Ivan's story continued...Prayers needed.

So if you have yet to read my story from last week of the street boy I brought home with me you can find it here.

So the next day ...and let me assure you it was a LONG day. I woke up early to take Ivan to the hospital. I brought him in for a check up of his general health. The pediatrician was a very sweet lady and she went through everything with Ivan asking him questions about how he feels and about his overall health, weighing him, taking his temperature, and checking him all over for signs of illness. She was very impressed with his overall health. She has seen a lot of street children brought in by the Tiger Club who are in very bad condition, but she was very impressed by the state Ivan seemed to be in. 

Thank you Jesus! I prayed the night before and all morning that he would have a clean chart and no serious illness. 

He did however seem to be suffering from parasites and worms from drinking and bathing in dirty water. She wrote me out his prescription and told me all he needs is a little bit of love and care. Before leaving I bought him some good parasite and deworming medicine that he now has been taking daily. After leaving the hospital we had about a 45 minute walk back to the house, on the way I bought Ivan a small water gun I saw him eyeing. We bartered and It cost me about 60 cents :p. We stopped for lunch on the way at a little Ugandan restaurant (which I was majorly regretting the next 2 days.. food poisoning is not fun... but Simon and Ivan were fine, they obviously have years of Ugandan  immunities built up that I just don't have.) ANYWAY won't be eating there again. 

When we finally arrived back at the house we took a quick water break and rested a little bit before making the long journey by Ugandan taxi and boda to Senga village. Ivan laid on the front porch playing with his new squirt gun. Its very rare to see children in Uganda with any kind of toy, let alone a street child having a toy. 

It was his first chance to relax and be a kid for a second. 

After a few long Ugandan taxi rides and a couple bodas we arrived to Senga and met with Lutaaya, one of the head directors of African Hearts. He met Ivan and asked him a few questions about his story.  One of the things i've learned is you don't ask a street child, "Do you want to go home?" or "Do you want to go back to school?" because they may only tell you what you want to hear. Street children are rough and rebellious and often most of them don't know anything other than the streets and drugs. So when you ask them questions like that they will only tell you what they know YOU want to hear, even though they may not mean it. 

 Fortunately for me,  it has proved to be that Ivan has either not been on the streets for long or he is just one of the lucky ones with unwavering character. Because it is very clear that the streets haven't stolen his innocences yet and we will see to it that it never happens. Everyone that meets Ivan is so surprised by his timid and innocent nature, that is very rare to come by in a street boy. We also learned that Ivan  does not huff fuel like the rest of the boys. EXTREMELY RARE. I actually think he is the only street boy I have met in this slum that is not on drugs. Again understand the children huff the paint to curb their hunger pains. 

We are very proud of Ivan and because he has so much potential he should be easy to place. 

So instead of Lutaaya asking questions that puts words in his mouth, he asked Ivan, what are the 4 things you want the most right now?

Ivan's reply was this:

1. I want to see my mom.

2. I want to go back to school.

3. I want to study really hard.

4. I want to make my mom proud. 

Ivan is 10 years old. He wants to be loved and he wants to go home. 

From there he continued with asking for the full story from Ivan about how he ended up on the streets. 

Ivan's Story:

Ivan told us he is from Mbale. I have been to Mbale before for a few days to take a little boy to surgery.  It is about 3 or 4 hour drive from Kampala (where we are now). 

He told us one day his mom sent him to the market to get a few things. When arriving at the market he ran into a neighborhood friend who started telling him stories about the city, with tall buildings and bright lights. He told him stories about the presidents house and the president having a huge yard that they could run and play in. There was a bus leaving for Kampala. So what did the boys do? They snuck on the bus and headed for the city. When they arrived however, it wasn't quite the fairy tale they had dreamed up in their heads and Ivan has been living on the streets since, he's not sure how long. 

Pretty crazy the kind of trouble two little boys can get themselves in isn't it? The streets of Africa are a cruel place. Witchcraft and child molesters are lurking everywhere, he is really lucky he has made it this far. 

Ironically enough, I was looking up the name Ivan to find out the biblical meaning of the name. Guess what the name Ivan means?

God is gracious. 

And God has been very gracious to Ivan. He is so lucky that God chose me to pick him up and take him home with me that day. 

