My blog posting has been thwarted today by a power cut which means I cannot connect to the internet or get on with work. These happen everyday here, though often only for a few minutes. Hopefully this one won’t last long and I’ll be able to upload this……
This week I’ve been having meetings every afternoon with each department to set the budgets for next financial year. It’s been contracted process as the charity is being restructured next year and some departments have been merged or split. Each meeting takes hours here as there is always lots of discussion in any case.
I also spent a morning with Anne, one of the social workers, visiting her outreach cases in a nearby town called Ruiru. We first met a single mother who has 3 daughters and who has been kicked out of her in-laws home after her husband died. This is quite common in Kenya. Anne is trying to get her two eldest daughters into school so we went to meet a local head teacher to arrange an interview for the girls. I was quite a celebrity in the playground. In one classroom all the children wanted to hug me.
We then went to visit a landlord of one of the boys that AfCiC help. He’s 16 and since his elder brother moved away hasn’t been able to pay the rent. The Landlord has been holding off but can no longer afford to, so Anne arranged for AfCiC to pay the rent so he can stay in school.
Our last visit of the day was to the Outreach clinic where homeless children can come and play one day a week and get lunch. It’s from these boys that AfCiC will get their bi-annual intakes for the residential programme at the ICC. A lot of them are under pressure to join gangs so it’s good to keep them occupied one day if possible. A mother and grandmother also brought their 2 daughters to meet Anne to see if she could help getting them into work. They want to train as hairdressers. Even though every women seems to get her hair restyled every second day here the set up costs are really high so Anne suggested they train as tailors instead. The family will need to find someone that can train them and ideally pay for the machine, but AfCiC will help with contacts and advice. It was an interesting morning.
The power is now back! I am going to the beach at Mombassa this weekend so will write more next week.
This week I’ve been having meetings every afternoon with each department to set the budgets for next financial year. It’s been contracted process as the charity is being restructured next year and some departments have been merged or split. Each meeting takes hours here as there is always lots of discussion in any case.
I also spent a morning with Anne, one of the social workers, visiting her outreach cases in a nearby town called Ruiru. We first met a single mother who has 3 daughters and who has been kicked out of her in-laws home after her husband died. This is quite common in Kenya. Anne is trying to get her two eldest daughters into school so we went to meet a local head teacher to arrange an interview for the girls. I was quite a celebrity in the playground. In one classroom all the children wanted to hug me.
We then went to visit a landlord of one of the boys that AfCiC help. He’s 16 and since his elder brother moved away hasn’t been able to pay the rent. The Landlord has been holding off but can no longer afford to, so Anne arranged for AfCiC to pay the rent so he can stay in school.
Our last visit of the day was to the Outreach clinic where homeless children can come and play one day a week and get lunch. It’s from these boys that AfCiC will get their bi-annual intakes for the residential programme at the ICC. A lot of them are under pressure to join gangs so it’s good to keep them occupied one day if possible. A mother and grandmother also brought their 2 daughters to meet Anne to see if she could help getting them into work. They want to train as hairdressers. Even though every women seems to get her hair restyled every second day here the set up costs are really high so Anne suggested they train as tailors instead. The family will need to find someone that can train them and ideally pay for the machine, but AfCiC will help with contacts and advice. It was an interesting morning.
The power is now back! I am going to the beach at Mombassa this weekend so will write more next week.
Great blog nic. Sound like you are doing a fantastic job. You will certainly leave your mark there nic! Dee xx
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