Day 3: The Children of Monoloa (By Kristin Kelley)

Today our group trekked slightly outside the city to a community called Monaloa. Our purpose: relieve the cooks that prepare food for neighborhood children at the local church for a day and love on children. We immediately got to work peeling green bananas, carrots and sweet potatoes, chopping celery and cilantro and making tortillas. We’ve definitely got some new recipes to bring back home . :) It’s such a cool thing because funds from the church support this work that allow them to hire local women to prepare a meal for almost 100 or more children each day.

After an hour or so, almost everything went into a soup for later, and members of our group trickled down to the local soccer “field,” which was more of a dirt area with goals set up. Tito and Vince somehow started a game of ultimate Frisbee with a Nerf football, while us girls tended to important matters like painting fingernails. Many spontaneous games of hide ‘n seek also sprung up, but mostly without rules like no base and no way to “get tagged out.”

Soon it was time for lunch, and bunches of children lined up outside the door to wash their hands and wait to be admitted to the church building where tables were set up for lunch. One by one they filed in, sat down and were served soup. More than 80 children had a filling meal…perhaps the only real meal they would have that day. 

 

Afterward we spent a few hours washing dishes and playing with the children from the community.  I have such a new respect for the four ladies who prepare this meal and wash those dishes five days a week.  It’s hard work….and soapy, slippery and hot.

After what seemed like hours of washing dishes, we decided to bust out the skits and children’s songs we had spent weeks practicing, and we took a little stroll around the neighborhood inviting kiddos to our “play.”

That’s when I met Angel. Angelito—my little adorable 6-year-old. He clung to me for the next 2 hours, and I don’t think I put him down but once. His sweetness poured over, and I fell in love. He kept repeating the English he overheard, and we made up a song that only had the lyrics “Thank you, you’re welcome.” I learned he had a twin brother who was developmentally challenged, and we picked him up along the way on our walk. David and Angel were the sweetest pair of little boys I’ve met in a while. I just wanted to love on them all day.

David and Angel

After we put on our super professional skit and sang any and every kids’ song we could think of, we packed up and headed out. What a scene leaving those children—and an eye-opening experience for much of our group.

When we “digested” the day as a group later, we ended up singing “Lord be There for Me,” but changing the words to be “Lord be There for Them,” referring to the children in Monoloa. From a view atop the highest mountain in the city, looking down on the dark streets dotted with lights below, it was hard to imagine the poverty we had seen that the darkness hides so well. However, now we’ve seen what lies beneath the darkness: a sweet Angel and hundreds more children like him--something we can never forget.