New Arrivals

So after blogging last week I realised that I didn’t really write much about exactly what I’ve been up to. It’s just that I feel so strongly about what’s going on in this world that maybe sometimes I get a bit carried away and miss what’s slap bang right in front of me. The little girl I wrote about last week is just going from strength to strength- or should I say smile to smile. She laughed out loud for the first time on Wednesday. I felt so humbled and blessed to have witnessed it. She now smiles a lot, she laughs, chatters away, interacts with the other babies and toys and now is even making attempts to start crawling. It truly has been a miracle. The pictures below show just how much she has changed in a little over a week. It’s not just her smile that is visibly different- you can see in her eyes now there is life and a desire and a will to fight. I know so many of you have been praying for her so thank you so much! God has truly answered our prayers! Hallelujah!

More exciting news comes in the form of not one, not two but three new arrivals at the village. We picked up a three month old gorgeous little baby boy up from the hospital on Thursday afternoon. It was such an amazing experience to go and collect our new arrival. When I picked him up for the first time I instantly felt drawn to him. I instantly felt that he was so desperate to be loved. I prayed over him and sang some songs and I felt the power of God flow from me to him. The connection I made with him that afternoon will never leave me and I hope and pray that before I leave that I can play a big part in his development both spiritually and emotionally. It truly was a special moment- one I’ll never forget. Then Robbie and another volunteer picked up his 12 month old brother on Friday afternoon. He was in so much distress when he arrived. Tears were streaming down his checks, it was quite an emotionally draining moment- I really struggled to keep it together. There are 9 months between the two siblings meaning that the mother got pregnant again as soon as she had the first little boy. Then just as the 12 month year old arrived a 6 year old little girl arrived. She seems to be quite happy although her English is not too good but hopefully she should settle in well and get to know the older children quickly. She has been put in a house with another 8 year old girl so hopefully they should get on well and for a special bond. All the other children can’t wait to meet the three new arrivals and make them welcome. They are especially excited to meet the 6 year old as that’s another recruit for the football and cricket matches!!!!! Please pray for these three new arrivals that they would feel as though they are at home and for the house mothers that they would make a deep and lasting connection with the new children.
Thursday brought the celebration of a birthday- any excuse for a party! We had cake, “chippies”, marshmallows and lots of fun! As always we sang happy birthday, blew out the candles and opened the presents. The afternoon is always such a special time as sometimes we forget that we can’t predict how many more birthdays the children will have so each one must be made a very special occasion. I took my camera with me (I rarely go anywhere without it!!!) and took so many photos- the kids absolutely adore having their photo taken as you can see from the pictures below…..

The older children have dance lessons once a week after school and they had their big performance last weekend. They performed brilliantly with so much passion and enthusiasm. I felt so nervous for them as we sat and watched all the other acts before it was their turn. The way they came onto the stage however soon dissolved my nerves. They just looked so exited and confident. They were amazing! Most of the children have such a good sense of rhythm- they really felt the music and that just shone through. Bias set aside they easily got the biggest clap of the night. I incidentally didn’t just clap- I screamed, whooped and clapped as loudly as I could whilst fighting back tears of joy. As with out new little arrival I feel already I have such a strong and deep connection with each and every child. I felt so proud of them and what they have achieved against all the odds. The love of God really shines through them and I feel just so privileged to be part of their lives……..

