Day 3 – An Eye Opener at the Soup Kitchen

Another early start, we were straight out on to the court and got on with the painting.  We managed to finish the main bulk of the court and with some of the remaining paint we decided to paint around the edges of the court as well.

After lunch we were then taken to the local township, where we got to help at a soup kitchen that takes place once a week.  We helped hand out milk and peanut butter and jam sandwiches to over 300 children.  We were told that normally there can be up to 800 children that come for food, which may be the only time during the week that they get to eat a proper meal, but due to it being school holidays lots of the children go to neighboring towns to visit family.

Before the children got their food, they all sang songs and said a prayer.  Chante and Cerys took the job of giving out sandwiches, Helen and Bryony were in charge of the milk, and Cat and Owain were pouring milk into bottles that the children had brought with them whilst the others played ball games with the children.  We gave out some Gloucester Rugby balls, which they all loved and showed some good skills.

This was an experience we wont be forgetting for a while.  It made us all realise how lucky we are and were grateful for the opportunity to help out. All of the children had big smiles despite the fact that they may have been hungry and may have to wait another week before they eat properly again. 

On the way back to the orphanage we spotted some giraffes on the side of the road. 

 

Day 2 – Our first day at work

We woke up nice and early at 7am to get up before the sun was too hot and spent an hour washing down the concrete surface that was going to be turned into a basketball and netball court.  We then went in for breakfast that our head chefs Bryony and Helen made us before going back out to work.

After a few hours working on the court, we went back to the house and spent time playing with the children.  We managed to learn some of the Children’s names: Pete, Jessica, Letta and Ronnie….only 12 more to learn.

In the afternoon we started to paint the D’s in blue and the middle section of the court in green. It took us a while to get going, but after the fist section we managed to work out a method between us which enabled us to pick up speed.

Any spare time we had was spent playing with the kids.  At 6pm we went to Mama Fatima’s house where all the kids gathered ready for Paul to read a bible story. At the end they all sang a sone and gave each other a hug before bed time. We all had a really nice day.