10 Things we would NEVER have said living in Georgia or Canada

 

As I was preparing to write my last blog of the year my friend Beth Blaisdell suggested that I write the “10 things we would NEVER have said living in Georgia or Canada”.  Why?  Because I am always saying things to her that she will stop me and say, “Did you hear what you just said?”.  So as our family hung out together this past week we all started taking note of things we were saying to each other, that we would NEVER had said while living in Georgia or Canada.

I hope you think they are as funny as we do.

10.   “Mom, I saw fire works going off as I flew into Hong Kong from Taiwan - tons of them. Pretty legit, they must have heard I was coming.” –  (Chloe flying to Swaziland from school in Taiwan).

9.     “Welcome home Spencer and Chloe!  Let’s stop and get a photo with your 47 brothers and sisters.”

8.     “Nothando, when Swazi women shake their bums like that do you call it “twerking” here? No, we call it ‘the Get Down’.”

 

7.     “Note to self – always be sure to wear your snake boots if you are riding an ATV to the top of the mountain.” 

 

6.     Spencer: Antony this giant spider was on my arm last night. Is it poisonous?                              
Antony:  Oh yes, that little one is poisonous, and if it bites you it will hurt, but not as much as the big ones.”  

 

5.     Ian: Janine, what are you up to today?                                                                                                   
Me: Well, the kids and I are going to stop by the National TB Hospital to drop off Christmas gift packs and KFC Chicken to all the patients.  Then we are going to visit a home where there are eight children living alone because their parents are in prison.  From there we will drop off cookies at the NICU and Pediatric ward at the hospital in town to thank them for all their help this year, then we will stop and pick up pizza for dinner.  

 

4.     “What the heck? Is that a crocodile? No, just a giant Monitor Lizard.”

3.     “Spencer since you are driving down to the Baby Home, can you drop off this live chicken please?”

 

2.     “It is SO HOT HERE!  Do you think it would be awkward to go hang out in the walk in fridge at the Toddler home since we don’t have AIR CONDITIONING?!”

1.    Supervisor:  Mr. Ian, is it okay if we have hookers at the front gate at Project Canaan?                    
 Ian:  You want to have hookers at the front gate?                                                                     
Supervisor: Yes, so people can stop and buy on their way home after work.                                       
 Ian: I don’t think that would be a good thing to promote prostitution at our gate since we are a Ministry here in Swaziland.                                                                                                       
Supervisor:  No not prostitution, they sell snacks and used clothing.                                                   
Ian: OH!  Hawkers!  No, we don’t want them there either.

 

I pray that in 2014 you find yourself saying things you would never have said before because you said YES to God’s calling on your life. Remember, His plans are better than our plans.  Not always easy or fun, but better.  And laughter helps a lot on the dark days.  That is a gift from Him too.

Happy New Year from the entire Maxwell family.

Live from Swaziland… yes, from Swaziland, Africa!

Janine

Short and sweet - Merry Christmas from us all!

Today is a great day. My family is all together again.

Spencer flew in from Atlanta, Georgia on Wednesday.  Chloe flew in from Taichung, Taiwan this morning.  My world is spinning so nicely right now and I just want to stop and give thanks to the Lord for the peace and joy that I have right now.

Today we celebrated the birth of our Lord and Savior on Project Canaan with a party for everyone who works on the farm and the people who make jewelry at the Khutsala Artisans Shop.  Yesterday we had a lovely Christmas lunch with the women who care for our babies at the Children's Campus (El Roi Baby Home and Labakhetsiwe).  The rest of this blog is photos from those parties.

Chloe's welcome home.  Thank you sisters on the farm!

Sorry for the short blog, but I need to go and prepare my family's favorite meal.  My heart is full and I am thankful that we said "yes" to HIS calling.  He gives "exceedingly and abundantly more than we could ask for or imagine.".

If you have not already seen this, please watch the  Christmas video from the Maxwell's .  We have a donor who will match up to $100,000 given to our Year End Giving Campaign.  Thank you for considering giving to Heart for Africa at this time of year.

Merry Christmas to you and your family, whoever and where ever they may be.

Live from Swaziland ... happy mama.

Janine

"The baby is a curse. Kill the baby and you can move back home."

