Gone but not forgotten.

Im sad to inform you all that our little premature baby boy, died on 15th December 2012 at 5pm (3pm GTM) after suffering lung failure and cardiac arrest. He had been kept on ventilators since monday and had to be resucitated three times.

He was visited during the hours of 3-4pm and when Chris arrived home she recieved a call to say he had passed away. As you can imagine we are all in complete shock, although he was 12 weeks premature, he arrived here at 5 weeks old and has been a strong healthy baby since.

We must celebrate the short life he had with us, the only family he ahd ever known, and praise the Lord for him. I hope you will join us all in this prayer.

November and December update so far

Well what a long time since I blogged, quite mad at myself because now I have to try and think of everything thats happened so I will try and keep things short and simple! It has been quite a rollercoaster as usual.

Our little girl who had been in hospital is doing very well, making progress every week little by little, she can almost poke her tounge out a little and is starting to hold her head up for longer. Still a long way to go, shockingly there has been no follow up appointments or explanation from the hospitals so we must just keep at it.

At the end of November the other couple who are volunteers, Herrie and Hans travelled home to Holand for one week as they have just become grandparents! SO that was lovely news for them. it meant a tough week for me and Maggie looking after all the children but of course you just have to keep yourself focused on what needs doing.

And on the 1st of December Kirstin actually come home from Belgium, she had a problem trying to find a family so after about 6 weeks in Belgium she decided it was best to come home and find work here. It was unfortunate for her but nice for us girls to have some more company! Though she is not on shift like us volunteers, she gives the odd help to feed a baby etc.

That sunday Mark and Chris were going, with the four older boys, on holiday. They have all just finished their school year and have 6 weeks off, exams all finished, and they havent managed to have a holiday in I think they said 6 years or something! They left on sunday and were staying 4 nights.

Although it was lovely for them it meant a heck of a busy time for us, luckily Kirstin did night duty every evening and me and Maggie did back-up 2 nights each. Then Herrie did the cooking and helped in the day, and we had another girl come and help called Briony, her sister also came down for 2 nights to help. It was a non-stop week.

Sadly I have some very bad news to report though. On the sunday evening Kirstin noticed our premature babies breathing was really fast and so we took him to the clinic the next day. They thought it was just very mild pnuemonia so gave him some medicines and vitamins for us to give him. But that evening we were all incredibly worried because he was breathing around 60bpm and not drinking his bottles much, maybe 40ml ervy 4 hours or so. So then we were worried he may start becoming dehydrated and keep getting worse.

That evening we took him to Jubilee Hospital, they carried out some tests but said the same as the clinic and told us to carry on using the medicines, if he didnt improve in 4 days time to bring him back. Considering he was 3 months premature, and 4 months old yet only weighed 4kg, we were till very on edge.

By wednesday evening I was with him the whole night and there was still no improvements. He was on my chest for about 4 hours and his breathing was horrific, 100bpm. I was on night duty with Kirstin and was going to just keep him on my chest all night to monitor him, yet I knew this was not right. So we called Hans to take him to hospital again.

He was admitted overnight, and when we visited him thursday he had a very slight improvments. Chris then arrived home on thursday evening and I went with her on fridya to visit him. (It was really sad for me, as it brought back memories of when i brought Oarabile into hospital) He had made great progress, he was just on a drip and being fed from a cup. Saturday he was also visited and was doing well, the nurses were hoping he would be home with us by monday.

Sunday no-one was able to go visit him, as it was just such a busy day yet monday morning at 11.30am Chris got a phonecall to say they wanted to move him to another hospital (the same hospital Oarabile was transferred to also) and that he had massively deteriorated. Chris was in Pretoria but went straight to hospital, and considering it was emergency it took them 3 hours to get an abulance! He was put in an incubater, with breathing tubes, feeding tubes, everything.

Yesterday was my day off and I was so blessed to be able to go with Chris to see him. He is in the Adult Intensive Care Unit. Well, what can I say. A very emotional time. He was in the adults ICU for some reason, we can only assume maybe he will be cared for better there than the children unit, maybe better equipment and staffing. So he is in a room with 5 other grown men. I was looking around dreading to think how they all got here. And our little prem baby looked so tiny on this huge bed, with 6 or 7 different tubes. They were even giving him blood we could see.

