Now that Sandy and I are feeling strong again we‘ve gotten right to the business of visiting our GGI children at their homes. Tuesday after our classes at the Bereket school we went with Pastor Emanuel to see Danye and his sister Mirat.
They live with their very elderly paternal Grandparents in an older house. It was very poorly lit and the furniture looked as tired as the grandparents. Danye’s grandfather is a dairy farmer and their compound is big, for being in town, but he explained to Sandy and I that the city confiscated his fields for development and left him only the compound for his cattle and home.
He supports his family by selling milk from his cows. I only saw one cow and calf and a couple of sheep in the yard. His wife is very weak and suffers from a respiratory illness. I can not imagine how they manage two young and active children at their age; although it was very clear to us that they love their grandkids and make every effort to provide a loving home for them.
Danye and Mirat’s father has passed away. Their mother has a new husband who won’t let the her children live with them. That leaves them in the care of very poor and elderly grandparents.
Danye is a bright boy and well behaved at our Saturday GGI program. I enjoy his sweet smile and quiet demeanor. I don’t know much about Mirat. She has only come to our program twice that I’m aware of. She is shy like her brother and is a very cute little girl. I am often a bit overwhelmed by the poverty of our children and yet I am amazed by the resiliency of their characters and the joy they have in the simplest of things.
It is know wonder to me that Jesus tells us to be like them and that ‘of such is the Kingdom of Heaven made.’ I am praying for sponsors for all 25 of our program kids. Cw
A visit to Busayu’s home
Thursday afternoon we went for a drive with Emanuel and Girma (he’s an architectural engineer). After seeing one of his construction sites we headed west out of Burayu and then turned onto a main highway going south by south east towards Addis. We drove through beautiful grazing land, rolling hills and broad flat fields with small herds of cattle, sheep and horses scattered here and there.
After a few kilometers we started to see more homes and some businesses and an area of industrial development. Girma explained that this area was under the authority of Burayu and the Oromo people and that a large complex is being built to be a trading center for grain and other commodities from rural parts of Oromo.
We stopped the car and crossed the road to visit a small chapel planted by Pastor Emanuel and Girma, then took a short walk to some compounds nearby. That's when Emanuel mentioned that we would visit Busayu’s home.
We entered the clean and grassy compound through a tin gate and approached a rustic stick and mud hut. A small but strong looking woman came out to greet us with a warm smile. She invited us into her modest home, just one room, a few chairs, a bed and some sacks of milled grain near the door. She makes injera from the grain and sells it to support her and Busayu. I was surprised to find out how far Busayu lives from Burayu and yet still makes it to our Saturday program. We have been giving her money for the bujas [small 3 wheeled taxis] but we really had no idea how far she was traveling. She is one of my best students on Saturday and just has the kindest face you can imagine.
I hope you will enjoy reading about our home visits as we continue the process of interviewing the families and guardians of these great kids.
Joyfully serving our Lord in Burayu, Carole
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