided to base ourselves), so we literally had to start from scratch and organise the whole event:

• finding a venue that was safe (a fenced compound with security guards)
• finding someone who would be competent enough to cook for 300 people every day
• finding a way to get food to and from the venue every day, as we had no kitchen and intermittent electricity
• finding a team who could mobilise people within the community and would literally spend days weaving in and out of the bars and filthy streets talking and persuading people to come - people who would be serious about committing to the 3 days of training
• we had to secure a 'good enough' relationship with the slum chief to provide us with a 'safe enough' status - without his 'support' we would not be safe
• we had to buy or find all the equipment and supplies, from chairs to toilet paper & soap, from training sheets to bottled water (900 over 3 days)....we also needed a venue that actually had running water (which is a luxury)
• we had to source armed guards also, as there was a security alert from the British Government just before we started, concerning possible terrorist attacks in slum areas.

The amazing fact was that somehow or other we actually overcame all these challenges... stumbling and faltering. And it happened, against all the odds....and it feels like a bit of a miracle. 

People actually came and we watched the impact of the training on people's lives over the 3 days. Thomas, a young guy, fighting a daily battle with strong drink and ill-health said to me, 'I know that if I don't change my thinking I will never change my life. I must lead myself to a better place. You have helped me to see that I can do this. I have potential...I want to be a bigger person'.  

During the 3 days Trevor taught about the destructive power of Hopelessness, which can feel like an impossibly high wall, impossible to overcome. And the corrosive impact of 'poverty thinking'  - poverty not just being a material reality, but one that can come to live inside our heads. He spoke about the need to think 'new thoughts' and to lay down the mindsets of a leader that would generate a proactive and life affirming way of thinking, that would expel entrenched fear and lead to living a life that helps discover our full potential. 

I have to say, that the 3 days were mighty tough, especially as Trevor was sick for days 2 & 3, but made it through hour by hour. He was totally brilliant!

We are both totally mackerooned right now, but that's ok, because we've been left feeling deeply moved by the courage of those who have so little, yet they left with a determination to flourish and write a different story for their lives - one of HOPE. We feel like we have scaled an impossibly high wall this week. We made it, inch by inch, trusting that we were in the right place at the right time. 

PS. I can't end without giving a 'big shout' to our friend Nick, who responding like grease lightning to our need for financial support to feed everyone over the 3 days - we are so thankful to you Nick!!! Respect and thanks 

- JB

Peter our cook, feeding the 5,000... (he started cooking the 600 chapati's each day at 3am!!!)

                                                                                          

TREVOR:
It’s hard to put into words what oppression and fear look like. We joke about ‘the big man’, ‘the mafia’, but we have been living with this first hand this week.

Corruption is endemic. It’s all about how people use their power for their own interest. They smile in your face and in the next second they are wanting money. Money for what? Nothing. They just see it as their right if they have a position of power that everything and everyone should be a source of income. If someone in the slums roof is leaking and needs a few nails then they have to pay the Chief money. Why? Because that’s how it works. The real thing that hurt us most about it all is that it ensures that poverty doesn’t get broken in these communities. Even when the young people come up with amazing initiatives to clean up the community, the powers that be want a slice of the action. It makes everyone smaller. It makes the community smaller. It crushes innovation & creative thinking that would bring about change. We had to fight with this attitude every day and not give in to giving bribes in order to make the space to bring Leadership for Hope into this community.

Martin Luther King said, “Darkness does not chase out darkness; only light chases out darkness”

Mary aged 27 - a true leader

And we had real glimpses of the light. Mary literally dragged herself each day the 3km from her home on her fragile 4’ body, on her two crutches to get to the training. Mary is courage. Mary is light. Mary told us that she will take the training back into her groups in the Kibera slum. The thing about Mary was she always had a smile on her face.
Peter is a Rastafarian from the Dandora slum, a single parent dad, with the most gracious heart, vision and talent.....he is light. Peter was influenced by Leadership for Hope in our early days in Kenya in 2012 and is now leading 9 community and income generating projects in his slum, was one of our first 15 trainers we trained on arrival here in September. Peter translated the whole of the 3 days with me this week and he was simply amazing.

Georgina, Trevor, Peter (our translator, friend and Kenyan Trainer) & Jane

PS. By the way, Nairobi Half Life is an excellent Kenyan film, made about inner city Nairobi. Sell the farm and get a copy



PPS. After our last blog thanks so much to those of you who were moved to offer money for the glasses. We have now bought the protective glasses and have had confirmation that they will be distributed to the ladies of the quarry this Saturday (with the blessing of the Chief – a prime example of how power can be used for the benefit of others).


