Annie & Ty day 10 & 11:
These are our last two days alone before our final two
volunteer teams arrive… and we’ve been spending it getting dirty! We are STILL digging the gosh-darn hole for
the new pit latrine toilet at our new child-headed home in Malindza (thanks Dr
Lisa and Aunt Colleen). We were moving
at a lightning fast pace until about 3 feet down and then we hit rocks and
rock-hard earth. And it’s difficult
because the shovel has no handle and the pick axe is splintering… we are sore
with bloody scratches everywhere. But
then we see the excitement on the children’s faces at the first set of blocks
being cemented together and it is all worth it!!
The builder for our New Hope Primary school has HIV and has
been bedridden but he is better now and eager to get back to work. After another delivery of plaster and cement
blocks, he will be able to finish classrooms 1, 2, and 3 entirely as well as
finish up our school kitchen. We will be
halted at this stage until more funding comes in for classroom 4 but we’re
excited to open in January’s 2015 school year offering 1st, 2nd,
and 3rd grade as last year we only served pre-school and first grade
orphans. The “nearest” school besides
ours is almost 10km (6 miles) away and is a Nazarene school so they charge
money to the orphans. The nearest free
public school is a 15 minute drive and there are no kombi’s in this area to
take children to school. Even if there
were, they wouldn’t have the bus fare.
Thus the entire community has been rallying behind the school. Even the local block maker has been giving us
discounts and making same day deliveries.
I am certain that the funding will continue to come in for the school
and our construction will not be halted for long.
One of the orphaned boys who will receive the home we are
building, Sisimo (below in the yellow shirt), has worms. Both ring
worm all over his face and intestinal worms (as you can tell from his severely protruding belly).
We went to the pharmacy today and bought intestinal de-worming pills as
well as an anti-fungal cream for him. He
isn’t feeling well and I hope this helps him heal. The pharmacist told us that it is important
to give every rural child a de-worming pill at least once every three months as
they have intestinal parasites in their water sources. If you could see the way that they collect scarce
rain water in moldy barrels for consumption (there is no lake, river, or clean
water source in Malindza Village) and leave these barrels open to bugs and
contaminants, you would understand why it is so easy for the children to get
sick. In the future, I hope to win a
grant that will enable us to buy de-worming pills to give to all of the orphans
at our school every 3 months to keep them healthy.
But don’t let him fool you with all of his worms; Sisimo is
a strong willed happy child!! He spent
the day bossing me and Ty around. He ordered
me to let him borrow the car (he’s only 6!) and then he stood around monitoring
Ty’s pick axing progress. I let him sit
on my lap and drive me to the hardware store (don’t worry, the only other
things on this rural “road” are goats and cows… and somehow they both knew to
run away when Sisimo sped past!). I’m very
thankful for all of the blisters, sunburns, sweat, and sore muscles we’ve
experienced this week building Sisimo a new home & toilet. It has enabled us to spend one-on-one time
with this precious previously shy little boy… getting to know his spunky
personality has been such a pleasure…
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