But all of a sudden, the staff gathered around and started to sing, the most beautiful harmonious African song, and then held hands and prayed. Would you ever see that in England?

There is no improvements with our little man, we are just hoping he gets better and better with all the tubes he is on etc. A very emotional time.

Then the other thing that happened on monday - the two year old boy that went back to his family in October, has now been brought back. The mother has disappeared, and the faily have heard nothing, she has a history of running away with men so we assume she has just run away again and left her poor son. The aunties and famliy are not willing to take care of him, so after just 2 months he is back! Its horrific. He is the most gorgeous little boy, and he has also changed a lot. It's so hard trying to get him back into the routine of things here, he is incredibly naughty now and demands all your attention, he's obviously used to being the children. He has also lost a lot of weight which is worrying.

Now Im not sure who knows about my visa situation but I had trouble getting it extended. It actually meant me and Mark taking a little road trip! We travelled to Botswana to the border crossing at Martin's Drift on 23rd November. It was wicked, we drove through all the mountains and it was beautiful. We also drove through some of the most desolate places, many little townships where people live in little shacks. Saw some horrific sights, but also some beautiful sights. When we stayed the night in Botswana, we stayed at a lodge and had a nice braai in the evening, and even had a hippo laid on the embankment on the river, just in front of our lodge! And the next morning were awakened by monkeys at the window and climbing the roof!

It was about a 6 hour drive to the border, and back home took a little less, but had to stop for food etc. but it meant my visa is now sorted till my flight in January. But yesterday I went again to Home Affairs to see if I could extend it a further couple of months. Eurgh it was a drag, its like standing in a sauna, no proper lights, the smallest stingy room, waiting in a queue for almost 3 hours. Had to see the lady then go and queue to pay the fee at a different counter then go back to the original lady to show her the reciept, only to find out I dont know if it will be accepted or rejected, I must go back in 30 days.

So Im a little confused because they took the money etc. and if I am staying I must change my flight, yet there is still a change it could be rejected for whatever reason so will have to make a decision on whether to change my flight or not yet.

Today Hans and Herrie have left Tsepho Ya Bana, so now we are jsut myself and Maggie till after Christmas when we get a new girl coming on 29th December. But Maggie is actually going on holiday with her family on Boxing Day so I will actually be alone for 4-5 days..... HELP!!! Hopefully Briony may be coming up, and assuming Kirstin doesnt have a job by then she will most likely help also.

Anyways, best be off now. Its 2 of our boys birthdays today - one has turned 1 years of age and one has turned 4!!!

Speak to you all soon xxx

This I wrote yesterday, but we had no internet again due to huge storms so Im uploading this a day late. But it also means I can update on further news about our little premature baby.

The nurse caleld this morning to say that there are no improvements, his heart gave in twice (yesterday and this morning) and they had to resucitate him both times. The nurse did not sound very hopeful, awe are expecting the worst and it is such a horrific time. I keep looking at his cot, and his bottles that are sterilised ready to make a bottle for him, and his tiny premature clothes and nappies. Every time Chris' phone rings we are all on edge.

And even worse, the mum and dad were called by the social worker to have a meeting to explain to them that their child is extremely sick and fighting for his life.... the parents never even showed up.

All we can do is pray, and we place his life in the Lord's hand. His will be done x

November already!

So I want to begin by informing you about our little girl who has spent 6 weeks in hospital - on Tuesday 25th she was finally allowed to come home! Although it is great to have her home it is also very upsetting. The MRI scans showed that part of her brain died, so she is partially brain dead. She can't walk, talk or drink or eat very well at all. It has been a very emotional time for everyone. When she was about to be brought home I told the toddlers and explained she wont be able to hug them or walk like she used to. When they greeted her, they kept asking me 'Where's the other Oarabile?? When is she coming back?'. It was by far one of the most emotional experiences I have faced.

