2020 – 2nd Quarter Update

Grateful

Grateful doesn't even begin to describe how we feel. This has been such a challenging time for all of us, and Kenya's Kidz has certainly been affected. We have not been able to have even one of our regular fundraisers or bead sales this year, but you, our incredible supporters, have helped us maintain our high standards of care for our children and stay afloat. We are grateful for our wonderful sponsors who faithfully support their child(ren) each and every month.

We are grateful for our amazing donors, who so generously give when there's a need. We are grateful for our prayer warriors. It's such a blessing to know that our kids and staff are covered in prayer. We are grateful for our staff, who have unselfishly increased their workload without time off to care for the children. In our remote village, adequate income to buy food has been a critical issue. Many of the men are day laborers in the nearby towns, while the women sell their beaded items; families generally live on less than $2 a day. And when that meager amount is reduced or eliminated when the population is unable to move about or earn a living, the situation becomes dire.

We had been hearing stories of families in our immediate area being rescued from literal starvation. Because of your generosity, about 70 families and teachers from the local school have received food. Because of your generosity, some of the elderly of the community have been given food. Because of your generosity, our staff has received food for their families, as well as a bonus for their extra workload. Please know that you, our treasured supporters, are impacting 30 precious children, our staff, and villagers in a remote community far away. For those of you who have gone with us, you know the difference it can make and how grateful the people are.

The Kenyans realize that there are caring faces behind the assistance. And as we have been told, it puts a whole new meaning to the prayer, "Give us this day, our daily bread." And so, from all of us at Kenya's Kidz and Namayiana Children's Home, thank you so very much. We are grateful.

COVID- 19UPDATE

On the Kenyan front, the situation is not so different from how it is here. There's much misinformation and confusion. Decisions are made to move forward and then rescinded. With the high density of people in the cities, the number of cases continues to increase. Social distancing is challenging at best. Until recently, movement into and out of the cities and towns was severely restricted. Our manager needed special dispensation from the police in order to travel to town to buy food for the children. And then he was also able to obtain food for many people of the village. A curfew has been in effect for several months, whereby no one can be out between 9 pm and 4 am, recently modified from 7:00 pm and 5 am, which is strictly enforced by the police. In addition, the sale of alcohol has been banned throughout the country.

Schools have been closed since mid-March, and the government has just announced that students will not return to school until January 2021, with all students repeating their grade. Remote learning, which has been largely adopted in the U.S., is not much of an option throughout Kenya, where most families don't have access to computers and the internet. For many, electricity isn't even available.

Although Kenya has indicated that they will start to open their borders to international travel commencing in August, we don't anticipate being able to safely travel and move about the country until much later in the year, if not next year. That means that we won't be able to have our annual birthday party this summer or deliver letters and gifts to your sponsored children. Conversely, we won't be able to send letters and pictures to our sponsors from their children. While that's a bummer for everyone, we do keep in touch with our staff via email and WhatsApp on a regular basis to make sure that they are doing well.

Being in a remote location obviously have its disadvantages, but fortunately, there are no known cases of COVID-19 in our village. We are grateful that our children and staff have stayed healthy.

We're still unable to conduct any fundraisers for the foreseeable future, but our needs to care for the children and pay our staff continue. We also want to be able to help the community again, should the need arise.

Would you consider donating to our general fund during this time? Donations can be made on our website or mailed to the address on the front on our newsletter.