The Happy Life Story: Saving abandoned children on the streets of Nairobi - 2nd Edition

By Sharon Emecz and Steve Emecz

This fully updated edition of The Happy Life Story tells the history of an inspiring children's home project near Nairobi, Kenya. It is told through the eyes of Sharon Emecz, who after twenty years on the corporate treadmill in London, took a career break and spent a month in Africa including volunteering at Happy Life. The Children's Home was founded in 2002 to "Provide the abandoned children of Kenya with a Home and a Hope for adoption." This is the heart-warming story of a small group of people saving the lives of hundreds of Children and arranging for many of these children to be adopted into "Forever Homes". Since 2002 over 500 children have been rescued with 300 being adopted.
Happy Life Children's Home now has 3 missions: To rescue and enable adoptions; to provide a Christian education, and to provide pediatric care in the Jesse Kay Children's Hospital. To accomplish this mission there are 2 Campuses: one campus is for infants to 3 years of age and the Hospital while the other campus is for the children who are 3 years and older. At this campus there is a church, Happy Life Christian School, and 3-bedroom homes for the children.
The first edition was completed when Sharon and her husband, Steve, returned from their 2nd Christmas at Happy Life. This new edition shares the great progress from 2014-2018. There are new stories, case studies, and news about the School and the Children's Hospital. All royalties from the book go to Happy Life Children's Home. More information is available at the Web Site: "happylifechildrenshome.com".
Enjoy the "STORY" and come to visit!

• Language: English
• Publisher: MX Publishing
• Release date: Mar 28, 2019
• ISBN: 9781787052703

Book preview

The Happy Life Story

Saving abandoned children on the streets of Nairobi

2nd Edition

Sharon Emecz

Edited by Steve Emecz

2018 digital version converted and published by

Andrews UK Limited

www.andrewsuk.com

First edition published in 2015

© Copyright 2015, 2018

Sharon and Steve Emecz

The right of Sharon and Steve Emecz to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998.

All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without express prior written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted except with express prior written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended). Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damage.

Although every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the information contained in this book, as of the date of publication, nothing herein should be construed as giving advice. Any opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of MX Publishing.

MX Publishing

335 Princess Park Manor, Royal Drive, London, N11 3GX

www.mxpublishing.com

Cover design by Brian Belanger

2nd edition update

Directors (2018): "When the Lord prompted us to begin this ministry to the abandoned children of Kenya in 2002, we never imagined how He would prosper and grow the ministry. We thank all the Happy Life partners for their love of the children of Kenya and for their support which has made this possible.

We especially acknowledge that this ministry is a work of the Lord. It is His love for the children that has inspired and motivated us to be his servants to the weak and poor.

It is the Lord’s doing and it is marvelous in our eyes.

- Psalm 118:23

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(Left to right: Sharon, Jim, Peter and Faith)

Happy Life 2014

Happy Life is a children’s home in the suburb of Kasarani in the capital city of Kenya, Nairobi. They rescue abandoned children from the streets, some of whom are orphans. There are around forty children aged 0–3 years at the main home in Kasarani. The organization has also expanded out into Juja Farm (a small village near Juja, North of Nairobi) with another home with sixty children aged 3–11 years, a church and a school.

The mission statement is:

Providing the abandoned children of Kenya with a home and hope for adoption

Introduction

Chiumbo is nearing the end of his ten hour shift collecting garbage in the Kibera slum and he is exhausted. He’s about to throw a clutch of carrier bags onto the wagon when he hears a noise.

He pauses - there is the sound again, coming from one of the plastic bags. He carefully lifts the rubbish from on top of what he can now see is a baby boy whose cries are growing faint.

Wrapped around the tiny infant’s bruised neck is a piece of rope where it looks like he has been strangled, and the placenta is still attached. Chiumbo calls over one of the other collectors. Mtoto (infant) says Chiumbo. Carefully they unwind the rope and Chiumbo grabs a cloth from the truck and wraps the baby in it. An hour later and the baby is at the hospital and a call is made to one of the many children’s homes in the area.

This scene is one that is played out many times a day, dozens of times a week and hundreds of times a month.

This book tells the story of Happy Life, one of the amazing organizations making a difference in the lives of abandoned children in Nairobi.

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Benaiah

[his name means ‘God Builds’]

Beniah is the young baby in the story above. He’s a very affectionate baby and is still at Happy Life in Kasarani happy and healthy.

How this book came about

This book tells the story of one special children’s home - ‘Happy Life’ based in the Kasarani suburb of Kenya’s capital city Nairobi.

The story is told by Sharon Emecz, who after twenty years on the corporate treadmill in the UK took a career break and ended up at the Happy Life rescue centre. Sharon describes the impact that the experience has had:

[Sharon] Many people use the phrase ‘life changing’ when they have volunteered in areas with high levels of poverty but for me personally, that’s the wrong term. A better way of describing what happened to me is ‘perspective changing’. Do I still live in London with my job and comfortable life? Yes. Am I more fundamentally grateful for the hand that life has dealt me? Absolutely. Do I have a better appreciation for the situation in places like Kasarani - I really hope so. To see what the team at Happy Life have achieved in such a short space of time has been wonderful - and to play a small part in that is very rewarding.

Once I decided to take three months