Soar Kenya

Each Form 4 student at Hopewell Schools in

Sincerely,

Vitalice Kahendah

Director and Founder

Hopewell Schools

Barut, Kenya

Their mother left them in their father’s care.  Their father later went to jail.  They now live with their elderly grandmother, a sick, poverty stricken widow.  They need help desperately.  Can you sponsor one of these girls or send a one-time gift?

Waunakee FFA is going to do a fund raiser for Soar in April. Its a kiss the calf contest.  Apparently, whichever teacher or principal raises the most money in their jar has to kiss the calf.  Sounds like a fun way to raise money!

The Benton School District in Southwestern Wisconsin has approximately 80 high school students.  The NHS has five energetic motivated students who decided this year to sponsor a child through Soar Kenya.  Last week they completed their fundraising efforts with a Sadie Hawkins Dance.  They raised enough money to support Steicy for 14 months, including birthday and Christmas gifts.  Way to go, Benton NHS!  You rock!

If anyone wishes to make a donation, the Donation button on the bottom right side of the screen will connect you to Paypal.

Also, if anyone wishes sponsor  the boy whose entire village was razed, please contact me at aileensoarkenya@yahoo.com.  Sponsorship  costs $24 a month.  One-time gifts are also welcome.

Feel free to post comments, questions or information.  Your input is welcome.  There is a delay in seeing the post as I  check all posts so we don’t have spam showing up on the website.

Thank you for taking time to consider helping us help the Kenyans.

Some fragile peace is holding and we only hope and pray that it holds permanently.The last few days have seen calm in many parts of Kenya….only the Kericho and Kisii border remains volatile.Though tension remains high even in towns, businesses and work are slowly resuming.Many people are hand-to-mouth types and realize that they must tolerate each other and go out to work daily to earn a living.

Schools re-started today and the turn-out was poor in most schools.But still,this is a positive sign that life will soon be back to normal.  At Hopewell,we only had 100 kids today and spent most of the time doing general guidance and counseling.Many kids are traumatized and have harrowing stories to tell.  We will be profiling individual cases starting tomorrow so that we know the most desperate cases and handle those ones first with what we have. The saddest narration was from N. in Form 3.The day I walked them from school at night and made everyone sleep in the hostels, he went to his home and found his father had been killed in the night.  The police came and took the body to the morgue but since then, they have searched in the three public morgues for the body but failed.You can imagine what the family is undergoing….losing the sole breadwinner and even losing the body. Another sad episode came from E. of Form 2. He went home the following day and couldn’t trace where his homestead was…..the whole village razed to the ground.The boy is so traumatized, and the situation is worsened by the fact that he hasn’t been able to trace any member of his family. Yes, school is definitely on but the whole of this first week,  staff will be doing lots of counseling and determining the best way to help the affected kids.We have immediately put all these desperate cases in the hostel.

I will be traveling to Nairobi tomorrow to go negotiate an exemption for the shipment which has been lying at the Embakasi ICD for over a week now.The clearing agent who was supposed to negotiate an exemption from customs apparently did nothing and only sent us a note saying customs wanted Kshs.251000 as fees……….where do we get that from, and if we had it,I would find better ways of using that.So I am there tomorrow and will et you know of my success!

Good day mama. I feel so good I have written you.Warmest regards to baba Johnny.

I didn’t get this posted immediately.  While things may have improved somewhat, this gives us a glimpse of what so many Kenyans have gone through.  I continue to remove most if not all identifying information, at least until life becomes normal again.

Dear Friends

Our city finally erupted yesterday and distinguished itself as the worst case of the post-election violence which necessitated the deployment of the army into the streets…….something unprecedented in the history of Kenya. Tension had been building up and everyone thought that the face to face meeting between Raila and Kibaki last Thursday would not only cool things but would usher in lasting peace and restraint.

