The Gallery
All text and photographs copyright of Our Forgotten Children
Outside in the yard, surrounded by the latest additions to this burgeoning family, BJ nods his approval. "Somebody has to look after those who can't look after themselves."
Meanwhile - less than a mile away, across the garbage-strewn mud paths of the Kibera slum - comes the sound of heavenly angels, singing in the late afternoon sun.
We're just in time for choir practice, at a school named Valley View. And what a view it is. In stark contrast to the corrugated iron sheds and rivers of sewage that surround them, the choir is turned out immaculately in uniforms of pink and grey.
The air is filled with acrid smoke from wood fires - and the jubilant voices of a hundred young boys and girls, singing in perfect harmony.
Valley View has won Kenya's top competition for school choirs three years running. Senior teacher Jacinta Mbuthye says "Unlike other schools, we don't have many facilities. But every child has a voice, and we teach our students to make the best of what they are born with."
A hundred yards away, thirty-five Grade 3 students sit crammed together inside one of Valley View's tiny classrooms, straining to read what's written on the blackboard.
This is a school without running water or mains electricity. "Yes, it's hard for them to see what I'm writing", acknowledges David, the geography teacher. "But it's worse when it rains. We're ankle deep in mud, the exercise books get soaked and what's on the blackboard is washed away."
Nevertheless, more than 750 students attend classes here every day, and there's a long waiting list to get in. In a country where ninety per cent of school children drop out before they're twelve, that's impressive.
Head Teacher Moses Sumba puts it down to what he calls the "abiding spirit of survival inside every child." The heavenly voices outside are living testimony to that.
Kenya
For twelve year-old Mbijji (pronounced BJ), life is good. He's selected the team for today's football match - and they are all his brothers. In a family of 86, including 38 sisters, he has plenty to choose from. "Most of them are too young," he says, "But my father wants to give everyone an equal chance."
His father is Mohammed Hiribae, and BJ and all of his 'siblings' live at the Mama Fatuma Orphanage in the Kibera region of Nairobi, the largest slum in all of Africa.
"Babies are brought to us nearly every day," says Mohammed, "and we try to make room for all of them." The babies have either been abandoned or newly orphaned, the offspring of AIDS-stricken single mothers. "We have no money for our future survival, just enough to get through from week to week."
While football practice gets under way in a narrow alleyway, BJ takes us on a tour of the tiny rooms where the entire extended family eats and sleeps and studies.
In the girls' dormitory, 13 year-old Jamila sits quietly on her bunk bed, wishing she had something to read. When she turns 18, she says, she'll seek out a life beyond the slums of Nairobi. Like BJ, Jamila dreams of becoming a lawyer. "A lawyer for human rights" she clarifies.