Mother’s Day is this week. It is no accident that several years ago we at Home of Grace Canada chose Mother’s Day weekend as the date for our annual fundraising and information event – to symbolize the love that the children here in Kenya need and receive through Home of Grace.(I hope many of you will support “Like a Mother’s Love” this Saturday!)
Edina is one kind of mother to the children and, in fact, to the much wider community. She, of course, has warmth and love. She provides for their practical needs – food, clothing, shelter, education. But she is more than that – she has wisdom, purpose, ideas and vision for her children and for the community. She is, in so many words, the driving force behind all that is Home of Grace. Many of you have heard a lot about Edina and I will tell more about her and her work over the next few months.
But there is another side to being a mother – and her name is Benta. Benta is the “house mother” at Home of Grace. She does the cooking, orchestrates the daily chores, and gets the children up, fed and off to school (a job that requires her to awake at 4 am!). In reality, she is what keeps Edina’s Home of Grace running on a day to day basis.
But there is much more to Benta that this. On the rare occasions that she is not in the kitchen or the cookhouse, I often find her in her spot in the girls room – sharing a quiet conversation with one of her ‘daughters’, reading, prayin – always with a smile on her face. She is fluent in English and I enjoy our conversations about the children and her life. She knows each child well – who needs a word or encouragement, who needs a firm hand. Not knowing more than a dozen Swahili words, I do not understand all that she says to them – but her expressions and smile tell it all.
My best image of Benta is this one – peering out from the kitchen, watching the childrn as they are singing or playing in the adjoining living room. Now THAT is one proud mom!
Auntie Benta – exactly what these children need and deserve – a warm and loving mama.
Edina with Sabina and Innocent
And Edina – a woman of love, determination and vision – the other aspect of ‘mother’ that every child needs in order to survive and thrive.
Together with the rest of the Home of Grace staff, these two mamas make a great team.
Happy Mama’s Day!!