- TW 




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Charles' Story

We told you William’s story a while back, so here’s Charles story. I first met Charles in January 2012. He was one of 100 people in Kenya’s first pilot of Leadership for Hope. I remember Charles because he stood up on the morning of day 3 and told how he gone home and ‘lifted up his head’ (one of the 7 different mind sets we teach on day 2). He told a jaw dropping story of how he had stopped to speak to a ‘mad’ woman on his street corner on the way home the previous evening…….and changed her life. He found her lodgings, recovered her dreams and got her hooked up with a project that would help her learn to make clothes and sell them……all in one evenings conversation! That was Charles.

I’ve met Charles on every visit back to Kenya since and he has been a solid and safe ‘pair of hands’ in arranging some of our work here. Last Wednesday we got a message from him asking if Jane and I would come for lunch and visit a school he’d started after Leadership for Hope. We were both curious and encouraged. So, this morning, with William driving us, we headed into Rongai community in inner Nairobi. We met Charles at an obvious land mark in the main street so he could guide us through the back street, dirt-roaded maze to his home. As we climbed the two stories of his apartment building I was aware how dark the corridors all seemed. Inside his flat we were warmly greeted by his wife Rose and then his 2 yr old son…..and then four other children they had simply adopted off the streets. I don’t have words in my heart to capture that level of generous, lifelong hospitality they have shown to these four children.

Charles was on our first Train the Trainer programme in September. And he’s using it. He is now running Leadership for Hope at work, he has been sharing the principles of it to his church groups, sharing the principles with visiting Catholic leaders from Italy who’d been hearing about the life changing work Charles was doing. Charles told us stories over lunch of the lives that are being changed as a result of the Leadership for Hope’s that HE is running (not us). I cant tell you how exciting it is to hear the stories that come via others training, rather than our own. It means the story is growing.

“The story is growing” became the repeated phrase throughout the day. William was invite into lunch with us and shared stories that beget more stories. We all sat humbled and amazed by what we were hearing. “The story is growing”.

After photos on the cramped balcony it was time to head out to the actual project in K. Charles told us the full story. In January 2012, the time of our first Kenya Leadership for Hope, he was living in K. (and having just visited the area this afternoon I can honestly say you have to see it to believe it). Down the dirt track of K is a quarry, a rock quarry.

After attending the programme Charles took a walk to the quarry and this is what he saw. There were literally hundreds of women sitting breaking rocks, surrounded by hundreds of children in rags. He talked to the ladies about their lives and asked about the children. The children were breaking rocks with their mothers. Why weren’t they in school? The mother’s couldn’t afford the money or

the time. It was easier to just have them swarming around them for the day and used as child labour for the family income.

Charles did a base line study and then met with the village Chief and built a vision for these 261 children from the quarry. They took over some derelict sheds as classrooms and started a school for 66 quarry children, looked after by 4 teachers. EVERY day Charles wife Rose goes to the school centre to encourage, help and lead the way forwards. After school more children come and sing and play. With the help of our very own Louise they have got some partner funding from Sweden and the children even have some Swedish pen pals. These children now have a safe place, food in their stomachs and an education……..all because Charles lifted up his head and took responsibility for what he saw.

Today we saw the tiny tin-shack school, played with the children, visited the plot of land that they hope to get a 10 year lease on, to build more classrooms to rescue more children from the quarry……and then we started walking with John the Chief and Charles and Rose and William to….the quarry.

Oh my goodness….today we watched child labour first hand!! We watched a 7 year old, an 8 year old, a nine year old, and countless others, sitting, like their mothers, breaking rocks. It takes a 12 hour day to break enough rocks to earn £1. Hour after hour smashing rocks under the watchful eye of their gang masters (who quickly were surrounding us to find out suspiciously what was happening. This is why it is so crucial to get the Chief and Charles on your side to take you in to such places).

We noticed no one wore glasses to protect their eyes from the flying flint. Why would they? You earn £1 a day and a pair of glasses cost £3 and you need to feed your children…..what would you do? We started calculating how much it would cost to source 100 pairs of protective glasses to get them started (which we aim to do before we leave) - Having spent a week with Chiefs who are only interested in lining their own pockets, what a joy it was to spend an afternoon with village Chief John.

So we saw what happened when Charles lifted up his head. We saw the quarry community where he lifted up his head, we saw the children and the mothers who were benefiting. We saw Charles wife who has caught her own leadership vision for these seriously vulnerable children (We asked her quietly if she had seen any difference in Charles since attending Leadership for Hope in 2012? She responded so positively “he is a different man”).

