For the past 3 days we have been taking a truck into a remote area, away from the compound we are staying on, and hanging out at one of the schools. The children are beautiful and they are so excited when we pull up…”Auntie, Auntie, Auntie…”. They study at the school from 9-4 and then venture back into their village. The children are all eager to know what is going on in America and in their little bit of English always ask if it is night in America. The first day was awkward because of the language barrier and the fact that some of these children have never seen a person with such light colored skin. They were quite shocked. I decided to break the awkwardness and draw a hopscotch board which warmed them up to the idea of us interacting with them.
We also visited the village and it was like nothing I have ever seen before. It was heartbreaking. I hate to even call it poverty because I believe it is way beyond poverty, destitution, needy. It was indescribable. There was garbage, feces, and filth everywhere. The children are running around playing games, the men were drinking and playing cards, the women were staring at us. Some of the women pulled out their cell phones to take pictures of us, the token white people. We were quite a spectacle and led quite a parade. It was uncomfortable.
The name of the village that we visited is Amri Tola. It is adjacent to a crushing factory where they crush pieces of the nearby mountain to grind into cement. Dust is everywhere and covers everything. There are an unsurmountable amount of these villages. The thing that makes this one different is a young man felt called in 2005 to pray for this particular village. He began a Sunday school for the kids bribing the kids to come by giving them snacks. The village people questioned the motives of the young man but when a doctor was able to come from the GEMS hospital to give medicine to a girl that was later healed of Tuberclosis, they began to gain a repore with the village people. A village that was overcome by prostitution and illegitimate, unwanted children was slowly becoming a place of HOPE and LOVE. Financial help was provided by Samaritan’s Purse and GEMS to help 64 children within the village. In one service 23 children from the village received the Holy Spirit and some were even healed from HIV and Hepatitis B.
The girls are safe during the day at the school that has been built, but at night they must return home to their parents who often make them “dance” at weddings and social functions.
All the girls on our team were wary of what this dancing involved as our first reaction was to make the little girls at the school feel beautiful even in their tattered, filthy navy blue sweaters that they are provided by Compassion Ministries. We wanted to spin and twirl them, but we were scared. We didn’t know the implications of these actions, if there were any. It is such a shame and frankly makes me sick thinking about the innocence of these careful girls being spoiled. These girls are living in fear of their moms, dads, uncles, brothers, even sisters who are encouraging the provocative dancing because they are hoping one of the men at these events might like what they see and pay extra, for a little extra. Only it is not a little extra. It is a lot, and it is not fair or right. It is despicable.
It doesn’t take a special pair of glasses or looking from a certain angle to see the hard life these children have. I can’t see it from their gorgeous smiles and their tight hugs. I can’t see it from their pleads to play the games with them.
I see it when they close their eyes to pray and have the deepest look of sincerity and desperation I have EVER seen. It is incomparable. The beauty of it is, I know my God is their God and I know just as He provides for the birds, He will provide for me, and He will provide for them.
