What is Poverty?

Just before I left for Kenya there was an article in the Star Tribune about the poverty line in Italy being around 10,000 Euros/year. While living is more expensive there than in Africa, having the equivalent here you would be considered quite fortunate.
Children in the primary school are given time at teh end of the day to do their homework, because their families are so poor that they do not have a single light/lantern at home so once it becomes dark the children could not see to study. It costs 300 shillings a year to go to the primary school (direct exchange $4.00), and this includes lunch of githere (for some that is the only meal they get a day), uniforms and books. Many cannot afford this fee, so the parents have the option of coming on a couple Saturdays to work in the school to pay the tuition. Some of the 7th and 8th grade students do the work instead of their parents since their parents cannot or will not come. The Sisters provide milk also to the children who are HIV positive because at home they get very little food.
Absolute poverty is considered to be living on less then $1 per day, adjusted for purchasing power parity (i.e. what you could buy is equivalent). Angeline, a teacher in the technical school who is 22 (my age) is currently the sole provider for her entire family. Her parents live some hours away, and sold all their cattle in order for her to be able to go to school. She has younger siblings, and she is the one who pays for them to go to school. Her brother has just finished and she is extremely happy that he has found a job. In her hometown the drought is extremely bad and the parents are unable to grow any food and are unemployed because there is no work. Without their garden growing the parents and younger siblings have nothing to eat. She sends them the money she can to help them to be able to have food. What really surprised me though is how fortunate Angeline feels. She says and truly means she is incredibly blessed to have a job and be able to help her family -- many people in her home are dying because there is no water and some families have no one with a job. At the end of the month Angeline makes very little and spends hardly any of that little bit on her needs.
I know in the U.S. many families struggle, but here being poor is the norm. The government provides little help to the people. While primary school education has been free in government schools since 2003, it still costs becasue of the uniforms and books. Some people here literally have nothing. I saw a little boy yesterday who was playing with a car made of an old milk carton and pop bottle caps.
It is difficult to see that there are a few people here who are very rich, and have no interest in helping those around them.