And as we walked back towards the car to head back to our secure, comfortable, base, we reflected to ourselves with full but pained and sobered hearts that……The story is growing.

TW

Beer and Biscuits

Never has a beer tasted so good as it does tonight (well... not since the last beer anyway). It's been a long, hot and dusty day and the old throat is as parched as a gravel pit.

This morning we headed off to Naivasha again. Belting along the crappy roads of Nairobi, we skimmed the elbows of cocky verge walkers, manoeuvred around balmy matato bus drivers and rode the rutted tarmac that once upon a time decided to turn itself into a river of tar and then at the last moment changed its mind.

We headed north-west out of the city (driver William at the wheel), and after an hour we rounded a bend and found ourselves gasping with spontaneous wonderment as we gazed down upon the Rift valley that sits at the head of the Maasai Mara. Words really can't alert anothers mind to the sheer awesomeness of the geography...our socks were totally knocked for six!!!

We made the hairy decent, with no roadside barriers in sight but plenty of lorry driving lunatics. We passed a tin shack painted with the words GOD IS GOOD, ALL THE TIME and a zillion red and white stalls all selling the same tourist-tat....until we reached the valley floor and on we went until suddenly William lurched off the road and headed across desert-like scrub. I recognised a few desolate landmarks and I knew we were almost at the orphanage again (the one we'd visited with William back in October, called PBB - Prayer Beyond Boundaries Academy)

All the girls 

This time we had returned with goodies for the 68 children aged 5-12. We'd been kindly donated footballs and skipping ropes by my brother-in-law Andy, from his school in Canterbury. And we'd bought some education materials and sugary biscuits.

When we arrived at the entrance and sat waiting for a guard to admit us at the metal gates, I was suddenly full of a great sense of inadequacy. It felt so pathetic to be arriving with these gifts....what use really were our meagre offerings? And who were we to be doing this drop'n'run charity visit?
I just didn't know if we were doing the right thing...but what would the right thing look like?

William gives out the footballs

The next moment we were driving into the children's world and parking the car. As my eyes scanned the group I was shocked. They looked so dishevelled, more than I'd remembered and they looked back with dulled eyes and exhausted expressions. Trevor and I exchanged looks and I knew what he was thinking....my heart tightened.

These children had all lost their parents, their families and their whole communities during the post election violence that swept across the country back in 2007. As Trevor wrote in one of our earlier blogs, they had witnessed unspeakable atrocities and many of them had escaped death by the skin of their teeth - surviving massacre attacks, terrifying brutality and acts of pure evil. Some had sort shelter and refuge in a church with their traumatised families only to have it set ablaze....and miraculously these little people had survived.

And now....now they are living under the care of a few adults, in very poor conditions. They have no guardians or mentors. They are not visited from outside or given an opportunity to experience the outside world. They have literally lost everything. They are homeless, rootless and hopeless.

Trevor and the older boys

We both threw ourselves into our time with the children; playing football, skipping and giving out biscuits to lick and nibble. But they were like tired, dusty birds...thin and ragged, with no hope of finding a cosy nest. I felt a waterfall of sorrow welling up in my heart. I longed to do so much more than skip with them and give out biscuits - I wanted to feed them, wash them, read to them, hug them and most of all play with them and see them smile.

When we drove away they burst into spontaneous song...''Good bye visitor, thank you for what you have done for us, God bless you visitor".

I didn't want to be just a visitor; a fleeting do-gooder. In the car for the rest of the drive we talked about what could be done to bring hope and a future to these children. We talked about the need for each child to have a mentor to love and support them emotionally with a link to a family in the outside world. The need to learn skills and crafts. To have fun making, creating and developing their imagination on a daily basis. To have the opportunity to play sport and have activities to develop their bodies. To delight in building dens and climbing trees. To keep pets and learn about life from people who keep telling them, "You are so incredibly special, we see the potential in your beautiful life and we can't wait to see how you'll grow and how you will bless this world....we are all so thrilled that you are here. You are unique and greatly loved".

Lining up for biscuits

Who will be there to tell them this? They are children of the universe and they deserve so much more.




As we left I was surprised to feel a great sense of hopefulness - that was not what I'd expected.  They have already proved they can survive. They have already shown how courageous they are.  They have already shown such resilience in life.
So, as we bumped our way back down the Masai cow herders track to the main road I decided to trust in their potential to overcome their traumatic start to life.



Braam Malherbe said, "What are you going to do to be an asset to the planet? If you're not an asset you are a liability. We have the ability to overcome. Life learns to Adapt or Die"

And Darwin said, "It's not the strongest who will survive, nor the most intelligent ....but the one who most accepts change"

                                                                                                                               - JB