Placement

AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!  A few things....

1. Kids are kids are kids no matter where you are in the world, they are just way easier to deal with when you speak the same language...
2. I cannot even begin to describe how grateful I am to have grown up where I did...I was absolutely humbled today watching 3-6 year olds being so gracious over receiving a cup of chai tea and a piece of butter bread (for most of them the only thing they would eat all day)
3. I’m incredibly impressed by the husband and wife who run the free nursery school where I work
4. I can’t believe that I’m going to be doing this for the next 8 weeks.

First and foremost the children that I’m working with are absolutely adorable, and so many of them are so smart.  Listening to them recite the alphabet and their numbers today was probably one of the most endearing things I’ve ever heard.  But with that said I can’t imagine bringing a child into the world that is here...for most of them, being hungry is the least of their daily worries.  They have huge cuts and scrapes that are filled with dirt, many of them have runny noses and no tissues and no medicine, there are over 60 children in a room barely bigger than my bedroom at home trying desperately to receive some attention and when they don’t get it they resort to wailing on each other so that myself or the other volunteer I’m working with will walk over.  Today three kids got so incredibly excited to show me there pencils when we were going over the letter P I wanted to cry and laugh simultaneously.  

It’s incredibly painful to realize that no matter what I do while I’m here, no matter how hard I work to help these children learn basic skills so that they are ready for primary school in a few years it won’t be enough...because in the end money rules the world, and without it this free school for street children will be shut down.  The question is...where do they get it and how do they make it sustainable?  I shudder to think what would happen to some of these kids if they didn’t get that one cup of tea and that one piece of bread.