Gems amongst the junk.

This is the view that faces you as you walk towards the dump site.  Mountains of waste and rubbish as far as the eye can see, and trucks filled to the brim going back and forth during the day making these mountains grow.  As we arrived the site, a garbage truck was following us ready to relieve it's load and out of nowhere came men and children running toward the truck rummaging through the garbage.  We carried on walking; over the mounds of waste and passed the cows that were grazing (on what I don't know!) and camouflaged into the rubbish I saw shanty houses scattered around. I came to realize that this was not just a dump site but it was home to hundreds of people.

Over a hundred families live here. Each family with between 1 and 8 children.  They have built their houses out of whatever they have been able to get their hands on; sticks, plastic, fabric, tires and wood.  The men and children will organize the garbage by material- separating plastic from the glass etc and put them in massive bags ready to be sold. This is their source of income. The women will collect all the electrical equipment and cut the wires to either try and sell them or use them to illegally connect to any electrical source they can find.

Some of the children who live here are able to go to the nearby school.  The parents have to pay for their children's education, and because the families here are so poor they send one child to school for maybe 1 year, then another child from the family the next year.  The older children cares for and looks after the younger siblings once they can walk so that the parents can try and work to get money.  MWB sponsors many of the children living here in the dump site.  This means that the children receive all the equipment they will need to go to school- backpack, books, pencils, ruler, pens and uniform; allowing them to enjoy full high school education.

Twice a week the children have a visit from some of the workers/volunteers from MWB. Around 80 children come to the hall that MWB have built in partnership with the government and there they hear the word of God, they sing songs, play games, have a lot of fun and have food to eat. It's great being a part of this project :)