The Lost Girls (25 page)

“Come, let me give you something in return,” Sister Freda said, leading us to her garden. Esther cooed into my neck as her little body bounced with each of my steps across the uneven ground. I noticed she had mud on her jean dress and, breathing her in, that she smelled like sunshine, grass, and dirt.

“Sister Freda?” I said. “There's something I wanted to ask
you. It's about Esther.” Jen was trailing behind us, chatting with one of the nurses.

“Yes?” she said, looking at me expectantly.

“I'd like to sponsor Esther, to help out with whatever the costs are for her food, clothing, and education.”

She stopped midstride and wrapped me in a heart-stopping hug. Embarrassed, I felt my cheeks turn the color of pomegranate. My small gesture wasn't a sacrifice. Sister Freda had quit her well-paying hospital job to spend her savings—and her life—healing the sick and poor. Sister Freda and Joshua were real-life heroes. They were the people who remained on the ground day after day, working to heal, to educate, and to save their neighbors. They'd given me something I didn't even know I needed: the faith that one person could absolutely make a difference.

Still, it's easy to get overwhelmed when faced with so much poverty, to turn away altogether. Sure, I'd seen the Christian Children's Fund infomercials with Sally Struthers stating otherwise, pleading for viewers to just save one child. But now that I'd held Esther's living, breathing, warm little body in my arms, I couldn't simply change the channel. I
could
do something.

Six months from now, I'd probably return home to my safe bed, far away from Sister Freda's clinic. Until then, one tiny thing I could do was share some money and leave Esther in Sister Freda's—and God's—hands. By vowing to myself to support her education until she graduated, I prayed that Esther wouldn't have to marry young or turn to prostitution in order to survive. After finding Esther, I hoped that touching the life of just one person was enough—or at least a start.

As Jen and I left the farm, our arms were piled high with avocados, a gift from Sister Freda's farm. Crossing over the threshold of the clinic's gates, I wondered if I'd ever go back to that place and if I'd ever see Esther again.

KIMININI, KENYA
OCTOBER

E
lbow deep in bubbles, I sat cross-legged on the lawn, hand-washing an elephant-print skirt. “Mama Sandra, look how many buckets I have! Aren't you proud of me?”

She popped her head out from behind a wet sheet on the clothesline and howled with laughter. “Ah, yah, Miss Jenni-fa. You are Kenyan woman now,” she said, before cracking up again.

Since our arrival at Pathfinder, Amanda, Holly, and I had done and said countless things that made Mama Sandra chuckle. But the first time I attempted to do laundry, I swore she almost popped a blood vessel from laughing so hard.

Since I had no more clean underwear (or emergency bikini bottoms) left in my backpack and my skirts were so stiff from dust and grime they could've doubled as an ironing board, Jen's Laundromat opened for business halfway through our monthlong stay. I'd seen Mama Sandra and the boarders cleaning their clothes outside on countless occasions, so I understood the general process. Pull up some water from the well, grab an empty bucket and detergent, plop down on the grass, and scrub away. No problem.

During an afternoon break, I'd set up shop on a vacant patch of grass and selected the first item from my pile, one of many Champion quick-dry thongs. I daintily dunked it into a bucket of soapy water, gently rubbed the fabric together for a few minutes, then rinsed it in a second bucket of clean water, stood up, draped it over the clothesline, and repeated the process with the next pair. Before long, I heard faint snickers wafting across the yard. I looked up. Naomi and Nancy were looking at me strangely and giggling.

“Hello, my gorgeous girls. What's happening?” I asked, grinning in their direction.

“Miss Jenni-fa, what is that you are washing, and where are your other buckets?” Naomi asked.

“Umm, it's my underwear,” I said, which only led to more giggling and questions, like “Why are they so small?” and “How do they fit on you?” and “Do Amanda and Holly have the same kind?”

I deflected their hilarious (and acutely savvy) inquiries as best I could, but the damage was done. I was now an official target for laundry scrutiny. As I swished a skirt through the suds, Mama Sandra approached, observed for a few seconds, and then doubled over in laughter.

“Jenni-fa, let me do that for you,” she said, grabbing a dirty garment off the ground.

“No way, Mama Sandra. You do way too much around here to help Joshua and the girls. We're supposed to make
your
life easier, not the other way around.”

“Yes, but you will never get these cleaned this way. You will be here all the way through the night,” she added with another laugh.

Try as I might to convince her that I really could wash my own clothes, she wouldn't take no for an answer, calling in the troops to bring more buckets—apparently anything less than
four was unacceptable. Before I knew it, Mama Sandra and her helpers were rigorously scrubbing, plunging, and twisting my “unmentionables” along an assembly line of plastic pails, as methodically and gracefully as a choreographed ballet.

