Orphans and street children

According to Unicef and the Ugandan government there are about 10,000 street children in Uganda, about 5,000 of whom live on the streets of Kampala.  Many of these children, some as young as three or four years old, travel from Karamoja in the north, lured like Dick Whittington was to London by Kampala's streets "paved with gold".  Sadly when they arrive here they face a hard reality and a life of scavenging, begging, exploitation and danger.  Many use drugs and sniff solvents or petrol as an escape from their troubles.

In addition to these street children there are many more orphans - in Uganda the term is used to describe a child who has lost either one or both parents.  It's estimated that there are around 1.8 million such orphans in Uganda.  Sometimes one or both parents die of AIDS, sometimes mothers die in childbirth, or just abandon their families and leave.  A father may support his children financially but be unable to care for them, so the children often go and live with an "auntie", grandparent or neighbor.  These orphans are very vulnerable - they often go hungry, miss school since there is no-one to pay the fees, or are beaten and abused by "aunties" resentful of having another mouth to feed.

On Saturday I went to visit Kitenge Africa Foundation's project off Bombo Road.  Fancy weddings were in progress at Watoto Church and Emerald Hotel on the way to the project, quite a contrast to the poverty just a few steps away.  The church backs on to a drainage ditch where children from the adjacent slum go to wash and fetch water.  Kitenge organizes activities for the slum and street children on the church grounds on Wednesday and Saturday afternoons.  When I arrived the children were playing football with a makeshift ball - a bundle of plastic bags and rubber bands.  Justus, the founder explained that they were holding tryouts for a girls' soccer team.

As we approached the yard I was spotted by an enthusiastic little boy aged about five.  As soon as we entered the gates he took a flying leap into my arms, so I carried him around for the rest of the afternoon.  He was a bit grubby and smelly but clearly loved cuddles and it was clear that someone used to read to him because he had the idea of turning pages in a book.  I have since made an African ABC picture book to take and read to him next week.

There is a stand-pipe in the church grounds where the children can wash, and we set up a medical center where they could come and have minor scrapes cleaned and dressed.  Each child came and pointed to the wounds that wanted attention - quite a few grazed knees.  Several had nasty cuts on their feet, from treading on broken glass.  Some have plastic flip flops but others don't have shoes.  Some had been beaten, with cuts on their heads and arms.

Kitenge is a Christian organization so they have a devotional session with teaching and worship.  After that I was invited to speak to the children - about 50 of them, boys sat on one side and girls on the other.  I talked about the importance of education, of being healthy and of helping one another.  I'd brought several bunches of bananas with me so we did a quiz - maths, geography and Bible questions, with bananas given as prizes for the correct answers.  I'd also brought a big bag of sweets so handed those around afterwards.  Then the children were given food - warm rice and meat that they squeeze out of small plastic bags, and were divided into small groups for more activities.

Justus introduced me to one little girl of about eight.  She said her auntie beats her all the time and has accused her of stealing money to buy new clothes - in fact the clothes were given to her by Kitenge.  She is now living with a jjajja "grandmother" but the jjajja also beats her.  It's hard to know what to say.

The luckier children are taken in by orphanages; although some orphanages require that surviving parents and family renounce all future rights to reclaim the child, to enable adoption, and not all families agree to this.  On Sunday at brunch I met several young American women working at NGOs in Kampala while finishing PhDs that were in the process of privately adopting orphan baby girls.  One of the girls was placed in an orphanage when her mother died in childbirth; the father is alive and visits but can't take care of his daughter, and at least she is well fed and will be educated in the care of her US legal guardians-to-be.  The women told me that it costs $3-5,000 to hire a lawyer to privately adopt a Ugandan orphan; the cost of going through an adoption agency is $30,000.  Apparently the rules for adoption by US citizens only are far more lax than rules for adoption by any other nationality, on a pragmatic assumption that the children will probably be better cared for in the US than they could be elsewhere.

Post script - August 18 2012
I visited the street children again today.  Little David (the boy in the blue shirt in the photos) was so pleased to see me that he wriggled under the fence to greet me and be picked up.  I took my African ABC to read to the little ones and some crayons; David liked the boda boda and traffic jam pictures best and demanded that I draw lots more boda bodas!

I spent most of the afternoon doing "Medical" which mainly involves cleaning and dressing cuts and grazes.  It's concerning how many of the children have deep cuts and puncture wounds on their feet from stepping on broken glass and nails.  They line up and point at the place where it hurts - the little girl on the right wanted attention and kept coming back with new places (old scars) for me to fuss over.  I noticed that she was wearing odd shoes - one flip flop and one clog - taking odd socks to the next level.