By Danielle Rivera

The flight dragged on. I couldn’t get comfortable and the month that stretched before me seemed like an insurmountable time if I ended up not liking where I was headed. Clocking in at almost nineteen hours, my flight to Kenya was one of the longest flights I had been on. I had traveled internationally alone before, but this was different. I couldn’t shake the fear and sadness that sat somewhere in my chest, blocking the air from reaching my lungs and keeping my heart in a tight hold which my rapid heartbeat couldn’t escape. Usually my anti-depressant helped me cope with these feelings, but on that day, the fears that I wouldn’t be able to handle the extreme poverty, or that I wouldn’t be able to maintain a neutral attitude, much less a positive one, and that I was no longer capable as I once was of being on my own were all dominant thoughts in my mind. I was afraid I would be a stone, dragging the group of teachers down, and that I would be a hindrance to the girls I was trying to help.

I kept repeating to myself, you’re working with young girls who live in extreme poverty in Kibera, a slum in Kenya; you are going to love it. Over and over. You even got a scholarship from the school to participate on this trip, you can’t let them down, I added—probably unhelpfully—to my mantra. But I still couldn’t shake it—the deeply seated thoughts of self doubt and fear.

The bus was boisterous, Lily, one of my roommates, sat next to me telling me about her experiences the previous year as we bounced around the back seat. I looked out the windows trying to absorb the entire slum in hopes I could cope, while Lily put on her Kenyan accent to share how the girls would say, “Teach-a may I go to washroom?” As we approached the slum, the streets became more crowded and narrowed. Tin shacks offered food, water and haircuts, including Obama’s barbershop, and other amenities. Finally, the pavement ran out and plumes of dust began to follow the bus.

Suddenly, dust wasn’t the only thing following us. A couple of men began to yell in rapid Kiswahili, hitting the windows, rattling the metal frames where Diesha sat. Their hands were curled into angry fists, which pounded the bus with a force that made the windows shake. A few men grew into eight. Seeking reassurance, I glanced back at Lily, hoping that this was normal, and not some new dangerous situation. Her shocked face clearly indicated that this was not common. Diesha quickly dropped the camera she had been holding, recording the drive into Kibera, hoping to deter them. Finally, the driver began to yell at them while gangly Nathan, one of the leaders on our trip, moved back with Diesha and grabbed her camera. It wasn’t until our Kenyan driver spoke to them in Kiswahili that they stopped and dispersed. We got off the bus, leaving me more unsettled about this place than I had ever been before.

 

Kibera, the size of Central Park, is the largest slum in Africa, and depending on whom you ask, in the world. No one knows how many people live there, but some estimate that it’s somewhere between 700,000 and 1.5 million. We walked daily into some of the poorer areas of the slum, where status can be judged by how close a person lives to the paved roads and concrete buildings. The slum, remnants of the British occupation, began after crossing the train tracks that stretched across Kenya. It was somewhat dangerous because the trains went by silently, and there were certainly no signs or warnings to keep passersby aware of incoming trains. Next to the tracks was the river of refuse that inevitably comes from so many people living so close together with no toilets, trash system, or formal waste disposal system. The air was smoky, a unique smell of refuse, fried dough, and smoke. The Kenyan government doesn’t recognize Kibera, so the slum is left to its own devices. Our morning walk, after jumping across the tracks and slowly moving river, wound us back into the roads among tin structures and women cooking bits of fried dough, kids running around, some heading to school, others helping with housework. The smoke was thick and copious. At the clinic, attached to the school we worked at, they had me take a TB test because of the chronic cough I had developed from the poor air quality. It was fascinating. There would be local political rallies, speeches, children who would chant, “how are you” and mutter “mzungu” (white person) as we went by.

On our first day at Kibera School for Girls, we didn’t actually interact with the girls. We only saw them through the window of the first floor classrooms as they waved at us while we walked by. We spent that day in an unused classroom bonding with our Kenyan teacher counterparts, and further preparing for our classes. The program leaders were Nathan and Alix, two American college graduates who had spent the last two years working for the school in Kenya. They ushered us into the small rooms, which were small and dark and had only one light, which meant that when the day was cloudy the classrooms stayed dark. It was here in the sparse rooms, uneven floors, and shaky wooden benches, where the girls began their education.

 

Nothing could prepare me for the girls I met. I was in charge of the 4th grade homeroom, the oldest girls, until one of the Kenyan students had to leave for a scholarship opportunity and I was placed in the Pre-K classroom. In between homeroom, we taught all of the kids and developed different activities for them each day. My first three days of lessons were with Aaron, one of the other American teachers, and we did a drawing activity with the Pre-K and Kindergarten kids. We would have fifteen kids in a small room (it felt like thirty) with colored pencils and butcher paper all laughing and generally going crazy. It didn’t help that they were all wearing red sweaters, knee length blue skirts, and long socks. Half of the younger girls all lost their nametags in the first day, the other half lost them (or ate them) by the end of the week, which meant until we learned their names, chaos reigned. The only time we could keep them quiet was through our demonstration, where Aaron would trace my body on the chalkboard. Every time when I stepped away, rapt eyes would widen and they’d gasp at the chalk outline that remained, despite watching it happen just before. Their energy was astounding.

