We met the caretaker of the home who did everything from painting to fixing to plumbing. The front of the home hadn't been decorated in some time and was looking very tired. The caretaker brought us tins of paint, rollers and brushes and we re-painted the front of the home in a pinky-red. At around 12pm the primary age children returned from school. We took out some of the toys we had brought with us for the children. Frisbees and footballs and we played for over half and hour with the children who were smiling and happy. At lunchtime everyone said grace, we had brought packed lunches with us, so not as to eat any of their precious food. The home's kitchen was across the path from the dining room. The kids lined up with their plates and were served from a window hatch.
After lunch we were shown around the home. We saw their dorm-like bedrooms with wooden bunk beds and clothing cupboards at the end of each bed. Shoes were stored on shelves outside the room by the stairs. All the shoes were the same with names written in marker pen on each pair. It was explained to us that the home relies heavily on donations and clothing companies will sometimes donate large amounts of identical stock.
we went up to the library where we were told that the children had a structured day, waking and eating breakfast before heading down the road to school. After school they had lunch and playtime before doing their homework. They had prayer time in the late afternoon and some more free time between dinner and bed. All of the children's books and clothes were donations. We were told that it would cost 9 - 10,000 ringgits a month (approx £2,000) to clothe, feed and educate the 72 children in the home if no donations were received. It was at this point that it really hit home what a difference we were going to make to these children. We were told stories about how the children came to be at Don Bosco. Most of the children had parents, but situations at home meant that they couldn't stay there. Many had only 1 parent who needed to go to work in order to make enough money to survive and then child was too young to be able to be at home alone and take themselves to school. Some children lived in areas so remote that they wouldn't receive an education and some children had parents who were in jail or involved with drugs and were therefore unable to take care of the children. Lots of the children would visit their families during the school holidays, but some would live at Don Bosco all year round.
Sister told us with pride about a young man who grew up at the home and went to school, studied hard, went to university and is now at medical school training to be a physiotherapist. She explained that the children work really hard at school to get themselves a good life.
In the mid-afternoon we went to the river where we would raft the following day. We tried out some traditional bamboo outdoor games and went to our Home-stays for the night. The local community in which we stayed, cooked a large amount of rich food and gave us a show of traditional drumming, before making us take part and try it ourselves and teaching the rest of us how to do the traditional dance!
The houses were quaint and the owners were very proud of them. There were no indoor toilets and washing facilities were outside. We were in the depths of mountainous jungle area and a midnight toilet break required walking down a flight of stairs (in the dark with very sore legs) finding a light, through the kitchen and out of the back door, across a court yard and into the toilet room, trying to find a light with the help of the moon-light.
On entering the kitchen on one occasion I turned on the light and saw a scurry of cockroaches running across the work surface to hide from the light and upon hearing a louder noise I turned and saw a nice fat rat run across the kitchen tops and down the back of a cupboard.....needless to say I am not surprised that I got food poisoning on my last day of the trip! My poor little stomach not so adapt to cope with those sorts of conditions...
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