Nairobi’s homeless need assistance

Railway

Nairobi; Kenya: A locomotive graveyard for beautiful, dead trains that stretch out for kilometres into the eternity of their nothingness.

Once they were young and vital and powerful and important to the society, but now they are cast aside and are rotting in rust as modern day industry circulates on their periphery.

Old containers containing ignored metallic memories.

These are the discarded cargo trains of Nairobi Railway Station.

They say that desperate times call for desperate measures. I do not adhere to this tautological philosophy. Instead, I feel that desperate times call for creative measures.

I fully believe that we must utilise creativity to shake up the lull of the world around us.

The other day, as I was walking home from work in Industrial Area, I passed the bridge over the railway station and witnessed all these old cargo train containers just lying there.

ABSOLUTE WASTE OF SPACE

The more I thought about it, the more I realised that it is an absolute waste of space and resources and they could be used  for something radically revolutionary.

Now bear with this contorted idea a moment before discarding it.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could turn the discarded cargo holds into small shacks for the homeless to stay in?

We could relocate so many families and get them off the streets and provide a roof over their heads.

The containers are not being used and they are occupying a space that could be transformed into something truly upbeat and communal.

Imagine if we could turn the whole scrapyard into a centralised community for the homeless.

People could visit and talk to them, we could organise weekly soup kitchens, we could also organise workshops and teach skills and set up little classes for the children and we could create a subculture within the city: Nairobi’s very own Homeless City. Imagine how the government would benefit from the PR. An innovative step towards the rehabilitation of homeless people.

The concept is pretty simple but would have to be well executed and regulated by selfless organisers to make sure it does not get derailed.For now, it is just a concept, but with some work and leeway from the government, we could make it a productive success.

This is what it should be about. Opening our minds to new ideas. Opening our hearts to people.

The more we talk about these things, the more ideas we create and subsequently, the more potential we have to change lives. It may or may not work. The point is that we should explore these possibilities.

If you have read my other pieces some weeks back, you will know that we have started an initiative called Homeless of Nairobi.

The concept has not been fully articulated yet and so in a nutshell, the Homeless of Nairobi is a Facebook Page where we give voice to the homeless people along the streets of Nairobi.

TRYING TO CHANGE LIVES

It is a virtual voice for the many who are ignored, discarded and abandoned by the strange society that Nairobi breeds.

Through the Homeless of Nairobi, we are trying to change lives.
It is a three phase project and the first phase is about raising awareness about the plight of the homeless.

Through the Facebook Page, we are trying to provide an interactive platform where people can see what the homeless undergo on the streets.

Throughout phase one, we will conduct a number of progressive little initiatives such as street stores for the homeless, soup kitchens and relocation of individuals who are willing to give up vices they have picked up along the streets of Nairobi.

Once we have built awareness, we move on to phase two which is about raising funds and skills allocation. Imagine, in the best of scenarios, a million people on the page each donating ten shillings. We would have ten million shillings with which to construct a shelter for the homeless.

In the shelter, we will construct gardens where they will be taught how to grow food and that will bring about an element of self-sustainability.

The third phase is maintenance of the shelter (or shelters). This is important because rehabilitation is a systematic process that takes time.

We cannot just throw money at a problem and hope that it disappears.

If you would like to join the Homeless of Nairobi, you can do so on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/homelessofnairobi.

Thank you, as always, for reading.

Twitter: @just_sham_it.