25th September - Being Seen

Today started with Devotions, walking down we heard beautiful singing by the choirs in devotions.

As usual we headed back to the guest house for breakfast and then our day began.

Anna had collected jewellery from her friends to give to the ladies here at Home of Hope. We started off at 8:30am with the ladies who have worked at Home of Hope most of their lives and know every child by name.

These ladies; Lucy, Linda, Mary, Dolly and Lerato all said - we feel seen. Thank you!

Next it was off to the primary school to take some clips for a new sponsorship video.

We had a wonderful talk with the head master of the primary school who explained how the education system works. He would love some UK teachers to come out for a short term trip to teach in the classes and teach the teachers as well. They have up to 60 students in each class and this means that the government will pay for teachers to be at the school. Of course not all children at the school turn up every day.

We slowly walked over to the secondary school where we found the head teacher. Once again an eye opening time hearing all about how the secondary school system works and how it has changed since the Covid 19 pandemic.

We filmed in some classes and then interviewed the headteacher. She is amazing!

Whilst close we popped into Protection 4 Education where some home of Hope graduates make reusable sanitary towels as well as some children’s clothes. The work they do keeps girls in school.

We crawled back to the guest house for lunch after a very busy morning. We were told to rest so did so.

This afternoon though was filled with delight, as the house mothers. Female College students and VTC students came to choose jewellery and bras. It was both beautiful and heart breaking to watch. Once again the big message they wanted us to know was that they had felt seen. They mentioned that the group before us (Gillian, Jo and Ruth) had also bought jewellery but they felt that they had been seen again and how wonderful it was that we could see how hard they are working.

We sent Dolly off with clothes for some of the boys and they came and showed us what they had chosen / been given by Dolly. They were so excited. A huge shout out to The Luton Borough Dragons. Some of the team donated their football kits from the last season.

We finished the day with Agogo and the girls thanking us for their bras.

Today has been exhausting. Tomorrow is our final day at Home of Hope including going back to the Boma.

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