  Earlier this week I got a call about a 10-month old baby who needed a home.  The mother suffered Placential Abruption prior to giving birth and an emergency C-Section was performed, but not until the child was without oxygen for some time. As soon as the baby was born everyone knew that things weren’t just as they should be.  The baby scored a 2 on her Apgar test and the mother had immediate concerns, but a good piece of news was that the baby tested negative for HIV, even though the mother was positive. 

I love the hearts on the jacket she was wearing.

 When the father of the baby came to see her he said he did not want the child because she was disabled.  The baby struggled to suck because she had a severe cleft palate, but the mother was patient and worked hard to get breast milk in to her tiny mouth.  Sadly, we learned that the baby has since contracted HIV from the mother’s breast milk and is now HIV positive.  The mother had no alternative for feeding  because she was poor, alone and uneducated. She is 23- years old and only finished first grade. She cannot read or write, but she loved that baby that God had given her.

As the child grew the disabilities became more pronounced and the Grandmother started to yell and call the baby an “animal”.  A few weeks ago she kicked the mother and baby out of the house saying that someone had put a curse on the family and the baby was proof of that curse (a very common belief of a disabled child in Swazi culture).  The Grandmother said that the mother must kill the baby, and then she could come back and live at home.  But this young mother loved the baby with all her heart and couldn’t kill the child. The mother and baby went from house to house looking for a place to stay, but with no job and no way to support herself it was difficult. Finally a Social Worker from a local hospital offered to help.  She took the two in and helped get a medical assessment of the baby done by a neurologist.

The CT scan was shocking. Half of the baby’s brain was “black” on the scan.  The baby has severe Cerebral Palsy, Epilepsy, blindness (not total), deafness (not total) and a severe cleft palate.  Both eye cross (one at a time) with seemingly no muscle to control them.  She struggles to swallow and is always choking and coughing saliva that has gone down the “wrong pipe”. The baby cries from morning to night.

On Friday I took Gcebile Shongwe (one of our Senior Supervisors at the baby home) and Brooke Sleeper (our Nurse Practitioner extra-ordinare) to the Social Welfare office to meet this young mother and the baby. It was a heart-breaking meeting and everyone in the room was making a case (aka getting ready to beg) for us to take the baby.  I am not going to lie. I was VERY nervous about us taking the child.  Not only do we not have the expertise needed in this area (not that the mother did either), but with the baby having so many problems and being HIV positive I was very nervous about her life span.  Lord?  What do we do?

I stopped the conversation about health and asked the mother what she wanted?  As tears welled up in her eyes and started to pour down her face she held her baby closer and told us that she loves the baby. She does not want to give the baby away, but she just doesn’t know how to care for her and help her live.  She was angry when she talked about how her own mother had kicked her out of the house and how the father of the child (AND his family) had shunned her and the baby.  It was heart-breaking and heart-warming all at the same time.

The solution suddenly became crystal clear.  I pulled the Social Welfare officer out of the room to present a possible plan.  She almost cried and said, “YES!  This is the best plan!”  Just then Brooke came out the door with the baby’s heath card and pointed at a box where you list what birth order this child came in.  Brooke said, “There is another child.  A 5-year old.” 

We went back inside and asked the mother about the other child.  Sure enough, there was a 5-year old girl who had been given away to the neighbors when the baby and mother had been kicked out of the house.

For the next 30-minutes we talked about Project Canaan – A place of Hope.  We told her about the “Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz” and the women who were living in five of the six rooms that had been built.  I cannot tell you how happy and relieved I was to know that we still had one room open at the women’s center.  I knew at that moment that this family was to come and live on Project Canaan and that we could help.  We invited her to come and live at the Kibbutz with her baby and that way we could help her as best we can with the medical appointments and healthcare, but she would still care for and love her own child. That is the best way.  She cried and told us she would love to come, but she had two questions.  The first question was if she could bring her other child?  Our answer was, “Of course!”

The second question was, “When can we go?”

I said, “Anytime is fine.”

She said, “Then let’s go now”. 

And we did.

We loaded up my car and headed off to her homestead.  We arrived to a tirade of obscenities being yelled her mother about the “animal” (referring to the baby) who had cursed the house.  We quickly packed up a small suitcase with all of her worldly belongings, sent for the 5-year old girl to come from the neighbors, jumped in the car and headed home. 

