The Face of Poverty: A Mzungu’s Awakening

It’s 4:00 in the morning, and I can’t sleep. Past experience suggests it’ll be another week before my body understands we’re not still in Africa; however, this pre-dawn awakening has nothing to do with discombobulated biorhythms. The Holy Spirit is speaking, and He’s saying, “See me.”

My mind turns to Kibera, one of Africa’s largest slums, which is located approximately three miles from downtown Nairobi. The slum covers an area equal to New York City’s Central Park, and more than one million people, 40 percent of the Kenyan capital’s residents, are packed within its confines. But those are just numbers; they’re not people. Right?

For me, articles do little to make poverty real or relevant. The scourge always remains a world away. And photographs don’t put a face on poverty, despite the number of children they contain. The sounds, smells and taste of the air are trapped in the image, like inhabitants in a slum. The flies on a child’s face don’t crawl on my skin, and the mounds of garbage don’t make me side-step into a stew of raw sewage and rotting food. Malnourished eyes and sallow skin may spur others to act, but in my eyes, poverty often remains a concept; without a breath, without hope, without a true face.

I sponsor a child with Compassion International. He lives south of Kisumu, near Lake Victoria, far away from Kibera. I write him once a month and ask lots of questions. I send pictures every quarter and financial gifts as the Lord’s blessing allows. I eagerly wait to get a letter in return. And somehow I’m left wanting.

I want more frequent letters, delivered faster, and with more information in them. I want my questions answered immediately. I want. I want. I want. And while I struggle with my self-absorption, Lerionga Sheshoroi, remains a name on a piece of paper. The poverty he lives in isn’t real to me. Who is he? Who is poverty?

As the bus of children arrives at the park, my tour leader explains that the children are going to play a game with us. Each child will pick his sponsor out of the nervous crowd of waiting wazungu (white people). I breathe a sigh of relief that the game isn’t the other way around, but my relief is as short as the breath I exhaled. The game IS the other way around.

One child immediately recognizes her sponsor, sparking my hope that I may be as lucky. But my little man doesn’t come a’runnin’. I watch as one sponsor after another find their children, while the refrain “I don’t know which one he is” plays in my mind.

The day before, I led the devotion at the Compassion Kenya office. I spoke about mission, about discovering who we are, and God’s purpose for each day. Now I smile reassuringly at Lerionga, the shy boy shuffling towards me. This is my purpose for today, and I’m helping create a world bathed in love by being encouraging and present. Poverty now has a pulse.

Two days later, I arrive at the Jipemoyo (Take Heart) Child Development Center. I’m here to help build a retaining wall. I mix concrete, hoe red dirt and heft big rocks and tons of Stoney, a very gingery ginger ale, into the air, while my mzungu (white person) skin bakes in the equatorial sun. Roselyne Wanjiku and Caroline Munigi (photo), teenagers in Compassion’s Child Sponsorship Program teach me Swahili slang as we work. One wall goes up, and another comes down. My disconnected heart experiences renewal. The face of poverty is supuu (beautiful).
On the penultimate day of the trip, I meet Anthony Moggaless Njoroge. Anthony is a “computer geek” studying Information Technology at Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology. He has a magnificent sense of humor and an infectious personality. Both testify to the resiliency which helped him break the cycle of poverty.

Anthony grew up in a Nairobi slum, amid violence, drugs and despair. He joined Compassion’s Child Sponsorship Program when he was six and discovered hope. He’s now in his third year of college; thanks to Compassion’s Leadership Development Program, which helps the brightest Compassion-assisted men and women get their degrees. The students overcome the worst poverty throws at them, and they excel in doing so. They have the potential to become influential leaders within their churches, communities and nations, and naturally, my conversation with Anthony focused not on theology, economics or international relations, but on something equally profound – feet.

Debating whether Hillary Clinton has attractive feet is frivolous, but it makes Anthony real to me. Was it an unsuitable topic, given what he has accomplished? Possibly. That’s why I’m grateful for his indulgence. His laugh builds a bridge between our two worlds that I can walk across. I assumed laughter was a luxury for those who could afford it. It’s not. It’s a gift more abundant in those the world says have nothing, than it seems to be in those the world says have everything.

Dear Anthony, Caroline, Roselyne and Lerionga; my eyes are open. I see you, recognize the Holy Spirit in you and am blessed by you. Asante sana. Bwana asifiwe! (Thank you very much. Praise the Lord!

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I wrote this in February 2007, after I returned from a Compassion sponsor tour to Kenya.