Yesterday, I spent four hours with the boy I sponsor. It was our second time together, and I enjoyed seeing him again, seeing how he has grown and hearing him speak a few words of English. Three years ago he didn’t know any English.

I was delighted to meet the director of his child development center and to finally see photos of his mother, father and younger sister. I also saw pictures of the house they built with one of the family gifts I sent.
I enjoyed telling Lerionga that I’m going to be a father soon and recounting in greater detail the things I’ve shared in my letters. But all of our conversation lasted about 10 minutes, and then there was silence.
I am extremely uncomfortable with silence when I think it’s not supposed to be there.
In advance of my time with Lerionga, I imagined this meeting would be different from our first one. I imagined that conversation would be easier, that there wouldn’t be silence. I imagined it would be an “unbelievable encounter” like this. But it wasn’t.
I can’t explain how one comes to love a child who they hardly know. But I can say that I felt like Akouvi was part of my family. I loved her. And so often in her letters, she told me that she loved me too.
I found myself very distracted the day we heard of his death. I wondered how his family is coping. I wondered what kind of ceremony they would have in Tanzania to remember such a precious child. I wondered if his family realized that his sponsor family was at a loss over what to do.
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