Lira Orphanage

Yesterday afternoon we visited one of the local orphanages that David's batallion sponsors.  We spent the afternoon playing with the kids.

The kids live in these cottages, and looks like they each have their own room.

 

The guys played soccer with some of the older kids.

 

My kids wanted to play too, but one of the boys walked Tristan and this little girl over to me and said they couldn't play because they were too little.  Grace was the only girl on the field, so I called her over too.  There was an extra soccer ball laying around so the three little kids kicked the ball around for a while - until we could absolutely no longer take the heat (which was only about 5 minutes).

 

I thought this was a cool way to grow squash!

The little girl took us and showed us some of the animals they had there.  They were in cages so I'm not sure if they serve a purpose for the orphanage or if they are just there for the kids to look at.

 

They had a male and a female peacock

 

And these two had chicks.

After we had the tour of the grounds we headed into the cool (I use this term very loosely - it was cooler than it was outside) building and played some games with the kids.

 

This is what David looked like after playing soccer for an hour or so.  He was able to wring his shirt out even after being inside for 45 minutes!  He was nice enough to take it off when we got in the car and put it in the back so we didn't have to smell him all the way home.

 

We also had some pizza with them.

The kids there ranged in age from 5-20.

 

Our kids were the stars though with their little blonde heads.

This girl wanted to take a picture of Grace with her phone, so David took her phone and told her to get in the picture with Grace, but she wouldn't look at the camera.  She didn't want her face in the picture.

It was an interesting experience, much different than I anticipated.  I guess I had in my mind that things would be on the destitute side and that there would be lots more kids, especially younger ones.  Grace wasn't so sure she liked it, but that's mostly because she couldn't talk to the kids.  We plan to go back again and the chaplain is trying to make arrangements to have a Thanksgiving and/or Christmas meal with them.