Tuesday, March 10th - A busy Day

Baby  Class 

A busy day at Rick of Ages. Karen spent the morning with the nursery classes. Today  she covered opposites and colors using story books she brought and of course she lead songs with accompanying hand actions.  I have never seen Karen in her professional role, but her 30+ years’ experience teaching pre-school is evident. She reports that she is hugely impressed with the 3 teachers  she has been working with and observes that  they are good teachers.

Pastor Jimmy also came today (he comes every Tuesday) to  work with the nursery class. Karen says it was fun to watch him relate to the kids as talked  to the kids about God’s creation. I was thrilled to see he uses the children’s bibles we purchased for the purchased for the school a couple of years back.  He told me they are a great resource for him.

I spent most of morning with Betty and Olivia as they called in parents to discuss various medical

Olivia with Elvis. He has serious, chronic infections
in one of his ears. He has trouble hearing,

issues and treatment options for   chronic ear infections, syphilis, and other ills. A couple of children are losing their hearing.  Olivia, our school nurse patiently explained they need to keep up with the medicine and go back for follow ups. She told me that often the parents are not sure that modern medicine really works so they are not diligent about taking the needed medicine. In the case of the dad who came in about  potential syphilis, she arranged for the whole family to be tested and told him we would then figure out where to go from there. They will go to St. Francis tomorrow. Olivia told me later than many people see syphilis as a curse and are not aware that it is treatable.

Betty and I  also spoke with a mom who’s  child attends ROA.  The child’s sponsor sent some money  for the family and Betty asked her what she needed. This mom makes sumbusa,  little triangular shaped pies filled with onions and peas that she sells for 100 shillings (about 3 cents) during school breaks. They go quite fast.  She also sells them in the market. She asked for funds to buy inventory so she can grow her business.  Currently a vendor extends her credit for the  flour, peas, onions an oil she needs to make the pies. Once +she sells them she pays the vendor and the keeps the rest. She wanted to have enough inventory so she  buy whole sale and replenish her stock as needed.  There was enough money to also buy a small table and a new  fuel efficient charcoal stove. She will now be able to use less charcoal which also cuts down her costs.  It is always a pleasure to help women  grow their businesses.