But I am also thrilled to tell you that although the doctors can do no more, she is making great progress. In the space of one week she is already starting to move her legs and arms, and can almost roll from her back to her side!! She is showing no signs of speech, she is only able to cry or laugh.

We have also had anothr baby girl dropped off on friday just gone. Friday was my day off which meant I got the chance to go to Pretoria (because Chris goes every friday to the large supermarket and picks Fetsi up form his boarding school). I looked around some shops and brought some lovely Biltong and Fanta Grape! A very south african snack! When Chris picked me up from the mall we also got KFC as we had still lots to do - it was a welcome treat also!

We then travelled through the 'nice' part of Pretoria to get a good view of the Jackaranders - they are trees that bloom during late October/early November and are the most beautiful purple leaves! It is quite a sight because they almost every street in the city!

But as we were driving home Chris got a phone call from Mama Catherine. The polce has just dropped off a 2 month old baby but Mama Catherine already has 72 children and she does not have the facilites to cope with children under 1 year yet alone any more children at all. So she dropped the baby off that afternoon.

When the baby arrived we didn't know the gender or name of the child. So we had to wait till the baby woke up till we could take the nappy off to see if it was a boy or girl! To our delight it is a baby girl! The next day we found out some more information, including her name and we now know her mother is a sixteen year old drug addict, why the police took the child from her I dread to think.

So to take you through the children we now have -

A premature baby, now 2 months old,
A 3 week old boy,
A 2 month old girl,
A 4 month old boy,
A 5 month old boy
An 8 month old girl,
A 10 month old boy,
An 11 month old boy,
A 17 month old boy,
A 19 month old girl,
3 toddlers (one of which we are unsure of his d.o.b.)
A 9 year old boy,
A 10 year old boy
An 11 year old boy
A 12 year old boy
A 13 year old boy,

So as you can imagine with just 3 volunteers here it is incredibly busy. And the amount of bottles we have to make is unreal! But the children are as great as ever. The toddlers - better known as the three little pigs - are as funny as ever. I'll quote some of their recent words!

During story time
Mark: 'So, Why didn't David get eaten by the lions?'
Tsephang: 'Because lions eat impala.'

When we had some visitors.
Chris: 'Tsephang, where is Auntie Maggie from?'
Tsephang: 'Germany.'
Chris: 'And Auntie Gemma?'
Tsephang: 'England.'
Chris: 'And where are you from Tsephang?'
Tsephang: 'The playroom.'

There are many more hilarious things these boys come out with but I cant think of any more right now! One of our little pigs, who is actually the oldest of the three, you would think he is the youngest. He has HIV and was malnutrised for his first 11 months and was the size of a new born baby. He is increidbly behind when you compare the children. We are currently trying to potty train him. I say to him 'Didi, do you need a wee?' 'No' 'Do you want to go on the potty?' 'Yes' 'Come let's go on the potty.' So he sits on it. 'Look Auntie - I poo!' So I take a look... nothing in the potty. 'Didi, the potty is empty.' 'Yes.' 'Do you need to do a poo?' 'No.'

Then 10 minutes later, wee and poo in his pants. This happens all day, every day. It is hilarious, frustrating and quite sad all at the same time!Communicating with him is so difficult, the only things he will ever say are either 'Look, Aeroplane!' 'Look, a car.' 'More milk... pleeeeeease.'

Im just trying to think if I have anything else to report... we now have elephants on the game reserve also. They were released last week, and the lions are roaming free and we have been told that within the first week they had killed 2 warthogs, 2 wildabeast and a bespock.

Last week we had an incredible heat wave where it was reaching 38 degree in the shade! It was actually a record for October, I think even Johannesburg reached mid thirties. But because we are higher altitude and in the bush we get even hotter. I was quite happy to hear that it doesnt get much hotter than that during summer. I cant explain quite how hot is it, especially when your working with lots of children. We have also been having the best thunderstorms ever! Last week on my day off in the evening I just sat at my window for hours just watching the lightening. Although it is so close, they often have lightening strike trees on the farm. It also means lots of power cuts. I love the power cuts in some ways because the lanterns we use are so lovely and I find it can be quite relaxing. ON the other hand it makes sterilising bottles so so difficult and we can't heat them up for the babies etc easily. SO makes the work load more! Yesterday we had a powercut form 6am till 7.30pm.

