I met Senteyo my first morning at Unity women’s village in Kenya.
I woke fully rested from a night in the guest hut, where the beds were comfortable and the mosquito netting was charming. She was sitting in the shade of the only tree, holding a baby on her lap while two women sat around making beaded jewelry. In the kitchen hut, Serewana was preparing my breakfast of fried eggs, toast, and fruit. Selling their beadwork and occasionally running an AirBnB in the guest hut are the village’s only sources of income. Senteyo asked me questions about my life in America, such as how many children I had, and she told me she had four. What she didn’t tell me was how many other children are living with her. Two of the children are her younger brothers. Their father and her older brother were murdered by cow thieves, on two separate occasions. They couldn’t call the cops because the thieves were cops. Their mother died of cancer. Two of the children are her nieces. Heart Projects has been raising money for Senteyo’s sister, Elizabeth Lenaiyasa, to go to college to study tourism. Getting this degree will be a huge help to the village, but Elizabeth has two daughters — a four-year-old and a ten-year-old — and she can’t take them with her. Elizabeth can’t pay to support her children for the four years she’ll be college. Senteyo offered to support them for her. The other four children are orphans, or their parents weren’t able to take care of them. Senteyo’s generosity blew me away. The Samburu women live in poverty. Their small huts usually have two rooms: the entryway/kitchen, and a bedroom for the family to share. Some families have a single bed, but many of them only have a mat of cow skin that they lay on a dirt floor. In that single room, twelve children sleep together on mats these. The huts and the dirt floor don’t bother me. I asked the matriarch of a different, more prosperous village if they could raise money to build houses, since Umoja has a dozen beautiful guest houses with floors and running water. It was a rude question; she said they liked their way of life. Their children might choose to live in different homes, but they enjoyed their huts. So it’s not the living in huts that gets me, or the laying on mats. It’s the size of the single hut holding so many children, with only one woman to support them and look after them. Building a second hut for the older children would be difficult, if not infeasible. Their homes are made of specific bendable sticks, which are difficult to find, that are woven together, wrapped in metal sheets, and topped with cardboard. A woman might walk hours every day to find them. The village is a tightly-knit community, so she has more help raising the children than an American woman would have. Still, it can’t be easy, especially since she’s covering their school fees in addition to their food and clothes. Education is very important to the Samburu people. I’ve occasionally wondered if it’s easier to give to others when you don’t have much. Maybe the excess of the Western world is a breeding ground for greed. But I suspect my second theory is true. Perhaps the Samburu women are so generous because each of them have needed help before, and they likely will again. Americans have a do-it-yourself mentality, whereas if a Samburu family doesn’t have enough to eat, they go to another hut to ask for help. Either way, it was a privilege to hear Senteyo’s story, and it’s a privilege to share her story with you. If you want to support Senteyo’s dozen children, support Elizabeth’s education, or support Heart Projects in general, find us on Venmo @heartprojects. Leave a note saying where you want the money to go. We’ll make sure it gets to the right place!
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August 2022
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