Mouth agape, I immediately scanned the farm for a tree or cow to hide behind. Luckily, my mortification was short-lived. After I offered up the magic words “My Kenyan experience would be far more rewarding if I learned to do laundry the way you do,” Mama Sandra gave in. Reviewing the proper procedure one more time, she allowed me to reclaim my clothes, but eyed me like a hawk every scrub of the way.

Maybe I was delirious from squatting in the hot sun for so long, but after washing side by side with Mama Sandra for the next hour, I thought I saw nods of approval from neighbors and other passersby. My laundry skills were finally up to the strictest local standards; everything from here on out would be a drop in the bucket. Or in this case, many buckets.

Now, crouched in the same spot two weeks later, a more highly evolved laundress, I couldn't believe our time at Common Ground was almost over. Since my inaugural underwear wash, we'd witnessed the birth of a calf (which Joshua had named HAJI after Holly, Amanda, Jen, and Irene), planted hundreds of baby saplings in the garden, perfected our chapati-rolling technique, and held Dr. Seuss readings in Pathfinder classes.

But by far our most rewarding experience and contribution was our
A Tree Grows in Kenya
play project, during which we had witnessed even the shyest boarders bloom into brave and talented actresses. Timid Barbara had chucked the “slow and steady wins the race” fable right out the classroom window, sprinting out of her shell and into the spotlight. Whereas some girls merely memorized and recited their lines, Barbara cloaked herself in the President Moi character, delivering emotions and mannerisms that broadened the script's horizon. Like proud
parents, Amanda, Holly, Irene, and I pushed back tears, cheering and clapping along with the rest of the cast.

With each play practice and evening danceathon, we'd grown closer and more connected to our little women. Our hut soon became a dedicated space for them to escape and unwind from their rigorous class and chores schedule, providing a friendly forum to express their preteen sensibilities. Whether it was a DVD screening or a homework tutoring session, our time with the boarders turned out to be the greatest reward we'd received as volunteers. Although we'd been a bit skeptical at first, as the Village Volunteer site suggested, it seemed that our presence alone had made a positive impact on them. And as a final token of our appreciation, we'd planned to make goodie bags for the girls and cook a special dinner for them and the entire staff.

Since it was now the morning before our departure, it was a race against the clock to get everything done in time. We had to hightail it to Kitale, blitz the grocery store, beat the daily afternoon thunderstorm back, and prepare the food—all before nightfall.

The last of my laundry washed and Holly back from her morning run, we grabbed Amanda and Irene and the countdown officially began. Now black belt masters of the matatu schedule, we made it to our favorite Kitale supermarket in record time. Grabbing a jumbo cart, we reviewed the list of ingredients we'd need to make our surprise meal. Though there was an ocean between us and Taco Bell, the generous supply of avocados we'd received from Sister Freda made our mission clear: to introduce our Pathfinder family to the joys of guacamole and Tex-Mex cuisine.

Given our limited grocery selection, the girls and I had devised a strategy: thinly rolled chapatis would double as tortillas, kidney beans and rice would serve as burrito filling, tomatoes,
onions, avocados, chili sauce, and limes in various combinations could make both guacamole and salsa. We even planned to create dessert using banana slices with ground cinnamon and sugar, cooked over the fire until it was golden and bubbly.

For the boarders' gifts, we wanted a mix of fun and practical items, so we grabbed everything from hair ties, lollipops, plastic bracelets, and modeling clay to colored pencils, crayons, and small sets of silverware. The four of us blasted through the aisles in less than a half hour and made it back to Pathfinder just as classes were dismissed. Knowing the boarders would be occupied in study hall for at least another hour, we spread their treats on our beds to sort and separate. After wrapping each girl's gift in pink cellophane paper and securing it with white ribbon, we tucked all fourteen bags out of sight and set out to commandeer the kitchen.

Soon after our arrival at Common Ground, we had noticed that the staff would disappear for hours on end into dark, smoke-filled huts, which we learned were the food prep and cooking areas. With only a wood-burning fire and steel cauldrons full of well water at their disposal, they'd have to work tirelessly all day long just to get lunch and dinner on the table for everyone. Knowing that, we couldn't in good conscience have our meals served to us on a (tin) platter without pitching in to help.

While we'd each eventually mastered the art of rolling dough and slicing mangoes, we'd never attempted to cook an entire meal until now. Neither Mama Sandra nor the chefs were fazed in the slightest by our inexperience. But the menu we'd suggested…well, now, that threw them for a loop. From the looks on their faces, you'd think we were speaking pig Latin as we explained why we were mashing up the avocados and adding spices to the mixture.

