Let the Little Children Come Unto Me

One day I saw little Ndu, PG’S four year old son, playing in the gravel outside our house. He’s ridiculously cute so I decided I would go outside and hang out with him. He had this old, almost used up pink marker in his hand and was using it as an airplane. As soon as I got out there though he held it up excitedly and yelled “this!” 

His English vocabulary consists of this, this one, yes, no, and what is this. All said with a lisp. “This?” I asked. “Yes, this.” He said, and proceeded to try and color my fingernails with the marker. I understood. So Ndu and I sat on the gravel and I colored all of his nails with the left over pink marker. His toes were next. I laughed the whole time and reminisced of the times I dressed up my little brother Eli in my pink Barbie dress and make him use my play vacuum. He loved it, simply because I was his older sister and I told him to. 

I figured this was the case with Ndu – that he just wanted the attention of another older sister. His hero in life, next to Spiderman, is his older sister Nothando. However, as I soon found out, this was not the case. Swazis, both male and female, purely love to have their nails painted. 

I was outside one hot day, sitting with the kids who are always hanging around the care point. None of them really speak English, and I could tell they were bored, so I was trying to think of something fun to do with them that wouldn’t involve leaving the shaded porch. 

Of course, cutex. That’s what they call nail polish. I figured the little girls would get a kick out of it, and the boys… well, they could watch. But when I came back kids started flocking to me from all over the care point. The little boys were almost more excited than the girls. I opened the bottle and started to paint one miniature hand at a time. Their nails were filthy, but you couldn’t tell once they were covered in the hot pink polish. Even the older boys wanted in on the action, but unlike the others they only wanted their pinky nails painted. Who knows. 

Since that day I have painted probably hundreds of tiny fingers. My bottle is now empty and there are little Swazi’s running around looking quite glamorous.
Every time I pulled out that bottle of nail polish and set to work, I wonder why it is that these kids love getting their nails painted so much. I mean, little American girls think it’s fun, but it doesn’t compare with the Swazis’ enthusiasm. The fact that the boys are so eager to join in is what really intrigued me. After pondering all the possible explanations and listening to a chapter of a Rob Bell book on Kate’s laptop, I realized that it’s a simple answer really. 

They like it because it’s beautiful. They like it because it makes them beautiful. This region of Swaziland is one of the poorest. Virtually the only jobs to be had around here are meager paying jobs in the sugar cane and citrus fields.

 

As a result, the vast majority of the people here are poor. Not just poor, but really poor. The kids all wear dirty, dirty clothes that don’t fit and are covered in holes. They don’t have enough water to bathe regularly. Many have probably never seen a toothbrush. They have sores, scars, and burns all over their skin. The long to be pretty, even the boys. They long for something to make them feel like they aren’t just kids destined for thievery and prostitution. And here I am, some random American girl, who makes their fingernails shiny and pink.