Bittersweet - Oct 28

I woke up this morning to make a cake…not just any cake, but a pink cake with blue icing (as per instructions). Today is Patrick’s birthday! We the help of Siouxanne the cake turned out perfect, and the icing tasted pretty amazing :) (if you couldn’t tell, this is the good part of the day).

On a sad note, Hassan had left to go to town the day before, when he didn’t return we thought that he had decided to go back to the streets. Later that nite Henry and I found him in town and he begged to go back to the Sanctuary, promising that he would be there in the morning and we would talk about things. I arrived at the boys house (cake in hand – yes I carried it in on a boda boda..i know, skills!) to find Hassan gone. I was told that he went to town early that morning. So, now all we can do is pray. We see him often in the streets, sometimes he runs away from us, but often if it is just me by myself he will come over and talk to me, and even talk about returning with us. BUT, from what I can tell, he is not willing to give up his life on the street. I realized before the lure of the street, but I always that thought in the end having a home to be at, 3 meals a day, and the chance of going to school would seem to be the better catch, but I guess that is not the case for all boys.

Probably the biggest thing I’ve learned (in regards to street kids) in my time here is what a problem we ‘mzungus’ are. I was in town later the next day, and I say Hassan walking with another Mzungu (who was presumably taking him to buy him food or clothes, etc.) I wanted to go up to her and tell her that Hassan is able to live with us, and that it is his choice that he is there on the streets, and that she is making the problem worse by doing this, but I realize how hypocritical that would be of me. This is exactly what I did when I came down last time, and what I do even now when we are trying to get to know a boys situation. I don’t really know what the answer is though….are white people making the problem worse? Yes, but in the case of children who have not found help yet, they need kind people to provide for them. I suppose it’s a catch 22…it just hurts me to see that he is choosing the life on the streets. Please continue to pray for him, you never know what could happen in the future that could cause him to change his mind.

On a more positive note, David and Robert are still living with us at The Sanctuary, and while they struggle with going into town, I pray that they will find peace and rest here.

Anyways, onto Patrick’s birthday! For some reason we didn’t end up eating until atleast 930/10pm! But it was great, the boys get so excited over the idea of having cake! Because we ate so loud, and it was a birthday, I am guessing the house was louder than usual, and apparently when this happens, they pull the power…lol. So we had candles on the table (instead of the birthday cake) and we ate our cake to candle light! (which was actually kinda fun). Again we went around the room, each person saying something they liked/appreciated in Patrick (can I add that Mike appreciated that it was his (Patrick’s) birthday, which meant that there was cake! Lol. Anyways, the night was great, but definitely late…I think that I got home around 11:30! I love spending nights like this with the boys. It’s great to have fun with them!

Oh, I should add that before we sat down to dinner, I had my laptop out and was helping the boys with their homework. They were amazed to be able to find answers to their questions easy accessible instantly on the computer. They were even to check their math homework to make sure they had the right answers. One of the boys commented in Luganda (Henry later translated to me) that people in Canada don’t need to learn/remember things because all of this information is at our fingertips….interesting, and true.