Don't Give up the Fight

Before I start my post I must apologise for not posting last week. I’ve been ill with tonsillitis (nice little present from the children) so I couldn’t get on the internet last weekend as I could hardly make it out of bed let alone to the internet café! I’m trying hard not to let this illness get the better of me by trying to stay as active as possible, drinking plenty of orange juice to keep up my vitamin C levels and generally trying to be as happy and smiley as possible but it’s hard. My energy levels are running low and I’m not having much contact with the kids as I don’t want to make them ill too so sometimes it’s hard to keep going but I’m plodding along. This week I’ve mainly been doing preparatory work for the "Bible Club" I’ll be starting with the kids in the next few weeks. Rehoboth seeks to look after the kids according to five different areas- Emotional, Physical, Intellectual, Medical and finally Spiritual. Emotionally the children are well supported by the house mothers, the sponsorship program, the Aunty and Uncle program and of course us as volunteers. Physically the children play a lot! We play outside in crèche, there are jungle gyms dotted about the village to keep them active and we’re currently in the process of constructing a football pitch which should be ready after Christmas. Intellectually all children above 6 who are able to recognise their names, know their colours, count to 10, speak English to a reasonable level and are well enough attend a local Christian school. We currently have a 6 year old and an 8 year old still in "big crèche" aimed at 3-6yrs who hopefully will start school in January providing they are healthy enough and can speak and understand enough English. Many of the children who arrive at Rehoboth don’t speak any English. While it is vital that the children learn to speak good English in order to attend school, we encourage the children the speak Zulu (their native tongue) to each other so they don’t totally leave their heritage behind. Clearly we look after the medical needs of the children by providing them with the right treatment according to their individual circumstances. Most of the children are on antiretroviral (ARV) treatment, however some remain quite healthy without it. Most of the younger babies also receive vitamin supplements and unfortunately some of the children newest to Rehoboth are receiving treatment for tuberculosis- another big killer here in the KwaZulu-Natal region. Finally spiritually the older children who attend school go to a Zulu church on a Sunday and attend the local Sunday school which they love. Also as they attend a Christian school in this way they are too told about Jesus. It has been felt however recently that we as a team here at Rehoboth should also be providing for the children spiritually hence why I am going to be starting up the "Bible Club" I mentioned earlier. The kids already have a good understanding of who God and Jesus is. They sing about Jesus at school, and in daily devotions the children that attend crèche also are involved in worshipping God and Jesus. They are all encouraged to enter a personal relationship with Jesus and accept Him as their Lord and Saviour and also their friend. All this however needs reinforcing with word from God so I will be reading them stories from the bible (with the aid of felt picture boards- v exciting!!) and teaching them hopefully a new bible verse every week. In this way each and every child should be "fed" with the word of God and also have a deep and meaningful relationship with Jesus. Your prayers that this would be realised at Rehoboth would be greatly appreciated!!!
With very little contact with the children this week due to my illness I have very little to report back on kids wise! We have had a major break through though with one of the children. She is 15 months old and until this week had never smiled. She came to Rehoboth in August and had very little life in her. As the weeks went by nothing changed, she remained very emotionally dead and was slowly giving up the fight. usually when children like this come to Rehoboth the love and care that they immediately receive is usually more than enough to bring them back to life, but not with this little one. She has received so much prayer but it was only this week that we’ve had the breakthrough we needed. She has started smiling and in her eyes you can now see that she’s starting to live again and build up the strength she needs to fight fight fight this horrendous virus. I’ve not seen it for myself yet but I’m very excited to see her when I’m all better. This combination seems to be the key to fighting this disease. The children need to be supported emotionally, physically, spiritually, medically and intellectually in order for them themselves to literally fight for their lives.
Please pray for each and every child struck with HIV/AIDS to fight for their lives through the love and care of Jesus Christ, our Lord, our Saviour and our Friend.

This is a picture of the little girl before she started smiling- hopefully in the next few weeks I'll be able to catch her now beautiful smile on camera to show you how much of a difference living at the village has made in her life! L xx

He's My Brother

Well after 9 months of waiting I finally arrived at Rehoboth last Friday. Everything still feels a little surreal but I’m here where I know I’m supposed to be and I can’t wait to see what’s in store during the next 6 months.
I’ve had a hectic week feeling my way around the village, organising some sort of schedule and of course attempting to learn the names of the 37 children and all the house mothers and other support staff. In the mornings I’ll be involved in co-ordinating baby crèche (0-3yrs) and the big crèche (3-6yrs). Then in the afternoon I’ll be doing lots of things ranging from working in the clinic sorting out all the many medicines that the children need, swimming with them, doing homework with the ones who go to school, music and dance lessons and of course sorting the storeroom where the many many donations of clothes, toys and other things need to be sorted and shelved. Any other time I have free I spent playing, reading and generally having fun with all the children. It’s gonna be a busy 6 months!!!