Now Ivan needs your prayers. It is very clear God is working in Ivans life and he has plans for this little boy. Because Simon, my friend who has been with me through all of Ivan's story just so happens to be from Mbale, he even speaks Ivan's native language. (Seriously!? God planned this all so perfectly).

 I sent Simon this week to Mbale to look for Ivan's mother. Ivan's father he told us passed away when he was young. We gathered lots more information before Simon left, but he was unsuccessful on finding Ivan's mother. We have to first meet the mother before taking Ivan home because often times families who have children run away here don't want the children back or anything to do with them. We have to first make sure it is a safe and healthy environment to bring Ivan back to. We also have to first make sure Ivan's story is true. He is a little boy and I imagine he has been through a lot of trauma in his short little life. And there are still lots of questions, like why would he run away to the city in the first place? So it is very important for us to first find his family and assess the situation before bringing Ivan to Mbale and making things anymore traumatic for him.

Please pray for Ivan and God's plan for his life. 

Right now things are very much up in the air and all I can do is pray.

I knew God had something big planned for me today, I just didn't know how BIG.

This morning started out like any other Thursday, I woke up and got ready to travel to the slums to the African Hearts Feeding Program and as usual I was dressing in old clothes and removing any valuables and only stuffing a few schillings in my pocket for food and travel. The only difference was all morning I had a very uneasy spirit and I was praying all morning that God would protect me and keep me always in his path and that I would walk solely with Jesus. I just felt like something was going to happen today and I needed to pray. So I did, the whole taxi ride into town my prayer was for protection and God's will to be done. When we reached the busy city we still had a few miles to walk to the slum and still as I walked I prayed, Jesus please walk with me and protect me today.

Finally we reached safely to the slum and the room slowly but surely started to fill with street children and the smell of them all... Its dirty work being a missionary, and smelly work too, but I wouldn't trade it because its the most fulfilling thing when you have the chance to help someone. It's very common for the street children to fall asleep during the program, and I think its because they finally feel safe and so most of them just want to sleep. However, they are encouraged not to sleep and to be awake and participate in the bible lesson. Today one little boy fell asleep right beside me, when the leaders came around to try to wake him to listen he wasn't budging.

(Ivan)

 He was completely out of it. Several people and street children tried waking him and sitting him up but nothing was working. He was out cold. I felt his head and he was very hot. In fact I had to wipe the sweat from my hands. He was clearly sick. He was so young and his clothes were filthy. I rubbed his head and prayed over him to feel better and prayed for his future as well. He never once seemed to be aware of my presences. I stayed by him the rest of the program praying about what I should do. Honestly when they brought the food in, bags of rice and water, I expected him to wake up at that point. NO ONE sleeps through feeding. I mean that is the sole reason they come to the program is to get fed. I watched as every last bag of rice was given out but he never woke up, although his friends tried to wake him and tell him to go get some food before it was gone. I knew I would be in charge of seeing that he got fed when he woke up. Soon after everyone had been fed, including the sweetest little 4 year old girl who came and sat on my lap towards the end of the program and never left my side until it was time for me to go back home. The program was over and everyone started to clear out of the room, everyone except this little boy who was left passed out on the chair, I insisted that we take him to the hospital, I couldn't just leave him there. So simon and another man carried him across the slum to a little clinic. This clinic wasn't creditable at all and I knew once they saw the color of my skin that I would be overcharged. The price they told me was outrageous and I was not paying for it. After having my friends barder for me, I ended up giving the "doctor" or should I say man posing as a doctor, about $4.00 just to let me take the boy out of there and to a real hospital. They had immediately started running tests on the boy to try to get me to pay for them. He told me the boy had Typhoid AND Malaria, we weren't so sure whether or not to believe him, but either way I was determined to take him to a creditable hospital. Because the boy was obviously sick, by this time however he was fully awake but clearly not feeling his best.

