| Gordon
Bramall
has received
the following email letter and photographs from Peter Davey who
heads up 'Rags to Riches', a charity of which St.Chad's Church
subscribes to. |
August
2009
A big Hello from everyone in Kenya and Peter and Linda in Portugal.
Its school
hols in Kenya, although it's what passes for the cool season
there rather than the mid summer we are enjoying in Europe. East
Africa depends on seasonal rains in April and May to permit planting
and to get the crops off to a good start. Unfortunately this
is yet another of those years, which are becoming increasingly
common it seems, where the rains are too short and too light.
Things are
fairly quiet in Kenya at the moment with the two groups that
were at loggerheads last year still bickering but just about
holding their coalition government together. Our hometown of
Nakuru is peaceful and we have been able to continue our work
without too many problems.
We thank God
that nowadays our programmes are able to continue on relatively
smoothly. We have 15 in Primary school to whom we provide uniforms,
shoes, books and a daily lunchtime meal. Four are in Secondary
boarding school, one in a Special School and one in Secondary
day school. The grannies continue to meet on Fridays, knitting
away and rearing the latest litter of piglets. Saturday mornings
are still very busy with 150 or so youngsters from all over the
slum area turning up for games, songs and a bite to eat.
Neither Peter
or Linda have been able to make it over to Kenya this year, but
when finances allow one or other of them will be there. Peter
will be traveling around England seeing sponsors and fundraising
in October, feel free to contact him should you wish to have
him speak in to your church or other group.
Although we
have faced some major resource challenges we are proud that the
children and grannies have been able to depend on the staff and
facilities of the charity. We continue to be in the greatest
debt to all our sponsors and fund raisers, thanks to you a varied
group of people on the other side of the world are being offered
assistance that not only lifts them out of desperate situations
but provides them with long term hope.
With this in
mind, I thought you might like to read in this issue about one
of our children, as it says a lot about what the long term commitment
to people can mean in practical terms. I have chosen our eldest
pupil, Catherine. By no means all of the children who have been
in the programme have excelled a she has, but she is an encouragement
to us and I hope a success story that can you can also take pride
in.
Catherine
is
about to take the final exams of her secondary education.
As you can
see she is now an attractive and confident young woman of nineteen
whom we expect to go on and make the most of her skills and abilities.
Things were
not always so rosy for her. We first met Catherine when she was
about eleven, playing and wandering around the rubbish dump.
At that time she was living at home with her Mum and the rest
of the children. She had an older sister who was sick with AIDS,
Linda began to visit the home and assisted them. Unfortunately
the sister died soon after.
Catherine and
her younger sister Julia joined our programme and began to go
to school and receive one square meal a day. However it wasn't
long after that her mother also fell ill and soon afterwards
she died. At this point the grandmother, Esther, took over the
care of the children. She had no husband and depended on scavenging
from the dump for her daily bread. Nevertheless she took the
children in and did her best.
Catherine's
mother's final request to Linda had been that she might look
after her girls when she was gone. Getting Catherine through
school became a priority for us.
She is a bright
girl and despite missing some years of primary education she
caught up with her classmates and after obtaining good marks
in her Primary examinations she was judged to be eligible for
secondary school. It must be said that she grabbed the opportunity
with both hands and has never looked back. She loved going to
boarding school, as you can imagine living with more privileged
pupils was a real eye opener, after a life spent in squalor.
She is always near the top of her class and conducts herself
well. It is always strange o see this smart, clean, well fed
young woman when she is on her way back home in the holidays,
trudging up the hill to her Grandmother's house in scruffy old
Hilton
After five
years in boarding schools in Nairobi and Nakuru district she
is now ready to take her final exams. She would love to have
the chance to go on to university, but it is more likely that
she will now seek employment or training. Whatever is decided
over the coming months one thing is certain, this young woman
is in a privileged position when it comes to taking her place
in the world.
Grandma Esther
by the way is now a stalwart of our grannies group and amongst
other things shares in the benefits of the knitting group and
the pig rearing programmes. Julia meanwhile remains in the programme
and is coming towards the end of her eight years of primary school.
So, I hope
that's good news to cheer you amongst so much gloomy stuff in
the media. We wish you a sunny and pleasant August at home or
abroad. Many thanks for your continued prayers and support of
the ministry. As someone once said to us, these children and
grannies have your fingerprints on them.