Any way, Ive just done lots of washing thats now on the line, and am about to play some guitar. Not really sure what else to do - it can get very boring now that there are less volunteers and we can't go for nice ong walks in the bush, or walk over to Derek's place to get food. But I'd rather stay on the farm than eaten by lions......

Love to everyone at home.

(As usual...wrote and went to upload this blog yesterday  to find the internet was down and just came back on this afternoon!)

Update I wrote on 21st October

So monday was alot more exciting than expected! In the morning Mark asked whether one of us volunteers would like to come and visit Oarabile in hospital that afternoon. Fortunately since Maggie had only come 2 weeks before she went into hospital I got the chance to go! So I was to work will 2 o'clock and then we would leave to go to the hospital which is an hours drive away.

But that morning we went for a nice long walk around the whole farm with the 4 toddlers and 2 of our babies and we saw 3 ostriches and a huge kudo! We thought that was exciting enough and then lo and behold Mark got a phone call from Darin who lives on the farm opposite. There had been a spotting of a rhino on their farm, so of course we all jumped into the car with the toddlers and managed to spot the rhino! Took a while to find him because they are so well hidden and we had to track him down, as you can imagine they soon move on. Got some great photos and videos of it!

Our little girl is still very sick Im sad to say, she can't hold her head up, move her legs, eat properly or make any noises. Although she smiled and laughed with me! She could recognise the songs I used to sing to her, and the names of the other children. She was being transported on wednesday to Pretoria hospital for the MRI Scan thank goodness! But she is being moved back today which we are all not happy about because 1) the hospital is a long trip when you have 16 other children to care for every day 2) she is not getting the care she should have, Pretoria hospital is a lot better.

Kirstin arrived safely in Belgium but sadly the host family she was due to be staying with have been very unwelcoming to her, so she is now going to have to find a new host family in Belgium. We are all trying to keep her spirits up because as you can imagine arriving in a completely new country, with no support around her and having to leave the family is a bit scary for her. But hopefully the Au Pairing Agency will look after her and find a nice new family who will welcome her properly.

Wednesday was my day of and we went to pick up a new baby - an 8 month old - a GIRL! We finally have a little girl to dress up! She's beautiful, all we know is that ehr mother never anted her from the start but her Uncle insisted she not be put up for adoption. I guess the mother had juts had enough! We also have a new born baby boy! Came to us last week only 4 days old (although he's bigger and drinking more than our premature baby who we've had in our care for 5 weeks! Crazy). He is also adorable.

But as you can imagine it is very very tough, we only have 3 volunteers helping with the childrne now and with 7 babies (4 babies under 4 months!), 2 one year olds and 3 toddlers it is madness. Every hour a baby needs a feed. We do have Mama Mina who is a local lady who works 7.30am-4am every week day. But weekends and evenings are the hardest when we have all of them to look after.

Please pray that we would get more volunteers! 2 people that Chris had in mind for next year but invited them to come earlier, because it is so crazy at the moment, have not been responding to her emails. So pray either that we would be able to cope, get another volunteer or more importantly that some of these beautiful children would actually be ADOPTED and go to families who want them!

We actually have Mark and Chris's granddaughter here today to help out, she lives and studies in Pretoria. She is a great help but obviously has studying and exams so can only come on odd days if she gets time. We get along very well, and she has invited me to a concert in Jo'burg in December so that's something to look forward to! At the moment I never get the chance to leave the farm - especially now the lions are here we cant even walk!

Oh and don't worry, I whave been taking advantage of having a beautiful swimming pool everyday! My hair is going turn into chlorine soon I think, but it wont stop me!

All my love!

October so far.

So, after a good night's sleep, Im now sat in a lovely new room , quite quaint and cosy, in a luxurious double bed, with a cup of tea beside me and a view of the bushland beyond my cottage. What more could I ask for??

