Kid's Club

We used to get really irritated with neighbor kids coming and fishing in our trash pits, making noise, leaving messes, sometimes stealing things. We try to get them to first greet us and ask for things rather than jumping in the pit and getting hurt (one morning I had to fish a kid out who couldn't climb up!!) or running away like thieves when we come outside to address them. Then we give them containers and other prized trash that we've saved so they don't rummage in the pit.

I felt bad about always being the ogre chewing them out for infractions. Who are they? Do they have parents? Are they genuinely needy? Hungry? But I didn't have time to invest in them or go figure out the details of their lives. I couldn't figure out why some of them have such bad attitudes, don't listen, or constantly do the opposite of what we ask.

So I talked to Rina (our next door neighbor and the Bishop's wife) about it.  She had similar concerns and we said we'd pray about it. We needed some way to get to know the kids and invest in them. But how, when we're so busy? And so I've prayed for the last few months. And a while into praying, God gave me the idea of a kid's club. Sometime in the future when I wasn't so busy with rainy season agriculture and teaching at BNTC.

Now it's January. Kids are out of school. And I'm free. And so is Melissa. And last Friday we had our very first kid's club!

It's a month long trial. Every Friday morning we're inviting about 15 young children of our neighbors and workers to come (roughly ages 5-12).

Our first session was a hit!

We wondered, at 9am, who (if anyone) would show up. First off, would they remember the day and time, and would they want to come? Second, if they did really remember, would they actually be able to come, or would there be other work keeping them? Third, if they remembered, and didn't have other work, there's still a thing we like to call "Sudan time." It translates roughly to: within several hours after the declared time. UNfashionably late by Western standards. :)  So we could have a bunch of kids show up right at lunch!

Not five minutes later, Zilpa's children and their cousins (about ten in all) showed up. Scrubbed down, and in their nice clothes, no less! I was flabbergasted. (Usually they're only partially clad, and in clothes that are, shall I say, "well-ventilated" from being well worn. ha ha! I had no clue they could clean up so well, let alone get anywhere on time. After rejecting one child - a barely 2 year old distraction to the others - sorry! - and waiting for some of the others we'd invited, we got started.

First, some ground rules!

     

     -Pay attention

     -Raise your hand and wait to be called on to speak

     -And don't make trouble :)  (Apparently they got this one because they proceeded to indicate and talk about what that entailed - provocative poking, talking, etc. hilarious!)

We all repeated the rules at the top of our lungs and with no few mischievous smiles.

Song Time:  

Melissa kicked us off with a song: "My God is so BIG, so STRONG, and so MIGHTY, there's nothing my God cannot do." The kids had a great time with the hand motions, but only two of them were old enough to have heard any English spoken in school, so they had trouble actually singing along. Good note to self: translate the songs into Moru for next time!

Then it was Question and Answer Time.

Me: Who is God? [Lu a'di ya? for language enthusiasts]

Them: "A spirit..." (wow! good one!) "I don't know..." "Someone who made everything..."

Me: Well where is He? [Lu eŋgwaroya?]

Them: "In heaven..." "At church..."

Me: Can you see Him? [Inye 'do mindre nda ndi ya?]

Them: "No."

Me: Why not?

Them: "He's a spirit."

Me: What does He do? [Lu ka e'di oye ya?]

Them: "He works..." "He prays..." "He walks around in the forest and does his work." ha!

Me: What work?

Them: "Praying..." "Making blind people see..."

Me: Can you talk to Him? [Nyatana ndi ndäri ya?]

Them: "No."

Me: Does He talk to you? [Inye 'do nda ata kpa amiri ya?]

Them: "No."

Me: Does He talk to anyone?

Them: "Yes. He talks to people in church. And other important people."

Me: Okay, well guess what?  God is here. In this room with us right now! He lives in heaven, but He is everywhere at the same time. We cannot see Him, but He's here. You know He can see you? And He can talk to you? And you can talk to Him anytime and He hears you? Everywhere you go, He is there and He can see you and you can talk to Him. When you're walking, when you're sleeping, when you're working, and when you're playing. God is always watching over us.