I called the ladies who live at the Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz and told them what was going on.  I usually seek their council before bringing a new person, but time was of the essence so I called them while we were driving. I briefly explained the situation and they said, “Bring them to us!  We will pray for the baby and welcome them all.”

And so we did.

Anthony went and got a brand new bed out of storage that had been purchased for Room #6.  We gathered sheets and new blankets and a bible (even though she cannot read).   We stopped and bought food and a bag of candy for the new girl to share with the children who lived there (instant friendship J).  It was a joyous day and I was so thankful that we had a solution that kept mother and child (children) together.

Live from Swaziland … doing for "one" what I wish I could do for many.

Janine

PS – in the middle of the visit to the mothers homestead I was given a goat by a Swazi.  It was a birthday gift to me from a friend who is thankful for what we do.  When we picked up the goat, and put her in the back of my car, we learned she was pregnant!  So we traveled 2-hours with 4 adults, 2 children and a pregnant goat.  The baby didn't cry, but the goat sounded like a baby!

Giant slugs, red frogs, flooding rivers, no electricity and a new baby.

“I live on a farm in Africa.” – Meryl Streep, Out of Africa

We live on a farm in Africa too and every day is a new adventure.

I have intentionally added lots of photos in this blog because a picture is worth a thousand words and maybe you sometimes think I just make things up. Nope, the photos, which you are about to see, really were taken here at Project Canaan.

There used to be a bridge there.

The rains have finally started to fall and the storms have been crazy.  With the rain has come golf ball sized hail, massive flooding of the river (3 feet higher than the bridge we have to cross) and our dam is up at least 12 feet and full to overflowing – literally.  Lightening has taken down trees, knocked out power around the country and struck our electrical cable buried in the ground.  This was not an easy fix.  It required a couple of guys to dig a trench 100 feet long, by 3 feet deep until they found the burned cable.  Meanwhile, the things in our freezer have thawed for the third time in several weeks. We have been charging laptops and phones in the car and going to be early, in the dark.  

Our electrical cable struck by lightening, then burned.

I can’t help but reread my last paragraph and laugh (or cry).  Most people here in Swaziland don’t have a car to drive across the bridge.  They don’t have electricity to be knocked out by lightening and they sure don’t have freezers full of “extra food” to thaw without power.  They don’t have laptops to charge and no car to charge their phones with.  They have roofs with holes that let the water pour in. They have walls made of mud that wash away in the torrential rain.  They have maize flour that gets wet in the rain and turns moldy in a few short days. They go to bed every night when it is dark, because it is dark.  At times I seem to feel “entitled” to my frustration about losing electricity for days at a time, when I know that I should be giving thanks for all of those things that I have to make my life more convenient and comfortable. I am ashamed for being angry about losing them for a short time.

In addition to weather we have seen strange creatures on our patio including a giant slug almost as big as my Size 10 sandal and a red frog, who I am told is trying to mate by sticking its tongue out to catch small insects and attract a female.  The good thing to see  this week were the turkeys who are fattening up on the farm getting ready for “you know what”.  Shhhh, we haven’t told them about the big day.

Giant slug the almost the size of my size 10 sandal.

Male red frog hoping to mate on our patio. 

Christmas dinner is fattening up!

The highlight of the week was picking up Baby Lenah (she is #47) from her 17-year old orphan mother.  Both of her parents died of HIV related illnesses.  Lenah is 3-months old and named after her 80-year old Grandmother who begged us to take the baby because the teenage mother was not caring for her at all.  The baby is HIV negative and is a healthy, happy baby.

I am thankful for the “little things”, like electricity.  I am thankful that I have a Christmas tree with decorations and lights that work.  I am thankful that I have a laptop to communicate with Spencer and Chloe from a million miles away. I am thankful that they will both be on an airplane in just a couple of weeks and that we can celebrate Christmas together, on our farm in Africa.

Live from Swaziland … I have nothing to complain about.

Janine

Another woman (girl) arrives at the Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz today

This week has been a time of giving thanks.  We are thankful for our family, our friends, good food, good fellowship and all the other blessings that we have received.  I could write all day long the things I am thankful for, but I will focus on just one today - having a spare room at the Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz (which means New Beginning Communal Living) on Project Canaan.

