Mathare and Huruma
Our next stop was at the Young Mothers’ Center in the Mathare slum in Ngong. The African slums are very densely populated areas with homes built of metal and wood. There are few streets, with most pathways being between the metal fence walls, as above. There is little (if any) sanitation, water only available at community pumps, sometimes minimal amounts of electricity (either wired or small solar panels), and no sign of law enforcement. They are dangerous, scary places.
Above, Sarah navigates a path through Mathare, behind Cedric, while carrying our mattresses we use in the classes. While walking past one home, I heard someone dump a pan of water through a hole in the floor onto the perpetual mud underneath. The smell was memorable.
The Young Womens’ Center is provided space in a facility called “Go Green,” which is a non-profit environmental organization. It is actually a nice oasis in the slum. The floor has a large tile mosaic that says “Go Geen (sic) Clubhouse Charity Connect,” seen above. The walls are covered with mural paintings. It is a pleasant space in the middle of the squalor of the slum.
There were about 32 women who came for the class. It was on a Sunday, so that is pretty good. Kenya is a highly religious country and many people spend most of Sunday in church. In fact, Wangari was not with us so she could attend her church services. A number of the women came to the class in their Sunday clothes.
The class was slated for the young mothers, but we had a variety of ages, including a woman who had to be at least my age. She took the class very seriously and even helped teach others the moves.
There were a couple of unique challenges with this class. The group was pretty raucous at times, but I’m used to that. They took it to a new level. In addition, most of the younger women brought children to the class. As I was teaching, at one point I had the young boy in pajamas above crawling between my legs. We just worked around or with the kids.
The second challenge is that at any given time there were 2 to 5 mothers nursing babies in the room. They’d be in the class until the baby started crying, then go to the back and nurse. We included them in the class throughout. They just did the technique one-handed, while seated holding the baby. In the above pic, you can see Cedric reaching between a couple women to get to a third mother.
Below, Cedric and I work with a couple women on a ground-escape technique. You can see several of the women in the back of the room with babies. And a couple toddler participants, one with beautiful blue braids with red beads in the lower right.
Our first stop the next day was Huruma Children’s Home. This is an orphanage for both boys and girls who either have no parents, or their parents are unable or unwilling to care for them. It started decades ago with Mama Zepporah and her husband taking orphaned children out of the slums. The home provides room and board, as well as schooling. Below is a pic of Mama Zepporah with our self-defense team.
We met in the church on the grounds of the orphanage. We had about 25 girls and one teacher. It is always helpful to have a teacher participate in the class. The girls will take it more seriously when there is a teacher alongside them.
The school is actually pretty big. We met with a small group of girls who are also in a Rotarians’ group, which kept the number down. As is typically the case, they would like us to come back and teach as many girls as we can.
Below the participating teacher and the Rotarian group Patron practice a move. Behind them, you can detect evidence that some of my team is more dedicated to teaching than others.
We had the mattresses to go over the ground-escape techniques. Wangari and I demonstrated it, then all the males left the room. The girls were in skirts so we couldn’t be present when several of them tried it out.
