Day 3: They murdered a goat for us today… yikes!
This morning we woke up early and drove to Malindza Village
to check on the progress of our primary school and meet with representatives of
the Ministry of Education. We drove to
the school and waited….and waited…and waited.
We are dealing with Swazi time here.
So in the meantime Tyler decided to help build the school and met a new
friend in the process. The Swazi builder
enjoyed chatting with Tyler in broken English and then fell in love with Angie
and proposed marriage. She
declined. We then moved on to play with
a little girl who was SO shy and missing all of her teeth. She is an orphan who will be attending our
school in the New Year. Tyler and I made
it our mission to make her smile. So, we
learned some Swazi games to play with her… They all involved throwing rocks at
people so we decided Ty made the best target.
She laughed and smiled and she pegged him with rock bullets. (Don’t worry, Ty was smiling too!) Just as we
were enjoying ourselves I hear crying and look up to see a goat being dragged
toward us by the horns. The community
decided to murder a goat in our honor and have a braai. I was devastated. I tried to explain to them that for the last
16 years I have only eaten plants but they just laughed, cut its head off, and
hung it by the feet from a tree.
Yikes! I was out of there about
15 seconds later.
After getting lost trying to find Sharon’s grandmother
(drive past the highway shop down the “road” (HAHA!) toward the pre-school
(that no one knew existed …because it doesn’t yet), we were finally
successful. I asked how Sharon was (she
was in school so we didn’t get a chance to see her) and the Gogo told us that
she is fine now but the doctors changed her HIV medication and she had a hard
time acclimating to the new ARVs for a week.
I asked how the rest of the family was and the grandma suddenly got
silent. She then confessed that the grandfather
tried to kill her. He had “found a new
broom since the old one was too weak to sweep properly” and wanted to get rid
of her to make room for the new (his 3rd) wife. She went to the police but nothing happened,
so she moved out. Sharon and Emily (both
HIV positive) are her step-grandkids but she has kept them alive for 15 years
(Sharon was only 1y when the grandma and grandpa married) and she wants
custody. What an awful situation. The grandmother said that she could
understand that he does not love her anymore and wants a younger more beautiful
wife, but it is hard for her to watch this woman move into her house and take
over her role that she loved for 15 years.
She’s now 57 and has no idea where life will take her but she said that
all things are possible with God and she has no fear since He has a plan for
her. I sure hope she is right! She is the only reason why Sharon is alive as
she has hitch-hiked to Siteki for 15 years to get ARV medication to keep Sharon
alive. Life is tough in Swaziland, I
will forever count and share my blessings.
A hungry puppy helping us build...
No comments:
Post a Comment