There have been many times that I have been asked whether we would consider opening a home for unwed/pregnant mothers?  The thinking is that even if the girl is raped and is pregnant from that rape she might want to keep the baby after its born rather than giving it away (or throwing it away).   It was a good thought and was the germ of the idea for the Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz to be built.

This week I was called about a 17-year old girl who has been badly abused (sexually, emotionally, physically) since she was 8-years old.  She is now 5-months pregnant after a multiple rape and does not want the baby. She has tried to commit suicide on several occasions and has tried to abort the baby twice.  Her attempts were not successful.

The girl was discovered by a group of kind women specifically helping young pregnant girls in need.  They offer counseling and some assistance while the girl gives birth and then they do some counseling after to help the young mother with motherhood.  When this girl told her long and terrible story to the counselor she called in the senior leadership to help. The girl was then taken to the Social Welfare Office to get assistance, both for the baby who was unwanted, and also for the girl who was in fear for her life and desperately wants to go back to school after the baby comes.  She will be 18-years old at that time and is just now going into Grade 6.

I was called and asked to come and hear the girl’s story and then pray about how we could help, and so I went.  For two hours this young girl told me the story of her life from the age of eight until she was 14.  Due to time restraints she had to jump from age 14 to 17 quickly to tell me how she became pregnant.  There were several times that I wanted her to stop because I didn’t want to hear anymore.  There were times that I put my hand over my eyes to hide my disgust or pain.  She is a brave girl and we wanted to help.

The good news was that we have two empty rooms still at the Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz and the next step would be for me to discuss her situation with the four women who already live there to see if they were willing to open their new home to a girl in desperate need.  I went straight back to Project Canaan and called a meeting.  I explained a small part of the story, which I was told and all of the women together said, “She must come here.  We can help her.”  I almost cried.  I was so proud of them.  Offering to bring in a 17-year old stranger, who comes with mountains of baggage, was the greatest gift that they could give.  I asked what would be needed and they said that they would scrub the floor of room #1 and we would just need to bring a bed, sheets, blankets and a towel (all of which we had in storage).  It was done. The young girl would come and live here.  It was that simple.  So here is the plan.

She will arrive in about an hour from now. Her room is ready and there is food for her to eat. She will start work on Monday morning making jewelry at the Khutsala Artisans Shop.  Her due date is February 3^rd and her plan is to stay with us until after she has healed from childbirth. We have agreed to take the child to El ROI if and only if that is her desire when the child comes (right now she wants nothing to do with the baby conceived by rape).  She wants to go back to school, but realizes that she would have to wait until January 2015, and she will be almost 19-years old entering Grade 6, but maybe she will love living here and want to stay. Maybe she will love being taught a skill and working alongside other wonderful women who have been chosen to come here.  Maybe she will find hope and love in the safe haven called Project Canaan. 

We don’t know what the future holds for this young girl, but we know that tonight she will sleep well, maybe for the first time in nine years.  We know that she will be loved and that she will know that Jesus loves her so much that He has brought her here to us.  Interestingly, she has already named her unborn child – he/she will be given the name “Innocent” as the girl sees the child as the innocent outcome of her own tragic life.  I see the child as part of God’s perfect and Holy plan – none of which we can even begin to understand.

Today I give thanks for the people who gave so generously to build the Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz so that this week we could say, “yes”!

I also give thanks to the anonymous donor who has put forward a $100,000 year end giving match so that every dollar that you give to our Year End Campaign will be matched to double its work.  As you give thanks for all that you have I ask that you consider making a Year End gift to us at Heart for Africa on this link.  Thank you.

Live from Swaziland … I am truly thankful.

Janine

PS - Photos from her arrival.

138 chickens, 17 goats and Nomsa got to see her babies.

I had a really great week.  On Tuesday I celebrated my 50^th birthday surrounded by friends and family (I even got to have a GREAT Skype call with Spencer in the US and Chloe in Taiwan!).  We hosted the “big kids” from the toddler home as well as “Baby Debs” (on Ian’s invitation), Rachel and Leah (Nomsa’s twins – see wednesdayswithnomsa.blogspot.com) and all the Aunties who care for the 46 children living at Project Canaan.  It is hard for me to grasp that I share my actual birthday with Rachel and Leah and that one-year ago after they were born they almost died in a mud hut while their mother lay dying next to them. 