Let's see what the Bible tells us about God.

Memory Verse Time:  Psalm 11:4

The LORD is in His Holy Temple [translated as 'big, beautiful house ;) ]

God's home is in heaven.

He watches everyone.

And sees what everyone is doing.

We repeated it a bazillion times - with hand motions to help them remember. We want to give them some prize at the end of the month if they can recite several verses on their own. Towards the end of our time, they were getting it, but still with difficulty - so perhaps we'll have to scale back to one verse every other week, or for the whole month. Enough was enough, so we took a break and moved on to...

Story Time:     Lazy Lion [trans. Ibi tovo]

There is a decided lack of reading material here in S. Sudan, and in Mundri in particular. We have a bookshop in town, but it's one little room with only a few books written in the Moru language. Knowing how much the kids at my home-stay had absolutely LOVED for me to read them stories, I was totally excited about finding and translating some children's books for the kid's club.

The first was about a lazy lion in Africa who went around ordering his fellow animals to build him a home because the rain was coming. But each time one of the animals built him a home, he had a problem with it - not wanting to live underground, or in a cave, or in a tree stump, etc. In the end, it started pouring, and all the animals watched the Lion getting drenched in the rain from the comfort of their own cozy homes. To this day he wanders the African plains without a home of his own.

They listened and looked with rapt attention and I had a brilliant time reading in Moru (which my home-stay mother, Viviana, had helped me to work out). Great stuff. And I rarely ever hear Moru children so quiet!

Craft Time:

Jennifer made some super handouts for the kids. A blank sheet of paper with a big cloud at the top in which she wrote, "God is watching us," with the reference to our memory verse.

With our help, the kids all drew their compounds underneath the cloud. Tukuls (little mud huts). Chickens. Goats. Senkes (small motor bikes that people use here). The other people on their compounds. Themselves. Mango trees. Flowers. Ducks. Even a duck egg - ha!

Each child had a chance to come up and show their handiwork to the rest of the class. They were just as proud and happy as could be explaining all that they had drawn. When they finished describing, I said, "See, God can see you and your compound and everything in it. He watches over you!" And then we would all clap!

Then came Game Time:

A fun race of Over and Under - guys against girls - that Melissa taught them. Much excitement, cheering, and hilarious instructing each other for those who couldn't quite manage how to pass the ball over or under themselves to the next person!

And Snack Time:

A handful of gnuts (ground nuts - otherwise known to us as peanuts), an orange, a baby banana, and a cup of water. Many kids that live nearby have a scant diet - mostly consisting of sorghum . . . maybe some greens cooked into a soup, some sweet potatoes, and some Moru beans that are a bit like cowpeas. In dry season, since nothing much grows unless it's by the river and watered everyday, the daily fare is pretty lean.

At all special functions, what kids look forward to is candy and soda. And while I want everything at kid's club to be special and fun, Melissa and I just couldn't stomach feeding kids junk when they hardly have anything good in their diet to begin with. So we figured we'd feed them all sorts of good things you can get here, but that they don't often have the privilege of eating at home - a little way to boost their nutrition while still giving them something fun and special.

And eat they did - to the very last licks and slurps of orange.

We went outside and took a group photo with all of the kid's artwork, and we sent them home until next week - all of us (Melissa, Jenn, Heidi, Andrew, and I) feeling fuller and more satisfied than their little bellies could have. One sweet baby step at a time, God is giving us ways to love our neighbors and share His good gifts.

Please pray for our January kid's club!

We've got three more sessions, and if all goes well and we have time, 

we're thinking to continue it in February as well.  

Pray For:

1. God to work in these kid's hearts to know His love, creativity, generosity, truth and have their own relationship with Him.

2. the kids to love it - for them to learn and grow both in mind, body, and spirit.

3. us (Melissa, Jenn, Andrew, and I) to have patience, wisdom, energy, and creativity.  And for us to get to know them better, and establish good rapport.

4. us to develop good relationships with their families and parents.

5. our language - we're doing all of this in Moru and Arabic!

6. them to keep coming - one never knows if people will show up or when!