Zambia 2013, Day 3 – More Than Just My Hand

June 27, 2013

Today was so beautiful. Once again we interacted with the kids at Chikumbuso and taught them different games and activities.  At Chikumbuso, the school is a really nice place for children to learn, but outside of the gate it is a totally different scenario.  There is much trash everywhere with goats and chickens running around.  But, more importantly, there are many children walking around who clearly should be in school but are not.  You have to wonder if they will ever be able to get an education or be motivated to go to school on their own.

Chitukuko is the other school that we went to today.  This school had dreadfully small classrooms, a nasty bathroom hole, and hundreds of beautiful children.  This was the turning point for me, just going and seeing the faces of the children who have next to nothing but each other. All of them smile and laugh which is so heart warming to me.  When comparing the two schools you can tell that the difference is which is getting donations in terms of the resources that they have.  Chitukuko was so small and had a small amount of people to look after all the kids.  When we arrived and played games and sang the kids were so excited. It was clear when watching them that they knew we truly cared about them just by us being there.  This one girl stuck onto me for the entire time. She wanted to me to hold her hand and just stay to comfort her. I felt so helpless because I wanted to give her more than just my hand; I wanted to give her a lot more joy in her life.  This showed me that kids in America are so ungrateful, I mean I knew it, but here we were actually experiencing little kids drink dirty water and eat minimal portions of food. The children here, so far, always wave and have a huge smile on their faces.  This experience is so beautiful and breathtaking.  Knowing that this has only been the second day I know that there is more to come.

Malik J., The SEED School