The day of celebration included eating cake, chasing chickens, petting baby goats and enjoying a great view with amazing people.   I had a great day.

The next day is what today’s blog is about.  It is my day with Nomsa.

My personal “what do you want to do on your birthday Janine” desire was to go and visit Nomsa at the TB Hospital and then bring her out to see Project Canaan. She has been diagnosed with XDR-TB (Extremely Drug Resistant Tuberculosis) and is infectious so she lives in an isolation room, by herself, at the hospital.  She has no TV or radio, no way to communicate with the outside world, no family to visit her and she has been really really sick.  We didn’t know if she would make it this time, but after six weeks she has rallied like the phoenix and is at least able to walk a little bit again.  She is very thin and gets weak easily, but she is still taking her meds and she is very much alive so we have not given up hope yet!

On Wednesday Lori Marschall, Ralph Glass and I started out on our all day journey. It’s about a 75-minute drive each way to and from the hospital, so that meant 75 minutes to go pick her up, 75 minutes to drive back to the farm, 75 minutes back to go back the hospital and 75 minutes to drive back to the farm.  We had to borrow a truck with an open back because Nomsa can’t ride inside a vehicle without running the chance of infecting us.  So Lori rode in the back of the truck on an old cushion and off we went. 

Nomsa was beyond excited to be getting out of the hospital on a day pass, out in to the fresh air to spend a few hours with people who are not sick.  She enjoyed chatting with Lori, looking at the beauty of nature and getting Fanta Orange and potato chips that Ralph picked up. 

When we arrived at the farm she turned around and faced the front of the truck so that she could see all there was to see.  Lori was her tour guide as we slowly drove past the El Rofi Medical clinic, Kufundza Carpentry Center, and down through the fields of green beans.  We visited the new dairy milk building, saw dozens of baby goats playing and stopped to taste our Moringa leaves.  It was like taking a child to Disney World for the first time. She was in awe of the beauty of the people and the farm.  Each time she was introduced, she was greeted warmly and welcomed by all.  Of course she had to keep her mask on at all times AND stay three feet away from everyone, but it was okay. We did our best not to make her feel like she had leprosy, even though the disease she carries is deadly to all in its path, especially to those who are HIV positive.

Then we went to the Sicalo Lesisha Kibbutz where we are building her a separate room.  We have talked about it for a year, but I am not sure that she ever believed me when I told her we were building her a home. She knows that she can’t come and live there until she is “sputum negative”, and she knows that it will take a miraculous act of God for her to actually become “sputum negative”, but that didn’t matter on Wednesday. That was her new home and we all believe in faith together that she will live there one day, soon.

From there we went to the El Roi Baby Home to see Nomsa’s twin girls, whom she has not seen since they were tiny newborns.  I have taken baby photos to her at the hospital, but to see her see the babies in person was not something that I was prepared for.  She couldn't hold them, she kept her mask on and her body at a safe distance, but there they were in front of her… beautiful, plump, happy, healthy and alive.  It was a miracle.

I wept.  Actually totally lost it and struggled when I looked at Helen who was also visibly shaken.  What total joy and sadness all at the same moment.  Auntie Shongwe and Helen held the babies and played with them while Nomsa sat and watched, and cried.  After some time and it was time for the babies to go and have their nap Nomsa looked at me, pulled her mask down and mouthed the words, “thank you.” 

We got back in the truck and I cried all the way to the TB Hospital and only was able to pull it together long enough to stop and buy her KFC (to make the day perfect), groceries, toiletries, and a few treats.  Thank you again to everyone who gives money to my Compassion Purse so that I have extra funds to do things like that (and even to pay for the gas in the vehicle).  We walked her up the stairs slowly, walked past sick, dying and naked women rolling around on the floor in delirium and put her things in her isolation room.

I cried all the way home and can’t write this blog with dry cheeks.  I am so overwhelmed with gratitude that I would be the “lucky one” to be called to do this work.  I can’t imagine doing anything else.

I had the best birthday. 

