Nancy sits in the living room and watches the silvery streaks of water fall from the rusty corrugated tin roof of her mud house. As the rain pattering down becomes heavier, the streaks become longer and the noise louder. An old lace tablecloth acts as a curtain and hangs from two rusty nails in the doorway to the only bedroom where her younger sister is sleeping. A flattened cardboard juice carton covers the hole in the broken window but there is just enough light coming through to make out the empty expression on her friend Bridget’s face.

Both girls are fifteen years old and best friends. Bridget lives with her stepfather and his four other children in their one bedroom shack, similar to the one where the two girls are now. She has lived there almost two years since her mother died from Aids leaving her and her three younger siblings to virtually fend for themselves. Fortunately an aunt had come to take the three younger ones away to her home on the other side of the Kibera slum about six months ago but had told Bridget she couldn’t take her so she would have to stay with her stepfather. Her worst fears had become reality last night when her stepfather had come home drunk again but this time had told her she needed to start earning her keep and she may as well start with him.         “You’ll stay with me tonight” Nancy said, “but you have to get away from here or he’ll come looking for you”.         “I know” Bridget answered, “but where, where can I go, I’m trapped”.         “We have to tell pastor Chris’s wife Miss Joanne at school, she’s a good lady, maybe she can help”. Nancy said. “I don’t know any other way and I’ve heard she’s helped others, especially before the riots last year. The dormitory at school was filled with girls like you then who needed help, perhaps she knows of a place. We have to ask tomorrow”.

“I’m afraid, what if she thinks it was my fault? What if she doesn’t believe me and takes me back? What if she makes me go for a test? I could get expelled. Then what?”         “It’s not your fault and she wont take you back home. You know she’s a good lady and she’s helped hundreds of people like you I’m sure. She’s heard it all before. Don’t be scared, I’ll go with you.” Nancy exclaimed, trying to reassure her best friend.         Bridget was silent for a minute or two before she answered “Alright, I’ll go if you go with me. But promise me you won’t tell anyone else”.         “I promise, of course I promise, you’re my best friend, why would I tell anyone. Let’s go back and get your things before your stepdad gets home and spend the night here. It’s cramped but we’ll make do. He wont come looking for you here, at least not tonight.”         Tears well up in Bridget’s eyes. “I wish my mother were alive” she sobs “it wouldn’t be like this if she were here.”        

Chris Okuma

This story plays itself out every night in Kibera slum and other such places. Nancy and Bridget are real people who have spent their lives growing up in Kibera. HIV/Aids devastating effects ripple down and know no social boundary. As is often the case children pay the heaviest price. Nancy says “when there is no food and you can’t pay the rent you have to turn to prostitution”, and so the cycle repeats.         According to a UNAIDS/WHO report published in 2008, at least 11.6 million African children have been orphaned by AIDS. A teenage girl living in Africa is three times more likely to become pregnant than her western counter part.         Many girls try to abort believing that drinking juice concentrate, herbal tea or bleached soap can induce abortion. Some mothers even kill their new borns rather than subject them to the dire poverty and hopelessness that they have been brought up in. “The mother throws her baby in a trash can where it can easily be found by dogs,” says Nancy. Both Nancy and Bridget have seen babies dumped on garbage piles as they walk to school in the morning.

The night brings a different kind of terror in Kibera. “There are so many corridors in Kibera and it has so many bars,” says Bridget “a girl out at night might easily be raped.” Both girls can recount separate stories of this happening. Nancy knew of a nine-year-old girl who was bathing outside her house when a neighbor in his 30’s violated her and Bridget spoke of a woman who was raped by men in police uniform.         Undoubtedly, both girls have witnessed more suffering, misery and pain in their short 15 years than most will see in a lifetime. But their lives are far from over. Even though their school uniforms may be shabby, stretched and scruffy, they are amongst the lucky 11% of children in East Africa who get a secondary education.         Despite rising at 4 a.m. everyday and walking for over an hour to school they describe their fee-free school as their only chance. Hardship has matured them and crystallized their drive to succeed for they know more than most children their age, that an education just might ensure their children have a life free of the nightmares they’ve had to endure.

Joanne drinks from the well

Chris Okuma and his wife Joanne are real people too. Pastor Chris started helping children in the Kibera slum over 25 years ago and he and his wife Joanne, who actually grew up in Kibera, have provided help to untold hundreds of kids. They are the ones who provide the fee-free secondary education to children like Nancy and Bridget. They provide medical help in the clinic they built and shelter in the dormitory.         But how, you might ask, can one couple do so much with so little? I asked that question myself, and discovered the answer is by prayer and obedience and a God given vision you can’t escape from. Now, through an almost miraculous series of events I have witnessed myself, a water well drilled on their property which provides an abundant supply of water. So abundant and so pure is the water that it is sold in bulk and delivered by tanker truck to neighboring affluent communities. The proceeds fund the projects but more is required.         If the water were to be bottled and sold the profits would be much greater and the therefore more Nancy’s and Bridget’s would have a chance. Chris and I have been talking about such a venture recently and he has asked me to be a member the board for a new company he is forming.         Of course, I was proud to accept. So tomorrow I’ll travel down to Nairobi and the process will begin. It’s just another turn on the highway to the unexpected adventure when you find yourself in His grasp.