Rob and I have been made to feel so unbelievable welcome. I feel so privileged and blessed to be among such loving and caring people. The children are just amazing- each so beautiful and special in their own little way. I’ve seen a lot of pictures of the children when they arrived at the village. They all looked so miserable and unloved. Most of them were very ill too for obvious reasons. To see them now and witness just how much the love and care of Jesus and his followers can transform a child into a happy, smiley, relatively healthy individual is very humbling indeed.

As you can see from the pictures below the children themselves are so loving towards one another- it’s hard to stop the tears from falling when I look at the pictures below.

In the last week blood test results have revealed that actually 3 of the little ones are HIV negative and hopefully in the next few months they will be reunited with family. These three children’s biological mothers are actually HIV positive so it really is a miracle that these children are negative. God is amazing!!!
The volunteer accommodation that we are living in is beautiful. My room is lovely and cosy. I’ve stuck lots of pictures of u all on my walls already to make it feel like home and I’m in the process of printing out photos of all the children to help me learn their names faster! Our living room and kitchen is really homely and the view from the building is beautiful! The whole village is set on the side of a massive hill so you have to walk up and down hills all day long- good way to get back into shape! At the bottom of the hill near our accommodation is a wee reservoir so at night the sound from the hundreds of frogs is almost deafening. I’m having to quickly get used to all the many many many different bugs- moths, flying beetles, flying ants, crickets, shongololos (not sure if that’s how u spell it- suffice to say they are really big long black centipede) and so many other things that are just horrid to look at. As most of you are aware I’m not a fan of creepy crawlies so I’m having to change my ways fast as there’s no way to avoid them there are so many about- especially at night! I’ve already got a few mossie bites- actually less than I expected as usually mossies love me (or my skin rather!).

The weather so far has not been the best. We’ve had quite a few horrendous thunder storms with fantastic lightning but torrential rain. We lost power from about 8.30pm til 11.00am the next day. I’m quickly learning that with being in such a remote and poor area it takes a lot lot longer for things to get into motion and for vital things like the power to get up and running again after storms knock it out. The difference between the area around Rehoboth and Joburg is staggering. It’s like we’ve stepped into a different world. Here almost everyone is black. Most people live in tiny little concrete shacks- very few actually have electricity. There are very few cars about except from taxi’s who ferry people about (usually there about 25 people crammed into a 8 seater car and the drivers are complete maniacs!). There are people walking next to the roads day and night. Most of them seem to be wandering aimlessly- not knowing or caring where they are actually going to end up. This last week really has been a wakeup call to the struggle these people face day in day out and I’m worrying about the fact that my hair won’t stay straight. I visited the local government hospital today and was appaled by the conditions. The wards were filthy, everything seemed so unorganised. the state of the TB ward was just unbelievable. No wonder so many people in Africa are dying not just of AIDS- TB remains a huge killer as well. The childrens ward wasn’t much better- kids with open TB who were supposed to be in quarantine were wandering around mixing with the other children who were clearly already rather ill. It really was unbelievable especially considering I was assured that this was one of the better hospitals in KwaZulu Natal- apparently the hospital received lots of funding to build new, more up to date wards however these wards haven’t opened as of yet as there are no staff to run them. Today really opened my eyes to how tremendously lucky we are to have free medical care which is of far greater standard. It seems to me that the KwaZulu Natal (nicknamed the AIDS region of South Africa as 40% of the people living here have HIV/AIDS) region whilst being so famous for its high rate of HIV/AIDS is in reality a region that the people of South Africa and indeed the rest of the world would much rather ignore…