Thank you to everyone who made my day special. The Heart for Africa “50^th Birthday Campaign” raised $55,000+!   Thanks to your generosity we can purchase 138 more chickens (for chicken coops at the toddler home and the Kibbutz), 17 more goats, a cow, 25 packs of diapers, 23 tins of formula, 99 BIRTHDAY CAKES (!),  4 bee hives, a HUGE playset for the kids AND we have most of the funds needed to start building the foundation for the next children’s home (when the toddlers outgrow their current home).  And on top of it all, my Compassion Purse has been refilled and I can continue to help people in need when the need arises. 

Live from Swaziland … thank you.

Janine

PS – if you didn’t see the video of our Toddlers singing “Happy Birthday” to me, please click on this link. It is only 14 seconds, but it will bring you joy. 

Happy (early) 50th birthday to me :)

This weekend my wonderful husband of 22 years has whisked me away to the Island of Mauritius to celebrate my 50^th birthday (November 19th) with some great friends, Ralph Glass, Mark Klee and Janice & Roy Johnson.  I have struggled with the feelings of guilt being in this beautiful paradise (4.5 hour flight east of Johannesburg in the middle of the Indian Ocean) and no doubt, some will judge us for going away for these few days, even though we have paid for this personally. But I am giving thanks for His provision and love and choose to enjoy this time of rest and fun. 

Mark, Ian, Janine, Roy, Janice Ralph.

I think that my friends would say, “Janine, take the weekend off!  You don't need to write a blog today!”   So to you friends, I thank you. I won’t write a blog today, I will just post a few photos and ask you to celebrate with me as I head in to another decade.  

It is hard to believe that 1,533 people read my blog post last week.  Thank you for reading it and for sharing it with others to help with awareness of what we are dealing with in Swaziland.  I was imagining if everyone who read it last week would give only $6 (the cost of a chicken) to my “birthday wish list” we could raise $4,599 to directly help the children living at Project Canaan.  Would you consider giving $6.00 US today?  Or more?  Thanks for considering it.

Help from US - click here

Help from Canada - click here

Live from Mauritius … it’s Saturday evening and I am thankful.

Janine

Inmate gives birth in prison then strangles her baby - not making this stuff up

Yesterday Thabile and I had an appointment in Mankayane and left the farm early to make the 90-minute journey.  On our way we saw a newspaper headline which read, “Inmate gives birth, attempts to kill her baby”.  I pointed at it and asked Thabile if she had seen that and she said yes, and she had heard it on the news the night before.  I was shocked by the headline, but drove on.  When we finished our meeting, we stopped and bought a newspaper then headed home. “Coincidentally” the woman’s prison was right on our way, meaning we LITERALLY had to drive past it to get back, and I felt prompted to stop by the prison and ask how the baby was doing. 

We have a very good relationship with the leadership at the prison so I sent a text message and put in a call.  We also contacted Social Welfare and the police to make sure it was okay with all the stakeholders that we check on the baby.  They all said, “YES!  Stop in and we will meet you there.”  So we did.

We checked in at the front gate and walked down to the highly secured building and waited to be called by the head of the prison.  After a short time we were escorted up to her office and walked past a sad looking woman holding a baby.  We knew instantly who she was.

After greetings were made and formalities complete the girl was asked to come in and sit on the floor. I took the baby from her and started to unwrap all the blankets to see what lay beneath.  When I finally got to the baby I saw a plump (3.6 KG or 7.9 LB) baby girl with lots of hair. She was/is beautiful.  I looked to the mother and asked her what happened.  Here is what we learned.

The mother is 27-years old and has a 14-month old child. She is very poor and the father of the child has gone off leaving her with no support.  She stole R800 ($80 US) from an old Grandmother and was arrested.  She was charged with theft and given the choice of paying a R1,000 ($100 US) fine or go to prison for one year.  She had no money so had to choose the prison sentence. She and her 14-month old child went to prison on October 26^th.   On October 28^th she started treatment for HIV (although we learned that she had known before her first child was born that she was positive, but didn’t want to start treatment).

She did not mention to anyone at the prison that she was pregnant, and for some reason, no one noticed.

Early on the morning of November 7^th the mother had stomach pains and diarrhea and stayed behind in her room at breakfast time.  She claims that she didn’t know she was pregnant (her story changed a lot over several hours), but suddenly a baby came out. She knew she was not allowed to have two babies in prison and the father of the new baby didn’t even know she was pregnant so she decided to kill the child.  

