Children. Everywhere there are children. We drive along the streets and children run along side of us waving. We walk into a room and they flock around us, hugging, and laughing, and calling out “Teacher, Look.”
Our group had a good discussion time last night and the general consensus is that this trip continues to change us in profound ways. We all are being changed in different ways, and once everyone returns home it may take us a while to process everything that has been experienced.
We are working now in three locations. Each location is either a preschool or a children’s club for orphans or vulnerable children. When parents die of AIDS they leave young children behind. It is these children we are working with each day. Many children also live in single parent homes or in homes where their only parent is very sick. Many others live in extreme poverty. These are the vulnerable children.
A recurrent theme in our discussion last night was the way one person can make a genuine difference if he or she decides to act. All of the not-for-profit organizations we have been working with have started because of someone’s vision for how to change a part of the world. We have been humbled and challenged to rethink who we are and what we should be doing with our lives.
We always say that children are the hope of the future. The many young men and women who are on this trip as Belmont students are many of our hopes for the future. Even these students have been reminded this week that a generation follows them. They have begun to think seriously about how they can impact the future as they serve and work with others.