Since last time I spoke to you, the pool has been up and running and since the older boys (Tsepho Nhlanhla, Tom and Kagiso) were off school for the week we had great fun in and out of the pool. Of course I could only go when I was on break from shift work but was still great. Their nephew Robert also came to stay for the week, who is ten years old, but we had lots of banter and laughter!

Im so excited to tell you that I had my first day out on Tuesday the 4th! Charlie, who comes from a near-by farm, agreed to take Kirstin and I to Gold Reef City. Johanesburg's big theme park. I have never been on a 'proper' rollercoaster, being strapped in and all, but I went on every ride! Even though it was school holidays the queues were only 10 minutes a time, and we went on the same ride over and over - one where you just get tipped up and down and get soaking wet!

That week one of our boys, who recently turned 2, was due to go back to his mother. She raised him for the first 11 months, but when he came to Tsepho Ya Bana he was incredibly undernourished and ill. Looking at pictures, you couldnt believe its the same child (which is a similar story to a couple of our boys here). But his mother didn't come to fetch him for a whole week, we were getting very nervous whether she was ever going to come, technically Chris and Mark has signed to papers over to him ont he 4th but he was still in our care till the 11th.

As I may have said before, Kirstin is off to Belgium for one year to au pair with a family. So that friday we had a braii for her and invited some of her friends over. It was a lovely relaxed evening and just stayed chatting outside till early hours of the morning. The next day I was on 6.30am start but the children were so well behaved for Auntie Gemma! And since some of the people stayed overnight it meant we als had some more helping hands, and a guy called Cameron for the boys to play with also.

That sunday I was also very happy to get the chance to go to church again with Mark and the older boys. It was a great sermon, it was at Constantia Park Baptist church. Its a very European style church (best way I can describe it).

Tuesday was my day off which was nice as Kirstin came to my room in the morning and said that two people we had met at the braii has invited us to come to Pretoria for an evening out. So again Charlie came with, and we met up with some new people. It was nice to meet some south africans my own age. Its funny out here because you either get the 'Africaans South Africans' or the 'English South Africans' so some are very similar in their ways to English people and some are very different.

That day I had spent most fo the day in the pool. We are able to take the three older toddlers in. Except on of our boys, doesn't like it very much and just cries and our other boy has really bad skin. So he cant go in water very much, and as you can imagine the chlorine is awful for his skin. But our third toddler absolutely loves it and jumps in the deep in even! Its so fun trying to teach him to swim and he's getting great. So he joined me in the pool on that tuesday.

That was also the day that Kamo got picked up from his mother, it was horrible saying goodbye but we know that it is much better for him. All of us, and the children, miss him very much. That evening when I put one of the boys to bed (he is about 16 months old and he and Kamo used to sleep next to eachother in cribs) started crying and crying. So had to keep rocking him to sleep.

This past week has been very busy as Kirstin has been packing to leave and on saturdya we had to say our final goodbye. It was very emotional because she's been my best friend ever since Ive been here, and she's even spoken about moving to England permanently so I know we will definately stay friends and meet up lots. She arrived in Belgium early sunday morning and as far as I know she said the travelling was long but the family seem nice.

So our last couple evenings we watched movies, all jumped in the pool with the older boys and all the other volunteers, and I stayed in her room one night and we were laughing and giggling till 2am! Again the 6.30am start was tough!

Now to tell you about our little girl, she is still no better. Luckily she is going THIS WEDNESDAY for an MRI, she is getting moved to a different hospital for 2 days to get the scan. Can't believe this is going to be her 5th week in hospital and she is still waiting for an MRI scan on her brain, meanwhile she is laid there not eating, not drinking, not talking, not moving. Lifeless.

Please keep praying for her.

Anyway I must now drag myself out of bed, these children need me to go make breakfast! We only have 3 days left where we can go for walks, because the lions get realised on thursday!! So I think I will be taking them on a nice long walk today!! Lets hope we see some animals!

Peace and love to you all.

Life of Late

Was going to post this last friday - unfortunately we had no internet since thursday so this is the first chance Ive had! The past few weeks have been lots of ups and downs I'm sad to say. I'll again pick up from where I left off but before I do I shall just warn you this is a very long post... yet again. You may want to grab a cuppa!