At recess one day, we were on the roof of the girls’ school. The upper school girls—the 1st through 4th graders—were running around, swinging, playing games I had never seen and will likely never see in an American school. Lilian, one of my fourth graders, was taking this time to learn more about the magical United States. Since she had hardly been outside of the Kenyan slum she lived in, it was hard to grasp just how abstract our culture is. Aaron stopped by us to grab sunscreen, lathering it into his pale, but reddish skin before resuming a boisterous game with some of the second grade girls.

Lilian asked me, “What is that white stuff?”

I explained, “That is a lotion that people with lighter skin have to wear when the sun is out. Otherwise, they would get burned.”

I could see her trying to grasp the concept. Looking back at me, her eyes processing my face and skin, she asked, pointing at the breakouts blooming on my face, “Is that a sunburn?” My embarrassment didn’t faze her, she had no idea that she had pointed something out that people try to hide.

Another day, Rachel and I were doing a music video workshop with some of the kindergarten girls on the rooftop. I loved this workshop because despite the girls having non-existent hips at four and five years old, they could rhythmically pop them back and forth in ways that were unfathomable to the rest of us. Besides, they really took to “Single Ladies” and danced with gusto. In between practice runs, one of the girls grabbed my nametag. She sounded out my name slowly, “D-a-n-i-e-l-l-a K-i-b-e-r-a.” Though she was wrong, she inadvertently adopted me into their home at the school. The Kenyan college students who were volunteering with us began to call me Kibera, and like it had become a part of my name there, it became part of who I was.

 

We spent our month in Kenya in a very nice house outside of the slum. It had been turned into a hotel, and had a beautiful chandelier, a TV that we rarely used, a pool with freezing water, and a surplus of bunk beds, so that each room could fit up to seven or eight beds. Each of us resided in a room with three others. It was a well-spaced room and we each had a couple of drawers and a cabinet for our stuff. By that point in time, I had already read most of my books, and all that was left was a religious book I couldn’t get into, and Half the Sky, a book about women’s rights by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. I had started it, but the stories were so painful that it was hard to get through. However, Kristof had written multiple articles on the school I was working at and I was determined to get through it. I spent most of the day reading, sleeping, and fighting off mosquitoes. By the time I finished the book, I wanted to read more of his work, particularly about my girls. The first article of his I read was an old opinion piece, sharing the successes that the school had since an earlier column. I was bursting with pride that came from being a part of this movement as I read the article, until I came across one line:

“Still, obstacles are enormous. This broke my heart: At least 20 percent of the girls have been raped, the teachers say. Rapes have left two of the kindergarten girls with fistulas, internal injuries causing them to leak wastes.”

I remembered a moment, in my fourth grade classroom, when I was practicing everyone’s names. I had turned to point at one of the girls, my arm swinging out wide from my body towards her, and I remembered how, instinctually, she flinched. I hadn’t considered it before, but I realized, while I had been innocently practicing names, she might have been instinctually reacting to something that, based on her experience, appeared far more sinister—physical abuse.

I began to realize, and picture, each smiling girl in my mind, knowing that these girls who I love had dealt with such horrific experiences, ones I couldn’t even fathom. Each day they came into class, boisterous and bright, with high-spirited personalities. Through my numerous tears, in my small twin bed, on a day that suddenly felt far too sunny, I came to appreciate the brave strength and hope with which they faced every day. In a culture where women’s education is not valued, and where women themselves are not valued, they got up each day, and walked—some of the youngest walked over a mile alone—to get to school. Their determination in the face of everything, gave me hope.

 

On our last day, there was a performance. All of us were looking forward to it, but kind of dreading it as well, as it would mark the end of our time with these girls we loved as if they were our children. There would be tears we knew, and wanted to avoid them as much as possible. The Pre-K girls had a fashion show, where they wore their Sunday best and one of their regular teachers put makeup on all of them. There were bright colors, fully denim outfits, and dresses galore. Then, each homeroom would perform something. Presentations always follow a routine. It begins with, “We are the Pre-K homeroom and we are presenting “Lean on Me.” Then they would curtsy and say, “Welcome.”

Then Daniella, a small boisterous girl with a shaved head who, whenever she saw me would shout, “Teacha Daniella! We have the same name!” began to sing.

“Sometimes in our lives, we all have pain, we all have sorrows. But, I’m going to need somebody to lean on. Lean on me. When I’m not strong I’m going to need somebody to lean on.”

By the end of the song, I was in tears. This song, which adapted Bill Wither’s lyrics, was somehow both a call for help from the world they lived in and a promise of being able to help others while they did it. While we were there to teach them and help them grow as students and as children, somehow I was the one leaning on them.

True to form, as they exited the stage, one of the girls stopped, seeing my face, and asked, “teacha, there is water on your face, are you ok?” Her genuine concern rested in her dark, brown eyes. Laughing, and wiping my eyes, I hugged her and assured her that I was more than okay.

 

Danielle Rivera is an English Writing and Rhetoric and Pre-Med student who graduates in December 2014. She will continue her education at St. Edward’s University, getting a Masters in Liberal Arts before continuing on to medical school. Her piece is about a summer she spent working for a non-profit, Shining Hope for Communities, which seeks to break the cycle of extreme poverty by educating girls.

Painting in header is “Oil and Water” by Jana Soares. Jana Soares is a senior Honors Student, majoring in Biology and minoring in Chemistry, at St. Edward’s University. She loves colors and design, and enjoys creating art through painting, drawing, and making handmade greeting cards, which she has done since a young age. Two of her art pieces have been featured in the Sorin Oak Review.