He has a cherubic face and looks all of 11, but he is probably 13 or 14. He is dressed in ragged clothes, probably handed down more than once. Like his friends around him, he has a biblical name, Daniel, to go along with Gideon and Ezekiel. If you saw him on a playground, you would know he was from a poor family.
But Daniel is from an extremely poor family and is homeless on the streets of Nairobi, Kenya, a city visited in the past year by both Pope Francis and President Obama. He lives in a slum called Mathare, containing almost 800,000 people, where many live on $1.25 per day. He almost certainly does not have two parents and more likely has none.
I approached him, and we began to talk, though he knows very little English because he does not go to school. His speech was somewhat slurred. It was clear why when I saw him attempting to hide a plastic Coke bottle behind his back. It was partially filled with industrial glue, and he was clearly snorting it before I saw him. By itself this was not alarming because several boys and almost all the men who were at a feeding station in Mathare were glue addicts. Still, Daniel was so young and, in appearance, so innocent.
After failing to communicate well, I decided to try fewer words—glue no, school yes. I doubt he understood me. He repeated the words back to me a couple of times, but probably almost as memorized nonsense syllables. I was profoundly sad and came back to him several times in the hour or so I was there. I could not communicate with words but only with gestures. I hugged him on each occasion, but I am not sure he even understood that.
I was surrounded by perhaps 200 people, the majority being young adult to middle aged men. Many were severely disabled and could barely speak if at all. I thought they were speaking Swahili, but I might have confused the babble for a language I do not know.
There are a few women, several with small children. One pregnant woman was snorting glue. The food of the day was chickpeas, probably the only meal they would have on that Sunday.
There were no old people waiting for food, because very few survive this life into old age. Most barely acknowledged my presence as I brought them their plastic plate of food. Few looked up. There were a couple of moments when there was too much jostling for food for me to feel safe.
I fear the adults are beyond conventional help. They are being maintained, and with dignity, but it is hard to imagine any of these men living anywhere but the streets of Mathare. But what about the children? The deck is stacked against them. Many of them will probably predecease me.
There is some good news. Father David, a Franciscan friar, supervises the distribution of food but has recently opened some upstairs rooms for the street children. He has hired teachers, and the kids can go to school. The rooms are somewhat shabby and ill equipped for elementary education. But they do offer hope; an investment in a life.
The next day I met Father David in a very rural area outside Kenya. He has started Momma Africa School there for the kids of Mathare. I did not see the dormitory for girls, but there were 19 boys in one room. They are happy there because they can learn and dream. They want to be engineers and doctors. Most will not achieve those goals, though the same is true for teens everywhere who dream of being astronauts and CEOs of big companies. But being able to dream is a large step above sniffing glue to ease pain because they felt warmer at night than on the streets.
I was asked to give an inspirational speech to the 100 students there. It was easy because they inspire me. I congratulated them for their enormous courage. They left parents and their familiar neighborhoods to head into the countryside. Now, they study French and chemistry and math for many hours per day.
In the security of Mamma Africa, these children appeared normal. They laugh and sing and play soccer. Their spiritual beauty shows through the scars on their faces and limbs. I told them that if they did not believe in miracles, all they needed to do was to look to their right and left. and in a mirror.
Some some will achieve their goals, but all are better off because there is a realistic possibility of a better life. Right now, the Bill Cook Foundation is committed to building a library for Mamma Africa school. Another Foundation has pledged 1,000 books. Now we need a facility to hold the books and provide study space. Will you help?
Critical funds for Kosovo, and beyond
Recently, I visited The Ideas Partnership (TIP), a non-profit that works with very poor children in Fushe Kosove, a town adjacent to Kosovo’s capital city, Prishtina. Located in an area where trash picking is the primary means of livelihood for most families, TIP provides vital services to children and their families, including a kindergarten, enrichment and educational programs, and support for children enrolling in the public schools. The families here are members of minority groups in Kosovo who face much isolation and discrimination. While Roma are the best known, Fushe Kosove also has Pashtines and Egyptians who migrated here when this was part of the Ottoman Empire. People are not sure exactly where these last two groups originated despite the latter’s name. TIP does wonderful work, and the Bill Cook Foundation plans to help them. It is difficult and costly to enroll students in public high schools because of complex rules and even quota systems. But, our contribution to The Ideas Partnership will assure these students have access to a high school education. We need your help. Now is a great time to make a gift because we distributed quite a bit of money at the beginning of the school year and need to replenish our funds for projects in Central America, India, Myanmar, and Vietnam as well as Kosovo. You can send a check, made out to the Bill Cook Foundation, to Bill Cook Foundation, 3 Oak Street, Geneseo, NY 14454. Or, you can give by credit card by going online to www.billcookfoundation.org. We are a 501(c)(3), so all contributions are tax deductible. Thank you.
