Many years ago, during one of the
not uncommon periods of major violence, it was built to house a large
army. When that need ended, it was just a deserted no man's land.
Hundreds of tin roofed shacks, now rusty, most not even tall enough
for a man to stand up in. Kinda like our hog houses we had at Wing.
Kibera now housed many thousands
of people. People who, in many cases, were homeless in the bush, and
drifted in. The government considers these people squatters, not
legal residents at all, and sees little reason to provide services to
better the circumstances for these people. They are from the wrong
tribe, and they are non-people.
We drove up to the entrance. Yeen
Lan told us to remove all jewelry, carry no cameras. People had died
for taking pictures inside Kibera.
She told the soldiers at the
entrance what we were doing, when we should be out. We walked in.
There were no toilets in sight. Flying toilets were the thing. Use a
plastic bag, throw it up on the roof. Or out on the walkway.
A single, small, plastic water
pipe led to the interior, where water was sold by the gallon. The
store consisted of a couple of butchered goats hanging, and a couple
of sacks containing beans and lentils, by the handfull.
At intervals there were towering
mountains of garbage, roamed by dogs and rats. We saw people high
from sniffing glue. It was one way to escape one's surroundings, at
least for a little while.
A sweet little girl, in rags, ran
out into our path, a sweet smile on her beautiful face. "Hello,"
she called out to us. "How are you?" Her smile broke our
hearts. Barbara and I both just wanted to take her hand, and take her
home with us, away from this place.
If residents had a set of decent
clothes, they always wore them. There was no place to secure
anything. Surprisingly, one would sometimes meet someone walking out
or in, dressed well, probably to or from a job, looking clean and
neat, clean shoes on the feces cover walkway. We saw no police
presence. We had been told that police almost never venture inside,
except to shake someone down.
They had their own system of
justice. If a thief was caught, a group of people would gather. An
old tire was produced, put over his head, set afire.
We passed a church, burned to the
ground. We had seen this on TV in America, during the recent
violence. Many people took refuge in that church during the violence,
it was set on fire, and many died.
The people generally, ignored us.
Some seemed curious and surprised. Nobody spoke. I was happy with
that. From what I had heard, I feared far worse. About 300 yards in,
we turned and headed out.
Despite its appearance, Kibera is
a powerful political force, by sheer numbers. It was the main backing
in the recent violence for the challenger in the presidential
election.
We'll not soon forget Kibera.
Barbara wrote that, early on, God just seemed to be giving her a
super-human boost in doing this work. As for me, That strange safe
feeling that always surrounded me in Peru, seemed to have made the
trip here to Africa with me, and kept me in good stead. When we
returned back to the village, one of the Mamas had heard we went to
Kibera. She asked if they threw stones at us. When we told her they
had not, she replied, "You were lucky."
Our children, since having arrived at
Rafiki, have only been taught that which is good. They do not know
hate, or prejudice, and very seldom anger or jealousy. They melt our
hearts.
Barbara and I go to a bible study,
with a different family, each night. The children were full fledged
prayer warriors, for the most part. Some were still too young or shy
to talk much. The mama led the bible study, and we were always amazed
when they could almost always answer her questions. We all sang hymns, they really got
in to it. When it came time to leave, they never wanted to let us go.We were the only mini missionaries
there now, but there were normally several at a time. I told the kids
how lucky they were. They were surrounded by all these loving people,
and I knew of none others who had so many people come from so far
away, just to be a part of their lives, for a time.
On the way back to our guest
house, the sounds of hymns being sung by many children, often filled
the night air. That blissful scene could sometimes be suddenly interrupted
when, without a sound, a big man, with a big club, face covered ninja
like with a scarf, was right there. Right at our elbow. Barbara
always screamed. That would be a guard. When I got to know the guards
better, I asked, "What's with the scarf over the face at night?"
"Our face is cold." Barb and I were very comfortable in the
cool African night in short sleeves, but they had never known cold.
If the temperature dropped close to 70 degrees, they started adding
clothes.
The guards laughed at us,
carefully lighting up our pathway at night with our "torch."
But I knew Black Mambas thrived here. One had just recently been
killed. The guards just laughed that off. "Snakes don't crawl at
night." They further asserted, "You Americans have used
torches so much, you have lost your night vision." There may be
some truth to that.
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