africa: day 7

Fri. 11.12.09

Started the day right: pancakes at the guest house!

After breakfast, we met the FOL boys who were 12 years old or younger at a little play area - monkey bars, slides, etc. They absolutely loved it!

Afterward, we took them to a park where we had a "photo scavenger hunt" - we split up into teams, each team rocking a different color bandana. Doug & I were the leaders of the orange team. Our team members were (L-R in pic below): Paul, Brian, Dan, William & John.

Boys being tuff...

"Human Pyramid"

"Something Flying"

After the photo scavenger hunt, we gave the boys LEGOS!!! Universal fact: little boys love things that have tiny parts that end up being a vehicle of some sort when you put it together.

Some families at our church also donated soccer jerseys for all the boys, so we were able to give those to them - which they were so excited about!

Then we sent the boys home & went to lunch (across the street from the U.S. Embassy in Kenya), where I had the most amazing chocolate milkshake of my life.

After lunch, we met up with the older boys at another park. We split up into groups just to chat with the boys. Sara, Doug & I were in one group with (L-R) Peter, Benedict, Reuben, David & Nicolas. Benedict & Reuben did most of the talking, but the others chipped in occasionally. They were really surprised to find out that Sara, Doug & I were all in our 20s. We talked about a bunch of different things, and over the course of the conversation, Sara taught the boys the term "BFF", which is pretty sweet.

After chatting for awhile, we broke into games of soccer, naturally, and gave them some jerseys as well.

Then... we took the boys to their first movie in a theater! But even better than that - it was their first experience with escalators, which was AWESOME. Absolutely hilarious. The movie theater was in a mall, so they were pretty much smacked with western corruption right away, but one funny story that Dave told us: When the boys were in the bathroom (yeah, about 15 hyper teenaged boys were all crammed in the men's room at once), they were all oohing and aahing over the foam soap dispensers (SOAP DISPENSERS, PEOPLE), and one boy, Joseph, excitedly exclaimed, "I think Jesus must be coming back soon!"

We saw G.I. Joe, which definitely would not have been our choice, but we weren't the ones to pick it - at least the boys loved it... although they probably had no clue what was going on. During the movie, I sat between Dennis & Benedict, who taught me more about selflessness in those 2 hours than 20 years in church. When we arrived at the theater, we got a bunch of popcorns so every 2 boys could share one. Dennis was sharing popcorn with another boy, but noticed that I didn't have any, so he asked if I wanted to share their popcorn. I accepted his offer and took a few small handfuls, but he kept prompting me over and over to, "Take more! Eat some more!" I tossed a couple pieces at some of the boys, instigating a minor popcorn war (sorry, janitors...). During the credits, Dennis kept leaning over to explain things to me: "That is one of our national comedians," or "That is our flag of Kenya," or "This is our National Anthem," (at which point we all stood up).

FOL had also purchased chocolate bars for everyone, which was quite the treat for the boys. I ate a few squares of mine, then gave the extras to a few boys. After we had settled into our seats, Benedict was still working on his chocolate, and he gave me a square. Then, when he was down to his last 2 pieces, he gave one of them to me. I know it's just a small thing, but how often do they get a whole candy bar to themselves? Heck, it takes a lot of effort for me to share chocolate as it is - but for a young boy to give up a piece?? I don't know - it was just a really sweet thing to experience.

Repeatedly humbled by those beautiful boys.

After the movie, we went back to the guest house for the usual: dinner, debrief, bed.