When we came back from church one day, street kids came
running after us and began jumping all over Courtney and Sam. Apparently they
had seen these kids before. There were six of them, one girl, all under the age
of 6. I was watching Sam and Courtney play with them, and then Grayson picked
one up, then Andrew, then Shelley.
I was just standing there. The kids were dirty; they had a
dirty pair of underwear to clothe them. One kid was holding a little baby,
wanting us to take it from him.
Don’t let this guy fool you, he may look sad, but as soon as he put that baby down, he went crazy!
I don’t do kids all that much or on the Race I haven’t.
But then, one of the boys came up to me, threw his arms above
his head and looked up at me with a huge gaps and rotten teeth smile. That was
it, my heart broke and I put the dirty kid in my arms.
It was something really interesting to me that the kids would
just come and look at me wanting me to hold them. They didn’t care if I played
with them or even seemed interested in them; they just wanted to be held and I loved doing that.
Later, we found out more of their story from their mom. She had six kids all on her own without a home and she just found a little baby on the street. She began taking care of him too. That’s love right there.
The time playing with them ended with one of the younger boys
chasing after me naked because I was ready to leave and he took his pants off. He tried to get me to
pick him up, but I kept telling him not without his pants. I think our translator
tried to get him to get his pants or something because the little boy left,
grabbed his pants, and came running back after me with the pants in hand.
I was trying to walk back to the hotel to get away from
him, but had to run across the street with him right behind trying to jump and climb on me, naked. This made a really funny scene for my
teammates and everyone driving by.
