Every Saturday and Sunday, two hundred children, ages four to 14, flood through the gates at Ancient Path in Kaliyeka Township. On Wednesdays, they are divided into classes for academic tutoring, After some time to play, they gather for peanut butter sandwiches, biscuits, drinks, and a multi-vitamin before returning home.
On Saturdays, the children come for spiritual training and a hot, nutritious meal. Feeding a hundred children plus team members is challenging, especially since all food must be purchased fresh from a market, prepared by hand, and cooked over firewood in huge pots.
Volunteers start food preparation in the early morning hours. As they sit together in the shade, slicing meat, peeling potatoes, chopping vegetables, they listen to the children learning bible stories and songs and reciting scriptures they memorized during the week. The children also learn the arts – they dance and sing and create dramas to tell stories.
For many of these children, two nutritious meals a week and chewable vitamins make the difference between healthy development and serious malnutrition. The same can be said for academic tutoring, spiritual care, and creative training – and the encouragement and acceptance they find within these gates.
Whether it’s helping out during sickness or a family crisis, providing blankets or mosquito nets or maize during times of extreme hunger, the children who are part of the Ancient Path Kids family know that they have somewhere to turn and reason to hope.
