Roll Bounce

Take a tour of Sparrow Village:



You may notice the domes are cracked at every angle, and that is true of all domes, old and new. Sparrow is actually involved in a legal battle with the man who built them, who promised that they would stand forever despite being cheap and quick to build. I got to see footage of them going up, which basically entails laying brick around an inflatable dome mold. I’m no structural engineer but it seems obvious that this method of building has no architectural basis in balancing angles or distributing forces.

The domes are organized into 10 clusters, each housing about 24 children and one rotating house mother. Like our lodge, there are three offshoot domes with bunkbeds for each kid, and they share a set of lockers to keep all their clothes, books, and private things. We are told the house mothers are generally childless widows above age 50, purposely selected to have few outside responsibilities. They apparently vary widely in their “parenting” style and competence. There is ongoing debate about whether to group the kids by age, which allows some caregiver specialization, and also prevents bullying, or to set them up more like families, so they feel like siblings and can help each other out.

Since the government roll-out program of HIV drugs in 2004, children have been surviving longer and longer, so that now for the first time, there is a whole cluster of teenagers. Both caretakers and administators have no idea what to do with the older kids, who don’t fit in with the flow of the orphanage. They are remodelling a cluster just for them, and efforts are underway to search for separate housing or a different set-up entirely that children can “graduate” into as they get older.

Throughout the complex lie loose litter, rusty bikes, and single shoes, seemingly abandoned mid-action. One volunteer remarks that orphans get everything in the world donated to them but can choose nothing. Therefore they feel a sense of entitlement and at the same time little valuation of property, so that it is very difficult getting the children to care for or about their few belongings. Someone donated bikes of all sizes a year or two ago, which the kids love to ride yet leave out to rust and break, so now they all got taken away.

There are also many abandoned projects throughout the village. Individuals, corporations, and other organizations donate large sums for the implementation of various ideas, but nothing to maintain it or follow it through. The regular staff here are overwhelmed and underpaid, so no one except the occasional volunteer takes any interest in reviving these efforts, and these are always transient. That being said, these children are so confined and their world so limited that any stimulation, however brief, serves them well. For instance, there is a Marimba band here (traditional southern African music), and the whole group got to fly to the UK to perform two years ago. They still love talking about it.

Therefore, tonight we are having a movie night with the older kids in the "homework" dome, which features a small TV and a billion beanbag chairs. Corine encourages movies starring African-Americans, so Caroline picked up a basketball movie she had never seen called “White Men Can’t Jump.” When we explained it was about a little more than basketball, she handed us the reins. Apparently Grease and Hairspray are big hits with this crowed (though I'm not aware of any non-white actors in either). I decided on a junior high roller skating story starring Lil Bow Wow. It features some jive 70s music and group roller skating dance scenes, so hopefully they'll dig it.