Day 4: Swazi pre-schoolers need time to warm up to sparkler
fireworks.
We had a New Years party at the pre-school this morning! Our
pre-school has 55 kids but some brought their older siblings so we ended up
with almost 70 kids (Kait, your guy who posed like a stud in our school library
was there and was cute as ever!). We had
to run to the store to buy more cakes!
We had chocolate, strawberry, and vanilla but soon the children were wearing
it all over their faces. It was a beautiful
site. They said that only the rich
schools have baseball and most Swazi kids never learn how to play. That doesn’t fly with me…so we brought out
the baseball bats and balls that we donated last month and taught the kids to
play. It wasn’t long before they were
pros!! Only one kid never quite caught on that he was supposed to swing the bat
and he just clutched it tightly and watched the ball fly by him…over and
over.
Then we brought out the fireworks. We purchased boxes of pop-rocks and sparklers
for everyone. They LOVED the pop rocks
and although I begged them not to throw them at people – they didnt seem to
listen. Then it was time for the
sparklers. The kids had to line up
holding their unlit sparkler while we lit them with a match. The kids had NO IDEA what was going on and
the first three kids – instantly upon their sparkler being lit – they screamed
and threw it to the ground. Eventually
they caught on and decided the sparklers were more fun than they were
scary.
We also paid for our eLangeni Secondary School students’
tuition today. We added three new
students to our group. The Thoreen
family sponsored Timi Msibi who is a half-sister of our already sponsored Msibi
group that includes Sizo, Nomfundo, and Nosipho. Her mother died recently and she was no
longer able to pay. She will complete
Form 4 this year (Junior year) and only then has one remaining year until
graduation. Thank you Thoreen Family!!
We also added two new boys: Mduduzi Dlamini and Mbhamali Banele. They have been trying to do odd jobs and pay
for their own schooling since their mother died. They have been living at the school and
working in our GHFP fields, sweeping the classrooms, grooming the gardens,
watering the GHFP fruit bearing trees, and tending the animals. This still leaves them short on their $450/year
school fees. When I met the boys, they
were covered in mud, sweat, and pig feces as they were spending their holidays
in the animal shed cleaning out the waste.
I told them to keep working hard, but maybe not SO hard because we
wanted to help them focus on their studies – they have the rest of their lives
to work. THANK YOU TO EVERYONE who has
donated to our GHFP Orphan Education Fund.
We still need more help!! There are 3 orphaned girls who have been
forced to drop out in Malindza village who we’d love to send to school. This would be $1,350 in total but even $25
helps. Please consider giving a little
so we can send these children to school.
If everyone pitches in, I know we will reach our goal!! www.ifightpoverty.org/donate.html
I will write again tomorrow morning about our “cross-over”
party tonight. We bought Cokes,
Grapetisers, Appletisers, and TONS of Chockit cookies. We also bought an enormous box of fireworks and
I can’t wait to spend the New Year with our amazing kiddos. Lungelo, Timi, Nomfundo, Sizo, Mazwi, Philo,
Samkelo, and Shali will be joining us this year up on a high mountain in rural
eLangeni. It is so beautiful to look out
over the darkness and see the sky light up with fireworks all around you
below. Every time I see one, I close my
eyes and make a wish for the future of each one of our vastly growing group of children. I wish them to be successful, healthy, and
happy. Their smiles and laughter mean
more to me than anything else in the world.
No comments:
Post a Comment