annie in swaziland

Day 5:

Today the assistant pre-school teacher Lindilwe took us to her homestead.  She wanted us to see where she was raising her 3 week old baby.  She rents a tiny one-room home for 100 rands per month (which is 100 times more than her volunteer salary of $0/mo) and sleeps on the concrete floor with her baby by her side.  She said without her high school diploma she will be unable to get a paid position and although she finished high school years ago, she was unable to pay the final year of schooling so the school refused to release her results.  So we have added yet another Orphan Education fund recipient. 

We then collected the children for movie day.  Today was an even more special treat because the Mr. Peabody animated movie was in 3D! The kids had no idea what the “sunglasses” were that I gave them before the movie and as soon as the animation started there were screeches, giggles, and squeals for the next hour and 45 minutes.  And as the tradition goes, the children stuffed their bellies with Debonairs pizza afterward.  Njabuliso refused to take his glasses off throughout dinner and even on his journey home.  On the drive home, Mazwi read the book “Dear Zoo” out loud in his sweet little voice.  He got every word correct except for stumbling on ferocious – not bad for our little one!! I am so proud of our little Maziya family – Celimphilo was position 2 (out of 110) and Mazwi was position 5.  Mazwi’s results especially surprise me because his HIV often causes him to miss school for doctor’s appointments and opportunistic infections (like TB).  I simply could not be more proud.   

Tomorrow is another Malindza Village day so I was glad we got to take it easy today.  We are going to Maseko’s church in the morning which consists of tons of orphaned children under a corrugated iron lean-to in the middle of a field and afterward we are going to hang out with Nomalungelo, Nothando, and Sharon – our sponsored Malindza high school orphans.  More tomorrow…