The Yard Has Begun!

View from the balcony of Hadayek el Maadi

The entire team is in Cairo now and we have begun to lay the foundation for the yard. While readjusting to Cairo has been rather easy, it’s hard to ever imagine adjusting to the heat. The lack of internet service might impede regular updates to the blog, but we will try to keep you as updated as possible.

We have made some progress on the center already, and we are preparing it to be opened in the near future. The apartment for the center is located in a new building with some of the other apartments still a gutted mess. However, our particular apartment is great. It is brand new and very clean and nice looking- even by US standards. There is an office, a large room, another medium sized room, a kitchen, bathroom, and large closet. The 7th floor balcony overlooks the crowded Hadayek el Maadi, a poor area of Cairo where many of the refugees live. Unfortunately, the elevator, or “lift” as it is called here, is not yet in service. The apartment is unfurnished, but the walls are newly painted and the floors look great. The sink outside the bathroom is perfect for the kids to wash their hands before playing. We have installed ceiling fans and hopefully will be able to purchase a refrigerator and stove pending donations. This will make it possible to provide food for the kids. While we are not as concerned about having the apartment extravagantly furnished, we want it to have the appliances that will make it a place for the entire community to use.

We’ve been organizing the toys that were donated or that we bought into general categories and have bought some bins, containers, tables, and had a water table built by local carpenters. The set up is really starting to look great and we’re excited about the kids getting to play at all the stations. We have it organized into a number of stations:


- Blocks, legos, knex, etc
- Dolls, Barbies, and stuffed animals
- Kitchen toys
- Tool table and tools
-Dress up clothes
- Puzzles
-Cars, trains, etc
-Water table
-Art room
-Puppets and music
- Reading ‘corner’

Registration starts today, and we’ll have more pictures up soon.