With every
blessing to you and yours
Peter and
Linda Davey
Previous letter from December 2008... more info >>
More
pictures - February 2010
  
  
Rags
to Riches News June 2010
At last I hear you say! Yes it has been a while but here at last
is an update and a reminder of the work in Nakuru that you are
involved in. This time I have decided to bring you word direct
from out coordinator Josephine, who is in charge on a day to
day basis up there in Hilton. I for one am greatly encouraged
by her reliability and perseverance, she and her husband are
doing a great job and the work goes well.
Some of you will know that I (Peter) have been unwell for a while
and as a result have had to cut back on a lot of activities,
including any plans to go back to Kenya. Fortunately we have
been able to reorganise things so that the day to day work carries
on. The admin that I normally do when I go to Kenya is being
adjusted so that I should be able to do it by email etc. from
home. We also plan to send other members of our board to Kenya
from time to time to bring a report of what is happening with
the young people and the grannies. So the work goes on and here
is Josephine to tell you more
Hi Peter and Linda and all in the work with us
We are very thankful for your commitment and sacrifice that you
are doing to see that Ministry is going on well also for your
recovery Peter and I thank God for that. We are praying for you.
I am able to give you a report of all that we have been able
to do:
GRANNIES;
We usually meet and have a great time together.They knit, socialize
and eat together.They are 16 in number.But unfortunately one
has just died this week and will be buried on Friday. She is
the Granny of Robert and Kennedy. At the moment we are up there
with the grannies and the family members most of the time making
the preparations for the burial. The Grannies have the project
of the pigs which assists them to buy food when they sell them.
They have project of poultry which they started this year and
this is continuing on well. The challenge that we face with them
is that most of the time the ladies are sickly because they are
elderly and their environment is not good, they live next to
Nakuru dumping site, some of them just live in polythene houses.
So they have many problems of different sorts with their health
and although we often assist them it is hard to meet their medical
bills. Some of them are HIV positive and so they usually need
special diet which for them is hard to get. But they are grateful
for the assistance they are given for buying milk and flour,
but we pray that we can do more for this group as time goes on.
SECONDARY PUPILS;
We have one boy, Pepsi, in a local secondary day school, we assist
his parents with fees and uniform, he has another year and a
half to go, and we have three boys, Anthony, Richard and Joseph
in secondary boarding school. Their school fees, uniforms, pocket
money and bits of shopping is be paid for by the ministry. Two
of the boys leave school in 18 months, the other has two and
a half years more until he finishes.They are working hard in
school and their grades have increased. In fact it is true that
their future is now changed, after school they will not go back
to that dumping site, they will be able to start a new kind of
life.
PRIMARY CHILDREN;
They are 16 in number and they are working hard in school. Because
of the ministry they are eating lunch in school, their tuition
fees and exams are been paid for and uniform has been bought.
They are very clean and smart, one cannot think the are from
the dumping site.This is a different generation that is coming
up because of your support.
Margaret is still in special school and boarding and she is doing
on well. She is among the best-and the ministry is paying school
fees and taking care for her. We are praying for God's direction
for the time after she finishes is a few years because the school
will not be able to stay caring for her and it is not easy to
find someone who will employ an orphan young woman with learning
difficulties.
CHURCH;
Cyrus and I are pastors in Hilton community and we are very thankful
to have the opportunity to minister there. From when we started
God has given us 20 to 30 committed members.We usually have seminars
and last month we held some open air meetings, did house to house
evangelism, some of those we talked with gave their lives to
Jesus Christ. Of course there is much to do there but it is difficult
to reach there without transport and assist the people we want
to, at the moment we are trying to visit the family of one who
has died as well as visiting the sick. We hope that one day we
will be able to purchase some kind of transport.
SATURDAY CHILDREN;
We still have so many who come along to the church compound on
Saturday mornings. They are 100 or more .They are taught from
the Bible, have games and they eat bread and bananas. Pastor
Cyrus helps me some time to do that. He sends his greeting
Thanks and
God bless you
Josephine Wambui
If you would
like to write to Josephine you can reach her at joswambui71@yahoo.com
I also want to add a brief word about Catherine. She received
her exam results in January. Although she passed well her grades
were not good enough to consider university. She thinks that
nursing may be her next choice. At this time she is staying with
family near to Nairobi. If she is serious about nursing or other
further training I know she will contact Josephine, although
I don't think we will be able to offer her more financial assistance.
We know that her life has taken a giant step forward from that
of her parents and we have every confidence that she will go
on to make a successful life. We will keep you posted about her.
As always our thanks go to you for your continued interest and
assistance with the work in Kenya.
With love from
us both
Peter and Linda
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