Ilunga & Mulumba

Here is 16 yr. old Ilunga & young brother, 14 yr. old Mulumba. They've been with us for a year and a 1/2 and are 2 of my very favorite boys. They have suffered difficulty most of their young lives but now are thriving in the safe place that God has made for them. They fled their home days after their mother died as they overheard her family blaming her death on them being witches. The conclusion was that Ilunga & Mulumba should die. They were 8 & 10 years old at the time. As they traveled on top of or under trains Ilunga made sure that Mulumba was safe; even, on one occasion, choosing to risk death or serious injury letting go of his safe place under the train when he saw Mulumba had fallen so that they would remain together.
We call Ilunga 'Commander' because he behaves like a soldier. Don't do the wrong thing where he can see you or he'll correct you or make sure that you are brought before some authority regardless of the cost to him. He is a young gentleman in a land where you don't find such people.

Kale

This is 16 year old Kale. He has been with us since April of 2007, when he came one day with another boy. He was very dirty & I think high on glue or some other chemical. How he has changed! He now loves school (he's in 7th grade) and is really beginning to do well. Before he came to live with us he worked stealing whatever he could. His father died leaving his mother alone with him and 2 sisters. A couple of weeks ago he was telling me about that experience and how he (at age 7 or 8) would go to the market & pick up pieces of corn to bring back to his mom & sisters so they would have something to eat. Not long after he began to ride trains back & forth from the province he lived in to Lubumbashi. I'm so thankful that the Lord has kept him & that he now has hope.

What we eat.

This, on the left, is what the Congolese MUST eat. It's bucardi. Corn meal & water. They haven't eaten if they haven't had this. Even if they ate a chicken, rice, 3 vegetables, potatoes, bread....etc. If they haven't had bucardi they haven't eaten.
But on Sundays we've started having spaghetti. They think it's for variety (which is partly true) but the reason we started eating it is because it was and still is on sale for .83/pkg.

And this is Michael showing us all how to cook spaghetti Nigerian style.

Everyone was shocked to see him cooking because that is not something men do in DRC.

Cooking fuel

This is Dauphine, the man who comes every Thursday to bring the charcoal we cook with. He usually arrives at the house around 8 or 9 in the morning; after riding from his home for about an hour. We spend about $80 per month on charcoal. The bundles of charcoal weigh around 25 pounds each. I see many men in & around Lubumbashi selling charcoal. Many of them ride their bikes for hours & hours.

Jeres.

Jeres & Toto discuss whether or not to amputate Jeres big toe. Jeres of course argued hard to keep it while Toto teased him that maybe it would be best to cut it off since it had a small injury that required too many bandaids. Jeres lost both his parents and has been with us since May. He is eager to be getting on with school and is in 1st grade.
His toe averted amputation!

Wash day.

Every Saturday morning the boys wash their clothes. Well they are supposed to wash their clothes. It has been a battle all along in every way. First just to get them to do it, to get them to wash all their clothes that are dirty, to admit that something is dirty, to not use all the soap (too much is not enough), to not fight over the buckets & basins, to wash more than one person per basin, etc, etc, etc. The battle goes on & on. I usually use the carrot of soccer or showing a DVD to get them started & to finish. But still you'll end up with someone like Kamba with a pile of dirty clothes hidden under his bed or worse yet in a basin of water.

MY hero.

Tarzan, the wonder cat. Responsible for making sure all the rodents, large & small, are either dead or at least stay on the roof. Thanks Tarzan.