A journey of service
to families in Kenya
- one by one

  
Kibera, Nairobi
  

According to one source, 60% of Nairobi’s population lives in the various slums of Nairobi, of which Kibera is by far the largest. It is a city within a city, complete with its own districts, services, schools, churches, shopping areas, medical clinics and bus stations.

Garbage is often discarded on the paths or in the streets.  The bulk of it is collected in huge roadside piles and left for the scavengers and goats to search. Vendors line the main roadways, many with booths running side by side along the sidewalk, sometimes two deep, space allowing. Others lay their products out on the ground along the edge of the road. Most of the property in Kibera is actually government owned land, on which occupants are technically squatters. But though the land isn't owned by the inhabitants legally, they take "ownership" of its structures, which are bought, sold and rented just as in every other neighborhood in Nairobi.

The homes, most of which are just shacks, are either made out of mud, plastered over sticks and boards, or made from mabati (corrugated iron sheets). A few are plastered over with cement.
The roofs are all made from mabati (corrugated iron), which, looking out over the top of Kibera, gives it a great rusted checkerboard texture. Some of the homes are divided into two rooms, often by a sheet, each room approximately 8 feet by 8 feet. Each home may house anywhere from two to a dozen people.
 

Is there hope for Kibera?  Read about
these new government plans to
transform the slum. (October 2004)

	Until 2003 there were few official facts about Kibera, as the government didn't recognize it as housing at all.  Most statistics about Kibera are based on the estimates of outside organizations.
	Kibera occupies 630 acres.
	800,000 to more than 1 million people live there.
	There are more than 100,000 orphaned children living there, the majority orphaned by the AIDS virus.
	Official documents referring to Kibera call it "informal settlements," although the area has been occupied since 1912 and under government control since 1948.
	Overcrowding in housing is so bad that parts of Kibera average only 12 square feet of housing per person, or the equivalent of floor space per person about 1 meter wide by 1 meter long.
	60% of Nairobi's residents live in one of its many slums.   Half of those residents live in Kibera.
	There is no running water to most homes in Kibera.  To obtain water, residents pay two to ten times what is paid by a Nairobi resident outside the slums.  The water is carried back to their houses in jerry cans.  However, water flows inconsistently throughout all of Nairobi, even in the plumbed neighborhoods.
	To use a toilet, some residents must pay 4 shillings (about 6 cents US) to use a filthy private latrine.  Those without other means use a plastic bag which "disappears" over the roof tops at night.
	Webster's dictionary defines a slum as a heavily populated area of a city characterized by poverty and poor housing.
	Kibera is the largest slum in Africa - one of the largest in the world.

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The pathways consist of a mixture of red dirt packed down together with all kinds of the refuse used in human habitation: plastic bags, clothing, rocks, foam rubber, wood, pieces of metal, broken glass, plastic, worn shoes, empty lighters, cardboard and anything else you can imagine. Trying to maintain balance on these pathways can be a challenge.  One must often hop from side to side and from mound to mound in order to support your weight and keep from slipping into the ditch as you walk along.  Often you also need to duck down to pass under the low eaves of the metal roofs and wet laundry hanging from lines strung diagonally along the path. Occasionally, an open space appears, next to which is a tiny duka, a mini-market (the size of an desk) or just a stand selling soft drinks, soap, candy, cigarettes, cooking oil, ugali (corn flour), or fresh vegetables and fruit.

The smells in Kibera are also constantly changing - generally either from the smoke of the burning charcoal and the food cooking upon it, or the smell of human waste.

To enter a home, one doesn't knock, but instead calls out, "Hodi…Hodi." The response is usually, "Karibu" (welcome). Inside most of the homes, everything is clean - worn, old, and falling apart - but freshly washed. The floor is washed once or twice a day. But, more importantly, inside most homes is a family that provides the warmest welcome. Be prepared to be overwhelmed with respect, attention and appreciation of your visit from everyone there, including every neighbor who just happened to see you enter the home. It may not look like much, but it's their home, and one can't help feeling good about being invited in.

If you are invited into a home, you should feel privileged, as most visitors to Kibera never get the chance to see the real living areas there and the routines of daily living. If you are invited in, you may be invited to enjoy some "chai" (boiled milk with sugar, lightly flavored with tea) and slices of white bread. If this is the case, you have made a friend. They will introduce you to all of their children and ask you to return. And you will return, if you can. Kibera is not attractive from the outside. But on the inside you'll meet men, women and children who, given a little of your time, will open up to you and invite you into their lives. Individuals you will come to love and who will love you back as they become your friends, moja moja.

       
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