Posted by:
cludgie
(
)
Date: October 13, 2018 01:48AM
When I lived in Kinshasa, everyone begged at me because I was white, and normally, the white residents are the only ones who had money. I seldom, if ever, gave money. I would buy bread and water (clean water being a real scarcity), or maybe bring them to a hot food vendor and have him order food, things like that. But one of the "shegue" (pronounced "she-GAY--homeless boys living and sleeping rough) named Regan really wanted to go to school and asked me for money to pay for a year of public school. So a co-worker and I went to the closest school and made a deal with the headmistress, and she gave me a list of the supplies and the costs of a year in elementary school. I couldn't believe it. It cost my co-worker and me over $100 in books, papers, tuition, uniform, and shoes. I'm surprised that any of the kids can get into school there.
(To know more about Kinshasa's shegue, see:
https://pix4notes.wordpress.com/2007/01/20/sheguekinshasa-street-children/(Also, completely off-topic, down toward the bottom of the stack of photos, there is a picture of a dead boy laying on a wet street, hit by a car during the night in the rain. It's shocking to me because I was right there, driving by when that particular event occurred. Of all the random things to find on a website, I find a picture of something that I witnessed.)