More than a simple meal
By Becky Timbers
10 February 2008
Like a thirsty herd of antelope drawn to fresh water, the knot of young school children raced to form a single file line before me, their faces bright and glowing, but each pair of eyes wide with an insatiable hunger. They kept fidgeting, unable to remain still while the thick aroma of boiled beans and maize fueled the growling in their bellies. Excited chatter filled the air, a babble of noise to my ears, like the nonsensical prattle of chipmunks. The young ones twisted their dirt-streaked hands in the folds of their stained t-shirts and shapeless dresses while the older boys and girls, lined up according to age behind the youngest, clasped each other's shoulders. On tiptoes, they peered out over the tops of black matted heads to where I was seated on a low wooden bench, ladling the watery mixture into cracked plastic cups and dented metal bowls.
One by one the children approached me, arms outstretched and containers clutched tightly between chapped fingers as if to offer me a chance for peace or redemption. I took their offering and filled it with salvation. One ladle per child, hardly enough to sustain an infant let alone a growing youngster. I ached to give them more, knowing that for most, this was the only meal they would receive that day. But I was afraid that I would run out and then have to explain to some, why they would not get their share, so I dutifully measured out each spoonful.
I was volunteering at the impoverished school through i-to-i, an international foundation committed to the improvement of developing nations. Situated on the outskirts of town and only one step away from the city garbage heap, Nakuru is a small city located in the south-western region of Kenya. Like most Kenyan villages, its streets are filled with fruit and vegetable stands and men on bicycles weave in and out of pedestrian traffic. The buildings are smudged with the grime of sooty exhaust and unmatched shoes litter the rutted pavement. Matatus, VW-like buses, zoom past at harrowing speeds, limbs and heads sticking out of the tiny windows as even more commuters pile in the sliding door and slip 40 shillings to the tout.
The school itself was rather decrepit. Three small classrooms, constructed of decaying beams and cement walls, were furnished with several rickety desks and a cracked slate chalkboard. Pages of donated workbooks lay crumpled in the corners, the paper yellowing and torn from age, and markers, long without their caps, were strewn across the dirt floor. A cramped schoolyard with dusty red dirt contained several flat soccer balls and other broken toys and a metal door, its hinges rusty and creaking, opened out from the serrated tin confines of the schoolyard and onto a furrowed dirt road.
At first, I was at a loss as to how to proceed in teaching basic math skills and English phrases to the children staring up at me from their benches. They waited silently, their dark pupils accentuated by the whiteness of their eyes and teeth and their skinny legs crossed in an indiscernible tangle beneath the tables.
As I began to read from the workbooks, however, and scratch addition problems onto the slate board with crumbling chalk, the children awoke from their spell. Hands shot up in the air and suppressed murmurs hinted to those who knew the answers or those who simply wanted to be called upon. The classroom transformed from a drab hole-in-the-wall to a lively celebration of excitement and enthusiasm. Over the next few days, teaching became easier as I grew to know each student and their personalities. I marked their papers with a red pen and worked with individuals on simple equations that even I, a junior in college, had trouble remembering how to complete.
Each day at around one pm, classes would let out and the younger children would sit cross-legged on the earthen floor of a hastily constructed shack, listening to a teacher read from old storybooks. The older students would help prepare the midday meal, gathering plates and bowls together and carrying two heavy buckets, filled with a mixture of beans and maize, down to the school from where it was attended to by women in long, dusty skirts and headbands tied around their foreheads.
As a volunteer, and thus a guest of honor, I had the privilege of serving the children their daily rations. It was a powerful experience, one that will always be embedded in my memory as distressing as well as rewarding. I felt a bond with each child as they handed me their tin to be filled; looking into their eyes, I felt like I was granting them hope and sanguinity, a future amid a world of poverty. Their home was among discarded plastic bottles and shredded plastic bags, but for several hours I could offer them respite from their penniless existence and feed them a meager meal.
After each child had received their spoonful, they retreated to a shady spot beneath the sun-beaten eaves of the schoolhouse or rested against the trunk of the sole Jacaranda tree, its branches popping in a wealth of vibrant purple.
The schoolyard, only moments before filled with the triumphant shrieks of goal scorers and the rhythmic beat of hands keeping time to the swoosh of a jump rope, was now silent aside from the scrape of a metal fork and the smack of dry lips.
I hadn't eaten since breakfast that morning and it was now well past noon. My stomach felt empty, but to eat the beans and maize before me would have been impossible. The food would have become lodged in my throat, a solid mass of guilt and shame that had no business of entering my stomach when there were so many children who were far hungrier than I. The teachers, even, stood at the perimeters of the schoolyard and oversaw the ritual midday meal with an indifference that belied their true hunger. I couldn't help but wonder if they had had breakfast that morning or whether they would return home to find a proper meal waiting for them, chock full of stewed meat and vegetables and served over hot rice.
Traveling is a gateway to a higher appreciation of all living things. It allows one to become an open book, ready to record new encounters and innovative ideas that are shared among open communities. It offers the opportunity to bridge the gap between rich and poor, white and colored, Christian and Muslim. Traveling broadens one's mind, a concept that is easily escaped amid the current spread of globalization and western influence.
Above all, this experience taught me humility; it taught me that my materialistic wants and desires are far less essential than a basic education or three substantial meals a day. I learned that to live in a world of ignorance, a world that revolves around a nine-to-five work schedule and taking the kids to soccer practice is to deny other individuals their right to basic needs. I learned that the only way to truly understand humanity as a whole is to extend yourself beyond your comfort-zone and to experience the culture and lifestyles of other societies from the viewpoint of a student, one that interacts and intermingles with their peers.
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