Children

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A story is being told of a teenage girl whose had wonderful dreams that got battered and shattered by the harsh realities of life. She was a girl who was destined for greater things. She had the ability to be anything she wants to be in life.

Life had so many opportunities and all she had to do was make her pick. But the friends she kept introduced her to the streets and soon she was having a baby.

As this was happening, all the good friends she used to keep turned their backs against her. The many men who used to follow her up and down are nowhere to be seen. She is now wondering which way to go as her stomach becomes bigger with each successive day.

She is now walking with her head downcast. She is now a product of the girl-child’s failed attempt at having a quality and bright future. She is like hundreds, or could be thousands of teenage girls in Eastlands, who have dropped out of primary schools due to teenage pregnancy and motherhood..

Nearly every household in Eastlands has a girl or two, who are or have given birth at home. Most of these teenage mothers have dropped out of school and are now taking care of their babies living with their parents in single-roomed houses dotting the landscape of Eastlands. These girls have their hands full since, apart from having to take care of their own babies they also have to look after their younger siblings.

Every day these young girls, whose rightful place is school, walk around in groups going about the business of looking after their babies in the estates. You meet them on the way to the city council clinic, to the shop and on their way to draw water with their babies strapped on their backs. Some of them end up giving birth not only once, but at times three or more times. They all have lost hope and are living one day at a time, seeing their childhood dreams shattered.

But this is a trend that Stacy, a Standard Seven pupil at Halisi Academy in Kayole want to stop. Stacy is one of a new crop of girls who are going flat out after their dreams. She is having big plans for her lives and from the look of things, nothing is going to stop her, unless she decides to cave in to the pressures that come with being the girl-child growing up in Eastlands.
I am standing listening to a poem aptly titled I am a Kenyan that she is presenting with three other girls, though they have said in the introduction sit back, relax and enjoy. I can’t help but marvel at the girls passion.

Their well synchronized voices ring out clear in the humid air as they talk about their love for Kenya, a country they hope to leave better.

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