My boys (4 of 6): Rabbi

Rabbi is eleven years old and lives with his mother, father, 2 younger sisters, 1 older sister, and 3 older brothers. That is 9 people in one house (the size of your walk in closet) and NO ONE works. I felt like Rabbi was one of my least taken care of boys. His nose was always running, his clothes were more tattered and torn than the others, he had scrapes and bumps on his legs. I just generally got the impression that he is worse off than most. With such a large family and no income, I can not imagine their living conditions.

Rabbi was my first big hug! He is a loving guy! He didn't tell me how many times he eats a day, I don't know if he was embarrassed or if it was so inconsistent that he literally didn't know how to answer.

His family can not afford for him to attend school. I couldn't get a good read on what he does all day. He is very quiet and doesn't say much (which makes this description a little difficult!) I want to say, you just need to meet him to know about him and love him.

Rabbi did open up about some ugly truths, he is very scared of being beaten by his elders, from what I could tell, his older brother, 29, beats him up a lot. I asked if it was when he is drunk, but Rabbi wouldn't say. He also told me that his 28 year old brother was arrested, and currently in jail, but he couldn't tell me what he had done to be arrested. Rabbi also opened up about the exposure to witches. He told me about his nephew had been cursed by witches and gave him stomach pains.

On community day, Rabbi's mother found us in the compound, she wanted to take Rabbi to an "appointment". NOW, lets be clear, I am just some white girl who has known her son since Monday. I didn't feel like I had any authority over this child, but she was ASKING me if she could take HER child. By mid conversation, Rabbi had moved from the center of the group to being pressed against me and wrapping his arms around my legs. SO, if she was really asking me for permission to take her child, and his reaction was to latch on to me, my answer was NO! I gathered my group like a mother duck and said "we will go now" and we left her there. As we walked away, I asked the translator to glance back and make sure she wasn't charging me for a beat down or for what I kind of felt like was kidnapping. I asked Rabbi several times if he knew what the appointment was about, but he said no. We also met Rabbi's sister, Gloria, on one hand, she was as skinny and tattered as Rabbi, on the other hand, she was as KIND, LOVING AND JOYFUL as Rabbi. She followed us all day, luckily we didn't run into the mother again!

The first day at camp, we were taking pictures and Rabbi very gently took my sunglasses off my head and put them on, then he put them back on my head and tucked my loose hair back behind my ear. Any chance he could get, he would pet my head, I am pretty sure it was my hair he wanted to touch. During large group, Rabbi would watch the skits so closely, in small group, he would want to retell everything that had happened.

He is such a sweet kid, I worried that he might be hurt after community day, but he came back on Friday as happy as nothing had happened. He was one of the "belly achers" on Friday, so we went to the nurses tent where he was given medicine and because it was so cold and he was not wearing enough clothes, they gave him another shirt for warmth. Once he had some one on one time with me standing in line (I was holding him close to block the wind and keep him warm) he seemed to be fine.

Rabbi needs a sponsor, he desperately wants to go to school, he told me how the children make fun of him because he has no education. I know he could use the one hot/healthy meal provided to the children at Family Legacy Schools, as well as discipleship and the solid education. Please let me know if you are interested in helping Rabbi, I would love to tell you more about him.