At first it looks like fun in the water, child’s play. A half-dozen kids are splashing in the river’s mouth, sending sparkling droplets flying through the air. One little boy, perhaps eight years old, appears particularly determined, he is using a stick for maximum impact, slapping it on the murky water’s surface.
But a closer look reveals this is anything but fun. These children are fishing for small fish, measuring no longer than your hand. It’s no hobby here, they are fishing for their livelihoods. All the splashing about is to attract their prey. They say they sell the fish to a woman who takes them to market. If they don’t catch any, or she doesn’t buy them, they don’t eat. It is as simple as that.
These children live in Kroo Bay, one of the poorest slums in Sierra Leone. It’s tiny, tin shacks lining both sides of a river. It’s banks littered with garbage. The homes are crushingly close to each other, leaning on each other. From up on a hill, all you can make out are interlocking tin roofs.
There is a labyrinth of narrow passageways snaking through the slum, in many parts, just wide enough for a single person to walk through. When it rains hard, as it does all during the rainy season, the river overflows its banks flooding the homes, sending the people searching for higher ground, but there is nowhere else for them to stay.
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Diseases spread quickly here. In a country with one of the highest mortality rates in the world (according to UNICEF, based on a 2010 survey, the mortality race for kids under five is 217 per 10,000 live births; in other words, one in five children won’t make it to their fifth birthday) the children of Kroo Bay are particularly vulnerable.
I met Sarah Bangura, who has lost a child. She says her son Sarh when he got sick and went into convulsions, but when she went to the hospital, there was no money to pay for doctors and nurses, so he died.
She remembers him as a little boy who loved nothing more than playing with friends.
Sarah plans to have another child and if this one gets sick, things will be different. In 2010, the government introduced free health care for children under five, pregnant women, and lactating mothers, which has been improving the outlook for children.
For Sarah, it is a relief knowing she will not be turned away again. She hopes though, one day, there will be free health care for all children, no matter what their age.
There is also preventative work going on here, with community volunteers trained to educate locals on the risks of and how diseases like cholera and malaria are contracted.
So things are improving for the health of children, but life overall in Kroo Bay remains a constant struggle. As I turn to go, I look back at the river’s mouth and see the children still out there fishing. I can only hope today’s haul is plentiful.
Christina is a Global National correspondent based in Toronto. Follow her on Twitter: @StevensGlobal.
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