128 days after landing in Cairo, we finally visited our first project sponsored by the 1% fund. We didn't have much information about the project itself other than it was to visit a toilet block and a daycare centre built by an NGO in an “informal settlement” in Nairobi somewhere. They came to pick us up and we headed off to Mitumba, in the south of the city, where we were to be shown around by Dr. Mary, the head of the NGO looking after the project.
Dr. Mary looks on as M scares off yet another kid
It evoked mixed reactions in me – on the one hand it was a strong reminder of how badly off people can be in some places – no running water, electricity, sanitation and so on. On the other hand it wasn't quite as bad as I had expected from a Nairobi slum – there were shops and businesses, the streets weren't littered with corpses and so on. Still – the NGO was building only the second block of toilets in the whole place (in which lived between 18000 and 20000 people, depending on who you asked) of which 25% were under the age of 5. Houses were made of whatever materials people could find. You could still see that people had pride in the community though – from the immaculately turned out Mr. Nicholas, community leader, who helped to show us around and had big dreams for the future of Mitumba, or the young guys who signed up for jobs emptying septic tanks and the thankless task of picking up the trash. The unemployment and trash problems were being tackled simultaneously by training local women to make handbags out of plastic bags found on the floor, of which M bought one. Mitumba was dirt poor, but there was a feeling of hope and action in the air somehow. It wasn't what I had expected at all.
The whole thing seemed well run and had good intentions and, while it won't fix the myriad problems facing people living in Mitumba, it's a first step in the right direction.
Wanderin the streets
M and T contemplate the future
As a P.S... there are an estimated 200 slums in Nairobi. The biggest is Kibera, where 40% of Nairobi's population lives in squalor in an area 1% of Nairobi's total. All in all, nearly half of the population of the city live in slums, mostly without the most basic of services and amenities, and this demographic is probably the biggest contributor to Nairobi's crime problem. As we saw in Mitumba, these people can be proud members of their community and extremely resourceful. Helping them to help themselves is a first step, although the problem runs far deeper than that. NGOs like Dr. Mary's can alleviate the symptoms, but it is up to Kenya's government to cure the disease.
Mitumba's community football pitch sees some action. The eagle-eyed will note that this particular match-up is England v. McDonald's
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