So from there we hired a Boda and headed back home to get him cleaned up and presentable enough to take into the hospital, otherwise he would possibly be sent away. This was the fun part. At this point I didn't even know his name yet. His name is Ivan, we soon asked him after arriving home. I brought him in the gate and gave him a plate of food, he ate as much as he could, but it wasn't much. I don't blame him because he wasn't feeling well and on top of that his body isn't use to so much food all at once. After giving him lunch, I took him behind the house where I do laundry and filled a laundry tub full of soapy water and scrubbed him from head to toe, the best I could, and with some help from Mary (my sweet Ugandan friend) soon he was looking much better, but it pained me to see all the scars and scabs on his body. After cleaning him I put lotion on him and all his scares. I gave him my orphan walk T-shirt (walk a mile in my shoes) how appropriate huh!? The shirt was from last years orphan walk where we walked bare foot through the park, and Ivan certainly did not own a pair of shoes. Emma's sister Liberty supplied him with a nice pair of basketball shorts that fit nicely and most importantly Emma's mom just happened to pack the perfect size brand new boys underwear! She knew she packed them for a reason :P After he was all dressed, it was crazy, he looked like an entirely different boy.

Ivan before bathing

Ivan after bathing! 

Doesn't he look handsome!? I'm not kidding after bathing him and changing his clothes and praying over him some more, oh and lets not forget a sweet lady named Laura brought him out a goodie bag of candies and toys and after all that he didn't even seem sick anymore. He looked like he had just won the lottery. I made sure he drank lots of water, he drank about two bottles right away. We gave him some garlic pills, vitamin C, and ibuprofen. It was all we had at the time but in the famous words of my sweet friend Mary, she said to me today, "He doesn't need a hospital, all he needs is a little bit of love." 

I think Mary is 100% right. In the slums he couldn't even sit up, not even to eat! It was either that he truly was VERY sick...or maybe it was just that he had completely given up hope, to the point where he didn't even care to eat anymore. I knew this morning that God had something big planned for me today, but I didn't imagine anything like this. 

All I know is I think I will be pretty busy for a while seeing that this boy is NOT put back on the streets. I had to make a decision to take this boy with me today and I knew that meant if I was taking him then I was going to take him ALL THE WAY. I am going to see to it that he is not dropped back on the streets and do everything in my power to get him placed in a home. I'll be honest, I really had to break into my funds today to pay for everything, and it made me cringe a little bit, but I know God will provide and i'm not worried. After bathing him and everything it was time to take him to the hospital, but first he needed one more thing. Shoes. So we took a long walk up the hill searching for a market that had shoes, finally we found one, and I bought him some shoes, he even got to pick them out! .. Oh and a soda too.. How could I tell him no? Before we left the house I gave him a little bag containing a lunch I packed him, soap, lotion, 2 water bottles, granola bars, and his goodie bag. He was SO proud of his bag. (It was actually a women's purse and all I had but he didn't care lol)

When we reached the hospital, unfortunately all the doctors were out on emergency calls and so we had to make an appointment for tomorrow morning instead. We had dinner at a nice "american style" restaurant, i am so regretting not taking pictures of Ivan, i specifically asked for the "sofa seats" and he was so cozy sitting in the pillowed sofa booth. I asked him what he wanted to order and he pointed to the big picture of the massive hamburger. So thats what he got and french fires and a large passion juice. I invited one of the African Hearts Street directors to have dinner with us, he is who the boy will be staying with tonight. He is a very nice man and one that i feel I can trust. I asked him how the street children usually get their food for the night. He told me that they rummage through trash cans looking for left over food that has been dumped inside. I was so proud of Ivan's table manners and he was trying so hard, he had never eaten with a fork so he was still learning.. and dropped the first 3 french fries he tried to put in his mouth.. lol I couldn't help but laugh, but i was so proud of him for trying  and being so neat with his food. At first he used his fork and knife to cut his hamburger and then after that clearly wasn't going over so well he used his napkin to pick up his hamburger and take a bite. It was adorable watching him eat with a plate and fork. The bill could have came to $100.00 and it would have been worth it. 

God has plans for this little boys future, please take time out of your day to join me in praying for Ivan. 

I'm just getting ready for bed, because I imagine we will have a long day at the doctors office tomorrow. I'm so happy Jesus chose me to love on his precious street children. Most days at the feeding programs I leave with no hope, and its so hard leaving those boys knowing that they will have to go right back to the streets. FINALLY today was different. 

Thank you Jesus!!!