Protect, feed, and educate 114 rescued children

Confident and academically focused Lewis is in his first year at a prestigious university in Kenya. He is pursuing a degree in Biotechnology. Every often he cracks a joke as he narrates how Grandsons of Abraham has impacted on his life, thanks to our supporters through GlobalGiving.

“I am Lewis, a second born in a family of four, two brothers and a sister. We were born to a single mum in Kitise, a remote village in Makueni County. My mother struggled to make ends meet in order to provide the basic necessities for us.

Pressure must have been too much on our Mum since at some point she left home and that was the last my siblings and I saw her. Owing to this, things turned to a tunnel of darkness when we learnt of it months after her journey to the unknown. We were left at the mercy of our ageing grandmother who had no source of income. She took care of us but could only afford to feed us once a day. School and luxuries like good clothes were only a dream for us. Despite longing to go to school with children my age, I could not. I had no school fees, no school uniform or stationery. I wondered what other children did at school the whole day while my siblings and I played at home or went grazing grandma’s goats many times going hungry the whole day.

One day I wandered away from home and found myself in the company of street boys. I did not want to go back home. I found myself surviving at the local towns begging for food and money from strangers and finally I miraculously landed in Mombasa streets in 2004. I was 8 years then.

My brother would also join me in the street and we had to coin survival tactics in order to survive in the streets. This became our life. I was happy that my brother was with me but with time life proved unbearable, the coldness, bullying from the bigger boys, police harassment and pessimistic society and their perception and comments of us "Street boys". I did not like the life at all.

In 2005, we met with the Grandsons of Abraham social workers who promised us school and making many friends if we would accept to go to the Centre. I did but my brother turned down the offer and disappeared back to the streets. Later we met but it was too late for him to join school. Though he later quit street life, he now hawks boiled eggs for a living.

At Grandsons, I have had my life rescued, actually given back to me, I must say. I have been able to attend school and also made a lot of friends. Grandsons has educated me, mothered and changed me from nobody to someone. My stay in university at the moment depends entirely on Grandsons. But the Sisters resources are always stretched since they support so many orphans, former street children and girls rescued from trafficking and other forms of abuse. Over the holidays I do some work to earn some money to support my university expenses and ease the burden for the Sisters.

Having come this far, I want to thank God for people of good will who have supported us by supporting Grandsons through GlobalGiving. Though they may not know me, they have become part of my family and I say Many thanks!"