Wednesday 7th Mark and Chris had a new baby grandson born! I've seen pictures and he's a beautiful baby boy. That saturday morning Chris went and drove up to stay with them for a week and got to have a bit of a holiday!

It meant we were all quite busy with doing nights shift every evening, we did 2 nights each between Kirstin Amy and I. But that saturday Kirstin and I had the chance to go for a big braai down the road at Sean's farm. A couple of Kirstins friends were down from Jo'burg for a holiday so we all got together with people on the other farms.

It was great to have an afternoon off, we worked 6.30am til 12.30 in the morning with the children and then spent the rest of the day at the braai. We even got thrown in the pool, its madness because it was the first time they used the pool since winter and they thought the water was freezing! When I told them I am used to Bournemouth beach they understood why I stayed in there for a while, whilst all the other jumped out.

We then went on a game drive with about 7 of us. It was awesome we saw giraffe only meters away, and he even started walking around showing off to us. The sun was setting as we went to the lake nearby, where they have hippo's and even crocs. Sadly we didnt spot them but maybe one day! Then we spent the rest of the evening by a big bonfire, drinking and eating and having lots of laughs! My first big social evening in South Africa!

But now to tell you the bad news. We have had a lot of sickness the last few weeks, all but 1 of the children have suffered. Some had fever for some time then recovered, other having sickness and diahreaa. But when we have even our smallest babies (2-3 months) coming down with a fever it was getting quite worrying especially with Chris away.

The little girl we have here went down ill friday the 9th so Mark took her to the doctors on monday because we started to get worried. That evening I was on night shift again and the whole night I could just hear her wimpering and struggling to sleep. She was so floppy and would not respond to anything. Neither eating or barely drinking.

Then by the next day Mark decided we should get her checked out at the hospital, luckily I got to go with her. I cant share all the details about her individually but she is still in hosital to this day, and has been transported to a bigger hosiptal about 2 hours drive from here. She has had brain scans that the doctors said show some abnormality but they need to wait for an MRI. BUT the hospital is not a private hospital and the MRI machine is not working! Because she is not detoreorating they are not treating her as urgent - yet she is a very young girl that is still not responding to anything and is being fed by a drip!

Please pray for our dear little girl, wish I could share more information for you all but as you can imagine she is in a critical state and needs our prayers that the Lord will heal her. We are trying to seek some other help, we need to get her moved to a private hospital where you get proper treatment out here, yet the because of the cost it is not possible. So we may look at trying to fundraise some money for her, which I will update you all on asap.

Chris arrived home last thursday the 15th, and by friday we had a premature baby! He is unbelieveable, he is 5 weeks old and yet only 3.75 pounds. We don't know how premature he was when he was born but he is still very small. We were a bit worried to bring him home when we have so mch sickness going around, so please also pray for his health.

Last friday 16th me and Kirstin had the day off together which was nice and we got to go into Pretoria to the Kollonade shopping mall. We had a lovely steak and chips for lunch! The first restaurant in 2 months, and so cheap! It only cost £10 for a huge rump steak and coca cola!

I got to go to a lovely church last sunday with Mark, Chris and the 4 boys. It is a church plant from Constantia Park Baptist and was great. The service and worship was great and then afterwards you all sit and have a discussion on the sermon and our thoughts which I think you'll agree is such a great idea to hear peoples experiences and share. It is mostly white congregation. I feel very fortunate to have experience 4 different churches so far, 2 black South African and 2 mostly white congregation. But since Ive only been once to each its hard to say which I will go to again.

This past week has been great - on monday Chris was having a busy day going into Pretoria. So there was no-one to home-school Nhlanhla and when Chris asked which Auntie he wanted to teach him he asked for me! So that was nice, and I said to him if he works well then I will take him across the road to one of the lodges for pizza. And thats exactly what we did! It was great. Also meant I had quite a relaxing day (although he has health problems so can be quite difficult to control.)