Support homeless girls in Kolkata
The school year is beginning in much of the world, and the Bill Cook Foundation has sent more than $30,000 in the last few weeks to support schools and students in Honduras, Kenya, Ethiopia, Laos, and Cambodia. In a few days, additional funds will be sent to the Philippines. We very much need to replenish our treasury to prepare for the start of school in other parts of the world that do not operate on the school calendar we are all familiar with. For example, we are looking for sponsors for very poor and homeless girls in Kolkata (Calcutta) to attend Sealdah school (the school years begins January 1). The school is located only four blocks from Saint Teresa of Kolkata’s Motherhouse and tomb. For about $600, one girl can study for a year and receive all she needs, which may include housing and food.
Sponsors will receive periodic reports about and messages from the girl they support. Please think about sponsoring or organizing a group to sponsor one of these wonderful girls. Right now, the whole USA only sponsors 3; we hope that our Foundation can sponsor 15 girls. The photo shows two Sealdah girls (on the right) teaching young children in a remote rural school near Kolkata. All the girls at Sealdah must do something to help others less fortunate than themselves, and often that consists of weekend instruction in the countryside. Please consider sponsoring a desperately poor girl in Kolkata.
A Life with Books: A New Chapter
I have been teaching in Beijing for a month and thus have not had access to Facebook. I am now home and getting ready for a new school year, not as a professor but as the president of the Bill Cook Foundation. Millions of children in all parts of the world are preparing to return to school. Many, however, lack basic supplies and good schools. The photo below is of a young child who lives on the island of Bougainville, a part of the nation of Papua New Guinea. Students there have lacked books—any books—until last year the Bill Cook Foundation shipped 1,000 books for children to Bougainville. Now this child can look forward to a year of school WITH BOOKS! Tomorrow, I will send more than $20,000 to places like Myanmar, Ethiopia, Laos, and Kenya for students starting a new year. I will need to replace those funds because we have ongoing projects and school starts in different places that occur all year long. I hope you can help. Go to www.billcookfoundation.org and give a gift today.
A shoeshine boy inspires a foundation.
I am often asked to explain why a retired, 72-year-old professor started a Foundation to help very poor kids receive an education. There are many parts of the story, especially my decision 34 years ago to adopt teenagers. However. let me focus on one story. In 1992, my third oldest son, Angel, and I were driving through Mexico and stopped in the non-descript town of San Andreas Tuxtla. We got a tolerable hotel room and headed to dinner. We were the only customers in one of the few restaurants we found. As we were eating, a kid entered the restaurant and asked us for food. The owner came to throw him out, but I told Angel to tell him to wait for us outside. When we finished, Pedro was there. We took him to a taco stand where this little guy ate an enormous number of tacos. He walked us to our hotel. To our surprise, he was outside the next morning to say goodbye. He had his shoeshine kit, for that is how he helped to support his family. Pedro was 11, and he should have been in school. I took a photo of him with his shoeshine kit, and we said goodbye. I realized that I had fed him for a night, but he would be hungry again the next day. When I got home, I had the photo of Pedro made into a 20x30 poster, framed it, and hung it on the stairway of my home. Twenty-four years later, it is still there. I often speak to the photo but also wonder what could have been done to help Pedro for more than a day. The answer to me is clear--provide him with educational opportunities. I cannot now go back in time and provide Pedro with educational opportunities, but there are millions of "Pedros" in the world, and I created the Bill Cook Foundation to help some of them, to provide a kind of food that would nourish them for a lifetime.
$25,000 matching grant challenge for 2016
Beginning January 1, 2016, the Bill Cook Foundation has received a challenge. Ann O'Brien, a friend of mine, has pledged to match gifts to our Foundation up to $25,000. This is a wonderful and generous act on Ann's part because she believes in what we are doing. So, please make a contribution today to help us reach that $25,000 goal. Let's build the momentum so that we can reach that amount as soon as possible.
Support the Bill Cook Foundation, Support Children
Here's your last chance in 2015 to support the Bill Cook Foundation. Your tax-deductible donation will help support some of the poorest children receive a better education.
