Philanthropy isn't just for Fraterities

Blake and I attended a Rotary meeting with my father in an attempt to meet people and see what his Rotary club was like. While we were there, I began talking about my time as a Rotary Youth Exchange student and my experiences with RYLA. Sally, the wife of Tom who is the Schutz school superintendent, asked me if I was willing to do an impromptu speech for a few minutes about my connections to Rotary. Afterward, a woman gave a speech about an orphanage that the Rotary club gives money to that she visited after a few years away and she stated that it wasn't in very good condition. David, a teacher at the school said that he believed the orphanage just needed to have Rotary members consistently check in on the orphanage after we spend a little money fixing it back up. David elected to go the first time and my family said we would go along and help.

Soccer game with the children.

     The next day, David, Nagua, Blake and my father went to the orphanage together with some sponges for cleaning and some new warm clothes for the boys. The boys were so happy to receive some attention. One of the boys was very excited to practice his English with us and acted as the translator for his friends. We played multiple games with them including duck duck goose, ninja, a game called billy billy ba where you have to yell "ba" before the other person can finish saying "billy billy ba" at you and others. Afterward, we saw their living quarters which were very unclean and smelly. We were disappointed in the condition and learned later on that only the boy's side was unclean because in Egypt they have very traditional gender roles and cleaning isn't seen as masculine. This causes a lot of problems in the orphanage. The boys who like to play quiet games get picked on and called crazy and there is a lot of bullying of the younger boys. Although their supervisor does a pretty good job keeping himself as an authoritative figure that the boys look up to I don't think they necessarily see these behaviors as bad. Another issue we discovered was that according to the Islamic religion and culture, a child cannot take someone else's name. This means that even orphans are not allowed to be adopted by anyone making their lives very difficult. We have gone back on multiple occasions to the shelter already to visit the children and bring them more necessary supplies.