Count 'Em: 106 & 107

So I haven’t updated. We’re busy; very busy. When you have 107 children (yes we gained two since I last updated), sleep, time and life seems to slip away.

Our number 106 child is Esther. She’s beautiful. She’s spunky. She’s malnourished. She’s HIV+. She’s suffered from untreated TB. She’s been raised by her eight year old brother, Philip.

Do I have your attention now?

On October 25^th, Carla received a phone call from the children’s department asking them to take Esther.  When Carla brought her home, we were shocked that she was 2.5 years old. A 2.5 year old girl in a nine month old body. A nine month old body with a mouth full of beautiful straight white teeth.

In November of 2010, Esther’s mother died of AIDS. It became the responsibility of her then eight year old brother to take care of his then 1.5 year old sister. Philip stayed at the hospital alongside with his mother until she passed away. He then walked miles and miles to his grandmother’s house, with Esther on his back, to tell her that her daughter had died and to hope that Esther and he could live with her. The grandmother let them stay there, for a little while, but didn’t take care of them. Philip began going to the streets, with Esther on his back, begging for food.

Both of them were starving. Philip wasn’t in school and Esther wasn’t growing; the symptoms of HIV and not getting a balanced diet were winning over her.

A concerned person who saw these children in their village contacted the children’s department asking them to rescue these two children.

And they were rescued.

Philip is with a ministry called Mattaw Children’s Village (www.mattawchildren.com), which was started by very dear friends of Sean and mine. Their names are Bud & Kimberly Huffman. 

Esther is with us at In Step (www.rehemainstep.com).  Our goal is to eventually reunite the siblings, as in living together, after we can build up Esther’s health, strength and immune system.

Here are some pictures of them:

Esther - shortly after we got her.

Esther & Philip together for the first time since separated. 

Esther & Philip together a few weeks ago.

Our number 107 child, Michelle 3 (we nicknamed her 3 because she is the third Michelle we have).  She is three years old.

I had stopped off at the children’s department on November 21^st to discuss a few things with them and there was this little girl in the office crying. I noticed she had on a pair of silver, little girl high heel shoes. She had her ears pierced by only one earring in an ear.

The children’s officer tried to get her to great “the white woman” but the little girl was scared of me.

A little while later (and my third trip to the children’s office the same day), this little girl had warmed up to me. She greeted me; she smiled at me and she even let me give her a hug.

Then the children’s officer asked me if In Step would take her for some time.  Apparently she got lost from her parents in an area of Kitale called Showground.  Whether she was separated from her parents by accident and they couldn’t find each other or whether they separated from her on purpose, is unknown.

Michelle, at the age of three, walked the streets of Kitale and ended up walking to an area called Tuwaini, which would be about 3-4 kilometers from where she was lost.  Finally someone there, a matatu (public service vehicle here) driver noticed this little girl walking around the streets by herself and he took her in to his home. For several days, he would take her into town with him, putting the word out that there was a little girl who had been separated from her parents, hoping her parents were looking for her too. No one ever came.

So the driver took her to the police station, who then took her to the children’s department, who then asked In Step to take her in.

Sean and Terry were waiting in the truck for me as I’m doing my last run for the day in the children’s office. I came running out of their office, opened up the door and said, “So, we have number 107 coming home with us today!”

What’s one more?!?!

I got in the truck and the children’s officer brought over Michelle and as soon as she realized that she was being put into a vehicle with three strangers and let that be three WHITE strangers, she began to scream.

I suddenly remembered that Terry had bought us popcorn from the grocery store and, with her in my lap, I grabbed a small bag of it and asked her in Swahili if she wanted it. She went from screaming to stopping (in less than half a second) and did a small grunt to answer that she indeed wanted the popcorn. I ripped it open for her, she leaned back against me and got comfortable and gobbled up the popcorn. And then 10 minutes later, she crawled over to Sean, who was sitting in the middle, curled up on his lap and fell asleep for the remainder of the ride back out to In Step.

Michelle, like Esther, is spunky. She will tell you what she likes and doesn’t like. If you do something wrong, she will give you a dirty look. She has no problem tattling on the other kids when they’ve teased her or someone else around. She even tried to get an Auntie in trouble because she didn’t want to do what the Auntie wanted her to.

The first few days were difficult for her; she said she wanted to go home and be with her mom.  We’ve got a picture out and hopefully the children’s department will be able to have the parents located. I really hope they are parents who want to be found and who didn’t really lose this beautiful little girl on purpose.

Here’s a picture of Michelle 3.

A week after being at In Step

If you are in the US and would like to sponsor one of these two girls or any of our other children, please go to www.rehemainstep.com.

We now have the sponsorship program available in Canada too!  We’re so excited about this. If you are in Canada and would like to sponsor an In Step child, please email us at: instepcanada@gmail.com for further details.  

Much Love,

Meredith