I started at school Thursday after spending the whole of Wednesday with N. and 4 other Rotarians,  at the worst hit area where our Rotary club in conjunction with the one in Nairobi had gone to deliver medical aid, beddings other relief items. I left school at 10am with the intention of reaching the showground to continue tent-pitching at our Rotary Shelter Camp. On reaching town, the tension that had been simmering boiled over as youths started throwing rocks and blockading roads. When the police arrived, the town became a chaotic scene giving an opportunity to the usual looters to break into shops and cause even more damage. I got a bicycle taxi(boda boda) to take me home from where I walked up to the school.   School remained calm but the residents, Kalenjin warriors started arming themselves to protect any possible invasion from the Kikuyu raiders from the town side. I ended the day at school and crossed over with students and teachers at the end of the day. We thought things would be equally tense in town but calm in our area so kids went to school peacefully in the morning. With my first class starting at 11 am, I started from town en route the showground but didn’t reach. Town was crazy with tear gas and gun shots renting the air, buildings burning, etc. Walked to school,  taught my class and miraculously reached the show ground in the afternoon to complete additional 21 tents with the few volunteers who managed to show up. R. called me at 5pm saying that kids from the town end of school were stranded in school and could not cross the bridge to the hostels and their homes. Violence had erupted in our area between the Kikuyu and Kalenjin. I went home, took my bike and cycled to school. I passed through five road blocks where I had to identify myself and tribe..something ridiculous and silly! I declined to mention my tribe and instead simply introduced myself as a  teacher going to bring back 80 stranded kids and sought for safe passage in advance. Persuading the Kikuyus on the town end was the trickiest part I am Luo and the choice target for the raiders. The Kalenjin warriors let me pass through without any problem. I have worked among them for the last 7 years and people there respect our school. Passing through the roadblocks with 80 kids in tow at 6.30 pm was spine chilling. All kids, especially the boys had to be inspected at close range if they were indeed students or just Kalenjin raiders dressed in uniforms. I was lucky no member of staff joined the group…the males would have probably been harmed. They remained and slept at R’s. I settled all kids in the hostel, hired 4 vigilantes to guard the premises for the night and cycled home unaware that a curfew had been declared. I was still lucky walking with God till about 200 metres from my house when I had a first run-in with the army. Instead of asking me anything or even ordering me to rush home, they just fired two shots in the air to scare away a lone harmless rider ignorant of curfew.

I had hardly settled into the house than my landlord and his wife entered to inform me that a decision had been arrived at in a meeting of the landlords (read Kikuyu) to flash out all Luo people from their rented houses and any landlord who doesn’t comply will risk a visit by the dreaded Mungiki(Kikuyu militia) who are renowned for beheading their victims. They gave me till noon today to pack my belongings and leave.

I started from town this morning in the hope of finding house rental agents open but no business was open today except the supermarket, major banks and matatus in the morning hours. I left town for the hostels to take basic food supplies that should last the kids there till this coming Tuesday. I found the greatest horror of my life at the gate of the building next to the hostel. A young man suspected of being a traitor by the Kikuyu youths, had been dragged from his house this morning, hacked to death and lynched. He was just there, dead and burning! This is a man I know; he trains one of the local soccer teams and runs his video show business. The killers said he was seen with the Kalenjin raiders the day before.

We managed to reach the parents of some of the kids and by the time I left the premises at 2pm this afternoon, 46 kids had either been picked up by parents, guardians or relatives. Some had been put into a bus after arrangement with their parents. We only have 4 kids there, an easier number to manage, especially in terms of security.

The curfew and army patrols have helped somehow and it was relatively calm today compared to the craziness of yesterday. We will watch how things unfold tomorrow Sunday and then make a decision on Monday. If the security situation continues worsening, we will take all the remaining kids to the Rotary Shelter camp which is being guarded by the paramilitary GSU unit and try reaching their relatives. If on the other hand the situation improves, as we all hope and pray for, then school will resume from Tuesday. I am 30 minutes away from curfew start and have to rush home. The cyber is closing down now. More tomorrow. We are safe……….but scared. All of us are real scared!

Be blessed dear friends.

We just concluded the first week of school well. Although the numbers of kids who have reported to schools are low, it is encouraging considering what Kenyans have gone through in the last one month. 50% of the kids have reported to class. We are only waiting for  a teacher at the Junior School and our Physics teacher who ferried his family back home to Western Province and was to be back today.

N. and I still share our time between the IDP camps and school. Our own school has been on this week and also has half the student population. We hope that the fear and tension that has been lingering should be gone by next week and schools should be full with kids. We are seriously considering opening up a second junior school in a quarter acre of land adjacent to the school (the part we grew cabbages on). This is an urgent need to cater for the many kids from the families that were displaced from the wider Rhonda slums and the main estates in town and crossed over to our  area where they have either rented apartments or live in the Chief’s camp. I will give you an update on this.

