The Lost Boys… Disney’s Peter Pan evokes images of pudgy little kids in animal costumes while the 1990’s hit Hook brings to mind imaginary food eating hooligans. While these two adaptations (or should I say extention in Hook’s case) of JM Barry’s classic story paint the boys in very different tones they have one thing in common, they’re orphans.
This past month I had an amazing opportunity to partner with Kedesh Santuario, a boys orphanage in Beira, Mozambique. Not all of the boys are orphans in the traditional mindset. Some come from of homes filled with abuse, while others have one, or two parents that just can’t take care of them, so they come to Kedesh, a place that is truly home.
When we arrived at Kedesh on a friday afternoon, after days of traveling the boys were still out of school on summer vacation. As we pulled up Regina Spektor was blaring over speakers in the tree house and all the boys came running, eager to help out. And helping became a continuous pattern over the month. The boys were all helpful, really helpful.
Kedesh is home to 26 boys ranging in age from about 9 to 21. The boys are expected to help out around the Kedesh property by keeping their personal space clean, doing their chores (which change every month), and by practicing good hygiene.
Undoubtably one of the most difficult chores, or at least more time consuming is cooking the meals (followed closely by tending the goats). Luckily the menu is fairly simple,
Breakfast- Oatmeal and/or Morvite (a grainy vitamin hot cereal)
Lunch- Rice and beans with bread
Dinner- Rice and cooked cabbage with bread
Dinner and lunch were sometimes switched and cabbage was sometimes substituted with pumpkin leaves, but preparing most of the meals was incredibly time consuming for the boys no matter which menu item they were asked to cook (save for breakfast), and their efforts were always greatly appreciated come meal time.
And then there was snack time…. Onion Rings, cake, fried dough and then popcorn… every night. Most nights after dinner we would watch either a movie or a couple episodes of season 2 of LOST (which the boys love and also semi plays into my blog title) and the boys would cook up a giant pot of popcorn. Our last week at Kedesh was actually quite devastating. Apparently Mozambique entered into a popcorn shortage and we were left popcorn-less for the rest of our time there. Bummer.
…And when the popcorn went away some of the boys began getting a little more creative with their snacks. One day I was standing in the kitchen when one of the younger boys, Blande came in and started emptying his pockets, pulling out an array of bugs, crickets, grasshoppers and things I don’t even know. He threw a little oil in the frying pan, threw in the bugs in a viola! Snack time! Being one who never wants to let an opportunity pass me by I had to try one, and you know what? It really did taste like chicken. I forgot to de-wing the cricket so those were the hardest part to swallow, but all in all, it wasn’t that bad…
After a week at Kedesh the boys went back to school so our days of racing around the trees in the “jungle” and catching ripe mangos when they fell from the trees were decreased. The young boys would go to school in the morning and most of the older boys would wither go to the local Adventist school in the afternoon, or to a vocational school called Young Africa. We worked around their schooling, finding time to help with their chores and with their school work, and we definitely still found time to have fun, like with our mid-day water fights usually instigated by Kedesh’s father figure John.
I learned a lot during my month at Kedesh, but I mostly saw that John and Heather are helping raise up some pretty incredible young men. Boys who are learning to honor their possessions, the people around them, and most of all, God, and it’s pretty cool to see. I look forward to checking in on the boys at Kedesh in a couple years. Seeing where they are in life, and what they’ve become because I know God has big things in store for each one of them.
