9 Lives… Our Day with the kids of OLA

Alright, we’ve come to learn that the power shuts off at 10PM… So I’ve got to work really quickly so that the blog can be posted while we still have electrons!

Last night we went to John and Corrie’s house for dinner…  We had chicken noodle soup and great conversation…  Corrie had prepared some great questions for us to discuss, and the Guckenberger home was a nice break for all of us…

Today we went to an orphanage run by Catholic Nuns called OLA (Our Lady of the Apostles)…  The orphanage is part of a larger compound that also contains a hospital…  That means that this particular orphanage is well-suited to care for kids with special needs…  Not all of the kids have special needs, but some of them do…  Here is a picture of Jason and Agnes (Aggy)…  You can’t really tell from the picture but she is severely bowlegged, and it’s painful to watch her walk (although she doesn’t seem to notice at all!)…

Here is a picture of me with a 9-year old boy named Daniel…  He latched onto my hand immediately and wanted me to stay near him as much as possible (I think he liked the video camera!)…  He’s quiet, but he has an irresistible smile…  From what we know, Daniel has been in this orphanage his whole life…

The next picture is of Brian and a young girl named Claire…  She lives in the nursery with the babies, but she’s actually closer to 8 or 9 years old…  She is deaf and blind…  She has seizures and scars on her tongue from biting it accidentally…  Her muscles are dramatically atrophied…  But she is a child of God, and I believe she must have some understanding that we cannot comprehend…  Brian spent a lot of time praying for her and holding her hand to comfort her…  

After touring the orphanage we loaded a bunch of the kids into a bus and drove them into town to take them to the zoo…  This is a big deal for many of them, as you can imagine…  None of the kids had ever been to the zoo in town, so they were all dressed up and very excited…  The following are a bunch of pictures from our time at the zoo :)

The girl that John is pushing in the wheelchair is named Abigail…  She is the victim of polio, and she spends all of her life in a chair…  She was, however, incredibly joyful and thankful that she got to go with us to the zoo…  She has a beautiful spirit, and a wonderful smile to go along with it!

There are some differences in just about every institution here in Nigeria…  The difference at the zoo is that animals who are mostly docile are, apparently, free to roam around…  We were shocked to notice that this camel was just as curious as we were to see the lions!  He was friendly because we had good snacks!

If you want to know what these girls are staring at you have to ask one of the guys on the trip…  And it is solely up to their discretion as to whether or not they think you can handle the truth of the matter…  If they deem you unfit for such knowledge, smile and be thankful…

We’ve passed this neighborhood every day that we’ve gone into town…  They call it the ghetto…  I would venture to say that these are middle class homes – they have means to have (or more likely share) a home, and it isn’t a hut, but you aren’t going to find much electricity and definitely no running water…

We were heading back to the Back2Back house that we’re staying at to throw a big party for the OLA kids…  We had, um, lamb that we, um, bought earlier and, um, had prepared for our feast…  If you want pictures you have to organize a comment-a-thon begging me to post them…  After dinner we had some traditional Nigerian dancers and drummers come to join our festivities…  

This was really fun, but the best part was when the OLA kids jumped in to join them…  The little kids were mimicking what the dancers were doing (just trying to keep up)…  But the most tender moment for me was when one of the girls rolled Abigail out there in her wheelchair…  Although she can barely move her limbs, her entire core was moving to the beat of the drums…  And her smile was radiant the whole time!

The last picture is of Aggy…  Here she is in her Christmas dress, dancing at the party like a princess…  Beautiful, isn’t it?  It’s surprising where you can find beauty if you just look for it…