Thursday and Friday night I was on night shift. Friday was very difficult, I stayed up late with the older boys playing cards and then watching Narnia but two of the babies were up most of the night and had to do 6 different feeds. So luckily I got a nice lie in this morning! I keep thinking how easy its going to be when Im a mum - only 1 or 2 children! Im getting used to looking after 6 toddlers and 5 babies!

We've also been trying to keep up to date with the World Cup Rugby! I am determined to buy an Original Springbok Jersey, although they are rather pricey! But everyone goes around wearing them - rugby is definately South Africa's sport! Sadly the channel we have only shows the SA matches so I havent got to see much of England playing so I am not ashamed to say I have been cheering on the Africans!

Our premature baby is still doing well and healthy and one of our other little boys who just turned age 2 is due to be going back to his family very soon. We dont know what happened to his father, but his mother is very young and the family could not help support her financially so he arrived here last year very sick and suffering from malnutrition. Fortunately he will be going home to his mum now, as the family have finally decided to help. We will miss him very dearly! He is beautiful.

Another exciting thing is the swimming pool! For the last weekend we have been empting the pool from the dirt its gathered over the winter. Kirstin and I started with 2 buckets and gradually all the older boys all came and helped and a couple other volunteers. We were there most of sundayafternoon, whilst I was on a 'break', and finished empting it! Now the cracks need filling and we need to scrub it clean but should be up by next week! Canny wait!

Oh almost forgot MORE exciting news. We now have lions on the reserve! 6 at the moment, 2 more are coming. They are in 2 prides. Elephants will also be following them. But yet its bitter sweet. In some ways - LIONS. I mean how awesome is that, we can actually hear them soon and they could walk past my cottage! Madness. But then its sad because we can no longer go for walks, not just in a selfish way (because as you have guessed I love going for walks on my break, in the bush, past the waterholes etc.) but we can no longer take the children for walks. Most days we like to go for a wak with the toddlers, and they love spotting the Kudo and Impala and Ostriches, and we saw a baby Giraffe with them by the dam the other morning! We can't even take them on our farm because the fence only goes around the houses and cottages. The lions are still being 'introduced' to the reserve so we have 31 days left before we have to stop leaving the gate. We also like to stroll across to neighbours farms, Joanne and Darren who live across the road love us bringing the children over, and Tamboti (the restaurant and lodge across the road) where I took Nhlanhla for pizza and us volunteers sometimes go for a drink.

But on tuesday we did get to go with Mark, Hans and Gerrie, Kirstin, Nhlanhla, Tom and the three toddlers to go see them! Because they are in an enclosure to start with which is at a local lodge all the local landowners get to go and visit them for free! The toddlers were petrified of the safari truck but once they were on they loved it! We saw 4 lions, 2 male and 2 female. They were beautiful and the thought that they are actual wild animals that have just been brought over from Botswana and will be released soon is crazy!

Today is my day off and me and the four older boys had a lovely treat today! School has broken up for 2 weeks, and Mark had promised the boys he would take them to Pretoria for a treat sometime, the boys asked me to come and so I managed to get today off. We went ice-skating at the shopping mall and then got burger and chips! It was so much fun, and I didnt fall over once, to the boys disappointment - they were looking forward to seeing Auntie Gemma fall flat on her bum. I also brought a lovely Springbok Jersey, woop-woop!

Anyway I have rambled on for more than half an hour, and this has probably taken an hour of time your time, so I shall stop talking now! (Oh sorry one more thing to say - I may be staying a few more months, its in discussion that I may stay a further 2-3 months!) Love to you all and hope everything is well back home.

I hope to update you all about our little precious baby girl very soon, lets pray its good news but if not, she is in the Lord's hands.

Mama Catherine's Visit

It was a few weeks ago I was telling you that I was going to visit another orphange run by Mama Catherine. And (as I say very often in these blogs) its was quite an experience, one I wont forget in a long time.

So I went on my day off with Joanne and Darren and their two children. They are a couple who stay across the road on Mark and Chris son's farm, they are an American couple who emigrated a couple months ago to start up a business. Yet when your working with 'South African time' you never know when anything will get done so they are still waiting for the plans to be set in place.

