the smell of struggle

Monday means orphanage day.

I find myself shutting off all emotions before I get there. I do that in selfish defense for myself. It is easier to feel nothing than to allow myself to feel everything for these children. Today the smell in the orphanage was extra strong. It felt damp and dirty the whole time. When we were walking up the steps, I could barely breathe without gagging.

The kids we see are so cute. There is a girl that smiles the biggest smile I've ever seen when you touch her face. One boy with down syndrome learned how to make a clicking sound with his tongue after i sat with him for a while. Another baby is just learning how to clap her hands. There is one girl Ting Ting, that never makes a sound. I am almost positive that she is mute. She is almost four and from what I can tell, is not physically handicapped at all. She is always tied to a crib with a leash-type rope, so that she doesn't walk around. When we go, I make sure that the first thing I do is go untie her. The Ayi's never say anything when I do it, so I guess they just keep her tied so that they don't have to watch her. She always smiles really big when I make weird noises or jump up and down. The other kids take toys from her and push her around. I find myself thinking about her all the time and getting excited to see her when we're almost there.

We usually stay until 11-11:30. We play with them for a while and then we help with feeding them, and then it's nap time.

For the rest of the day I feel like I could throw up at any second. When I turn a certain way, I get a whiff of the what the orphanage smells like and sometimes, if it catches me off guard, I find my heart tightening and remembering what I saw that day.

For me, this smell is horrible and makes me gag and I want nothing more than to take off the clothes, pour bleach on them and then jump in the shower for an hour so I could be sure that the smell was completely gone. On other days, I would have done that. But today I decided that I would not. That I would go all day and whenever I felt sick or got a whiff of the smell, that I would remember that those kids are in those conditions all the time, for the rest of their life most likely. I also would say a little prayer every time I remembered them. It doesn't hurt me to uncomfortable for just a few hours while people are uncomfortable every second of their lives.