Today I send special and sincere gratitude to you and Johnny, HOPE Inc and your many friends who positively responded to our appeal for help during the most trying period that our country has undergone. It is during such times that one gets to know who true friends are and the many Americans who contributed to keep the Hopewell community afloat and alive in terms of food and other basic needs, have distinguished themselves as true friends. We and the other charitable projects that are principally supported by donations and goodwill could easily have gone under and the many children whose hopes of getting out of poverty and its debilitating effects could have been the biggest losers. I will forever be grateful for the speed with which you took up this appeal and the generosity which followed. Every single dollar has so far gone into buying foodstuffs(whose prices have more than doubled),helping take care of the 800  internally displaced persons who sought refuge at our school and lived in our classrooms for two weeks at the height of the ethnic violence, paying for the transportation of staff and students back to school from the far-flung areas of the country and now being used to stabilize the school and getting the most-afflicted students basic school supplies and personal effects to restart life. More food will still have to be bought to last the school till the second week of April when first term ends. I am also most grateful for the speedy wiring of the staff pay for both December and January which practically kept our staff ALIVE during this time. Many thanks………you just didn’t help me, you helped all the 40 teachers and administrative staff and their families survive the mayhem and ensure they stay put . You kept many hopes alive and ours now is to soldier on with what we know how to do best……..teach, counsel, model and help transform these many young souls under our care into the catalysts that will bring the lasting and positive healing that this hurting country needs. THANK YOU VERY MUCH AND BE FOREVER BLESSED.

Please pass our sincere gratitude to all those who contributed in this large-scale humanitarian relief project spearheaded by HOPE.

Dear Friends,

Times have become tough. There is no trust between us - Kenyans, any more. Everyone has become a suspect and i cannot help wondering what will happen to us when peace returns to this country. Kikuyu landlords have sent away their Luo tenants and most shopkeepers will sell to you after knowing your tribe. Silly!!Silly!! - i know you agree with me. Reality will hit them once life gets back to normal and business will be bad for them - they will need tenants and buyers but woe unto them.

Life has become very difficult - with all the rumors and fear of attacks!!! You keep turning as you speak lest your words fall on wrong ears, you cannot identify yourself by tribe and it is a crime to speak your mother tongue coz you never know who is listening. We are living a day at a time, trying to think positively and worrying less about tomorrow.

Those of us whose minds are still sober are trying to help out where possible. It is a difficult task indeed because a Luo will not understand why a Kikuyu like me is trying to help and as I said everyone is a suspect. So they all think there is a hidden agenda. I try to make them understand that despite the fact that I am a Kikuyu, all of us belong to one tribe - the Kenyan ‘tribe’. For those who understand me, helping them is easy but for those who refuse to understand they accept me because they have no choice. It is an accomplishment at the end of the day because despite what they think about me, i still save a life.

V. and I have been very busy at the IDPs camps. Most of our teachers and old boys/girls have been of great help. It is a pathetic situation and what makes it difficult for me is to think of all those vulnerable people - kids, expectant women, sick people etc sleeping in the cold not very sure about what tomorow holds for them. This is what has become of our lives. We are doing our best. They are now settled, so congested in the tents but still living. So we have three sets to take care of - our kids at school who have been reporting back since Monday, the Show-ground camp and the Stadium camp. Most of our kids and teachers have also been displaced and in fact wake up from IDP camps to come to school. We pray that all will be well with us some day soon.

It’s tiresome but I feel God meant V. and I to do this. So many offer to help but give up on the way but through school, V. and I know better. You never give hope to the hopeless and then take it away. That is worse that murder.

So, we have been very busy, taking care of fellow Kenyans. Everyone was affected in one way or the other - some lost their loved ones, others their property and all of us suffer from unprecedented trauma. Thank God there are those who are stronger and have been taking care of the weaker. I haven’t written in a long time because there has always been something to do at the 3 places and I have to be home before 7 oclock , that is when the curfew begins.

Thank you so much for the times we have talked on phone and all the time you have spared to drop a line. I am humbled by the concern and love you have shown me. I do appreciate all the good deeds you have directed in our way. I can give you nothing in return for this priceless gesture.  I pray that our dear God blesses you and your loved ones. May He restore peace and love that once reigned in this great Nation.

I love you all.