Joanne and Darren have known Mark and Chris for many years and have visited this area countless times and whilst they are waiting to get the business started they help out a lot at the orphanage.

The orphange itself is different to Tshepo Ya Bana in many ways and sadly not in a good way. They are in much more of a poverty state and have around 60 children. They range from ages as young as 1 years to early 20's. Im not sure on the exact amount of children there at this moment in time.

But so we arrived around midday and took some balloons with us to blow up as I was told the children absolute love balloons! They all speak Africanse so I couldnt speak with any of the younger children but the older girls I could talk to. They learn English from an early age at school, so it was great to be able to talk to some of the older girls.

Most of them were absolutely enthralled when I told them I was from England and just kept stroking my hair and complimenting me, which was so crazy. But it was nice to try and talk to them about life at the orphanage, most of them dont have much aims in life because they are into their late teens and still at this orphanage yet finished schooling.

But we sang some songs: Beyonce and Rihanna etc. and they adored it.

The younger children loved me even more as soon as I took the balloons out of my bag, sadly I only had about 20 balloons so some were left quite unsatisfied. But some of the children had such a sadness in their eyes, three inparticular did not let go of me. They were just holding onto my clothes or wrapping their arm around my legs and wanting me to pick them up constantly. Crying out for love.

You see, the orphanage works from local support from churches and contacts and largely runs on donations. They have lots of Mamas working there, I saw around 20 older African women there yet they are not paid. It is in such a poverty area that the people come and work to get a meal and food daily. So these workers actually do not care for these children in any way, practically or emotionally. Me and Joanne had just arrived as visitors but we were the only ones playing with the children, interacting with them, helping feed them. We were just in complete shock that these women are here to help in order to recieve food in return, yet they were sat drinking tea the whole duration of our visit.

That is one of the main issues that is happening at Mama Catherines.

So after playing with the children and the older girls for an hour or two, it was now lunchtime for everyone. Yet as soon as we started to grab some tables and chairs all the older children disappeared and it was just the children ages 8 or younger left. So we had around 20/30 young children with no supervision trying to feed themselves. It was horrific.

There was no cups for water and no bowl to wash their hands in. So firs and formost me and Joanne got a big bucket for them to wash their hands before they sat up. Then we noticed thta there were around 4 or 5 children just able to wak (so no older than 14 months) sat trying to feed themselves. All the children eat with their fingers as that is typical African, yet these young children had absolutely no Mamas helping them or showing them what to do so we grabbed them and started to help feed them.

After most of them had finished we suddenly noticed that there was one of the 1 year olds drinking the dirty water from the bucket we put out to wash their hands. Immediately we pulled him away and then noticed that none of these children had been given cups and there was no water or taps in sight.

So Joanne grabbed a cup for this little boy and a bucket of 'clean' water. Before I knew it they were running up to me drinking 3 or 4 cups each, having to take it in turns because we could not find any more cups. Children as young as one years of age drank 4 large cup fulls of water in one go.

How long had they been without water? We had no idea when they were last given the chance to drink.

The main problem we noticed when we were there was that these poor children do have lots of things... bed, blankets, plenty of donated clothes, food on their plates and taps for water. Yet they have no actual care. The older children disappear and dont help the younger children, and the Mamas and Papas who are there to work sit down on chairs and talk.

It was a very eye-opening situation as you can imagine and I cant write all the things I experienced there but this was the main thing I wanted you all to hear about my first visit to Mama Catherines.

Joanne came yesterday to Tshepo Ya Bana and I spoke with her briefly and she said that Pete (Mama Catherines side-kick if you will) has asked after me saying when can I come again. Its clear they need all the help they can get for these poor children sakes. And even last week there was news to say one fo the 7 year old boys had died. Mark and Chris attended the funeral, all anyone knows is that the boy began with a fever and by a couple hours he was gone.

If you are a believer please pray for this orphanage. Pray for Mama Catherine. Pray for these children. And pray that I may get another opportunity to visit and help in any way possible.

(Hope this hasn't been too much of an essay to read!)