“Just wait, Mama Sandra. You are going to love guacamole,” Amanda said as she chopped and blended the ingredients.

“Yeah, and Amanda's recipe is the best too. She makes it all the time back home. Although the amount she has in that bowl contains about twenty dollars worth of avocados, if you can believe it,” I added, which was the biggest shock of all to her, as an avocado could be purchased at the Kiminini produce stand for about ten cents.

“Jen, chapati cockroach alert,” Holly interjected, glancing down at my workstation.

“Oh, thanks,” I said, brushing a few wandering critters off the table near the dough I was rolling. They hit the dirt and skittered back to the wall to reunite with their relatives. I scanned the plywood table with my headlamp to make sure the roach coast was clear, then went back to the task at hand.

Not too long before, such an incident would've sparked a fit of spastic convulsions and shrieks and sent us bolting for the nearest exit. It's not that I was suddenly thrilled to have the planet's only plausible nuclear fallout survivors crawling across my hands or swan diving into my meals. But since cockroaches were as much a part of the landscape as mud or grass, our bug-induced breakdowns started to seem foolish. Sure, Amanda and Holly had continued sleeping head to toe with Irene and me to avoid the bugs in their assigned beds. But when every kitchen wall and most available surfaces teemed with troops of cockroaches on 24/7 patrol, a few stowaways in the food weren't the end of the world.

Although the boarders normally ate dinner in their dorms, our Tex-Mex experiment required a different course of action. Setting up a buffet in the food prep area, we constructed a sample burrito so they could see how it was done. After that we asked them to proceed down the line, while we took individual orders and heaped food onto their plates like lunch ladies. Moving outside, we all sat on plastic chairs to eat. Like students nervously waiting for the results of our final exams, Amanda,
Holly, Irene, and I watched with bated breath as everyone dug in. Would they like our meal? Would Mama Sandra think our avocado concoction was gross?

Soon our worries were squelched as even the most apprehensive boarders were smiling and scooping spoonfuls of food into their mouths. Mama Sandra practically fell out of her chair when she tasted her first bite of guacamole, and the cooks were already helping themselves to second portions.

“So do you like it, Miss Naomi?” Amanda asked, giving the little girl a hug. “We did not fail?”

“No, you did not fail. We very much like all of this that you have prepared. Thank you, Miss Amanda.”

After the last of the guacamole had been scraped from the bowl and the burrito station broken down, we all headed up to the main house to say our final good-byes before bedtime. In preparation for our departure, Joshua had coordinated another special performance so we could see our girls in action one last time.

Opening with the name game, which by now we knew by heart, we twirled around the room together, a symphony of little voices sewn onto our own. When the boarders showed off moves from Amanda's dance routine, we laughed. When they recited poems we'd helped them write, we cheered. And when they grinned for our cameras, we grinned too. But when they opened their gift bags, we cried. Not just because it finalized our good-bye but because out of all the items we'd included, it was the spoons, knives, and forks they held most dear. Not the whimsical trinkets. Not the candy. But basic utensils. Eyes sparkling, the girls clutched the silverware to their chests and thanked us for their very first sets.

Since our arrival at Pathfinder, we had constantly been amazed by how courageous and cheerful the girls were even though they had so little, but I had never anticipated how dif
ficult it would be to leave them. Hiding my tears in the shadows of the kerosene lamps, I watched them smile and squeal over their goodies, honored to have been in the presence of these remarkable young women even for a brief while.

Back in Manhattan, the personal problems that had once plagued my life had seemed all-consuming. Yes, in theory, I'd known that compared to most people in the world, I was pretty well off. But in reality, I'd had no idea how extraordinarily lucky I was. It's not that I would never again stress out about my career or get annoyed at a friend or shed tears over a relationship. In fact, I could almost guarantee that I would. But if those were the worst of my woes, I was blessed and could no longer turn a blind eye to those less fortunate around the world or back home. And even though our time as volunteers was almost up, I vowed to take those lessons with me.

Glancing over at an equally emotional Amanda and Holly, I was hit by an overwhelming sense of pride and gratitude to have them by my side. Without hesitation or complaint, they'd wholeheartedly adopted my lifelong dream to visit Kenya as their own, encouraging me to turn it into a reality. And not only did they go along with my desire to work with children in a poorer, rural part of the country, but they'd flourished as mentors themselves, which made the experience so much more meaningful and beautiful than I ever could have imagined.

As we bid tearful farewells to Joshua, Mama Sandra, Irene, and all the boarders the next morning, Amanda, Holly, and I promised to stay in touch and to continue our efforts to find sponsors for the girls. Our backpacks loaded into a van bound for the Maasai village of Oronkai, we waved furiously out the window until Pathfinder faded from view.