POLISH EASTER AT AMANI KIBERA CENTRE

On March 29th, 2024, we celebrated Good Friday as the day Jesus was killed. On Saturday the 30th, we enjoyed our Easter holiday with many children at Amani Kibera Centre, and this is how it went.

We arrived at Amani at around 10:30 a.m., as we had scheduled to begin the event at 11. For this day, we had a guest, Liana, the daughter of Charles, our team member and driver. We carried with us 100 boiled eggs, some cartoon stickers, mandazis for snacks, a source of heat, and vinegar. We set up quickly and had our projector screen up and running in just a moment. 

The children had started to flow in, all from different areas, ethnicities, religions and ages. We only wanted to educate them about the meaning of celebrating Easter and what they should do during this season.

We were introduced to them by Ben, the founder of Amani, and Dorcas, a member of the Amani Kibera Center. We didn’t hesitate to show them what we had planned for the day. We taught the children how to clothe the egg with the sticker and then instructed them on the process of boiling it in the vinegar. To avoid accidents, Edyta dealt with the fire and boiling eggs while we distributed the eggs to respective owners. 

It was a long process of about an hour or so, but once everyone had a decorated egg, it was worth it. We then showed them a presentation we had made about Easter celebrations around the world. It was a good discussion with them, and they told us what they did during Good Friday. We ended the presentation with a summary of Polish Easter traditions. Edyta also explained the Christian aspect of this Holy Week.

We distributed the mandazis we had brought to the kids. We ate as Holger tuned us into a movie session. We watched an animated movie called ‘The Magician’s Elephant’ that weaves a tale of wonder, hope, and unexpected connections. It excited the children, and for almost 2 hours, we sat in silence, breaking out in laughter at some of the scenes. We were joined by Knight and her daughter Joy at this moment.

Once the movie ended, we said goodbye to the children, but a few of them stayed back for mentorship while others went to the library at the centre to study. 

Holger connected Starlink Internet, which is a satellite internet constellation operated by Starlink Services, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of American aerospace company SpaceX, providing coverage to over 70 countries. It is a fast and new technology which should be adopted as soon as possible by Kenyans if we are to reach a high level of technological advancements and innovation.

We then wrapped up and packed our stuff, back to the vehicle and left at around 2.30pm to allow everyone to have a good time during the holiday.