She didn’t have anything sharp to cut the umbilical cord so she torn it off with her bare hands, leaving the placenta deep inside her.  She put her hands around the baby’s tiny throat and squeezed to stop her from breathing, leaving deep fingernail marks on the baby’s tender skin.  Once the baby stopped breathing, the mother put her in the bottom of a trash bin and then piled garbage on top of her hoping that when the trash was emptied the baby would be done and no one would know. 

The mother started to bleed profusely and another inmate came to check on her and found the pool of blood. They screamed for help and a nurse and several officers came running.  The nurse immediately thought that the woman had tried to abort a child, but the mother said it was not true. Slowly the bleeding mother walked over to the trash bin and started pulling the garbage off the baby.  She reached down and pulled the newborn out by her foot.  The baby was grey by this time. 

The nurse and the officers were shocked and immediately went in to action. I am told that the nurse started CPR immediately and the officers around stood and prayed out loud. I can only imagine what the sound of their cries was like.  After a time, the baby took a deep breath and her heart started to beat again.  (No doubt the angel that was protecting her also took a deep breath too!)  The nurse brought this newborn back to life and then they rushed the baby and mother off to the hospital.  The mother was hemorrhaging badly and was in and out of consciousness.  The doctors were able to remove the placenta and the mother stabilized quickly.  By the next morning, the day we were there, both mother and child had returned to the prison.

So there we sat. We listened to her story as it was slowly and painfully pulled out of her.  She seemed totally detached from the baby and from what was happening around her.  I couldn’t begin to put myself in her shoes. She had just delivered a 7.9 LB baby (BIG) by herself, killed her child, almost bled to death and 24-hours later is sitting on the floor talking to us.  Surreal.

Thabile and I took turns holding the precious baby and praying over her, but she started to cry and wanted to eat.  The prison officials suggested that the mother nurse the baby, but because the mother is HIV positive we wanted to discourage that in case the child was going to come to El Roi where she would continue with bottle-feeding.  We didn’t want to chance passing HIV to the baby through breast milk if this was going to be a “one time” feeding (the mother did breast feed during the night and the baby has been put on Nivirapine as a HIV prevention method – we will have her tested in six weeks).  But we had nothing else to give her.  The nurse scoured to find a bottle and formula and finally found both, but could not find a nipple for the bottle.  The baby started to cry more.

I think this is my favorite part of the whole story.

I always carry a diaper bag in my car complete with bottles, formula, diapers, wipes and clothes. I just never know when I am going to get a call to pick up a baby.  But this time, I was in Ian’s car because mine was in the shop so my usually “prepared” items were not in the back.  As the baby’s cries got louder and started to think. I said to Thabile, “You know, if we had known that we were picking up a baby today we would have packed a diaper bag right?”

She said, “Yes, we would have, but we didn’t know”.

I said, “Right, but obviously Jesus knew that we were going to pick up a baby. I wonder if He packed a bag?  We know that He cares about the small details. I wonder if there is something in the back of Ian’s car?”

I handed the keys to Thabile and asked her to go check.  That is not an easy thing to do because we were inside the prison walls and she would have to get escorted back out through security, take the long walk to the main road, pass that security and go to my car parked on the highway.  She didn't want to go because it was a long way, and a hassle, but she was obedient and took the keys.  (I love that girl!). Twenty minutes later she walked back in the tiny room where we were sitting and had a FULL diaper bag with her complete with bottles, formula, diapers, wipes and clothes!  Jesus packed a bag and it was in the back of Ian’s car.  I later discovered that Ian had put it there two weeks prior when he thought it was needed for a trip to get Baby Isaiah, but Isaiah was not ready for pick up at that time, so it stayed in the car.  I love my husband!

At that time we were all overwhelmed by God’s provision for this little baby.  Not only did He bring her back to life, and then He had us right near the prison to drop in an check on the baby, He also made sure that we had all the supplies we needed for this little angel.  And that is what we have named her.  Angel.

After four hours at the prison we were asked to take the baby to the El Roi Baby Home. The mother will be charged with attempted murder and her time in prison will be extended.  I don’t know whether to feel pity for her or anger.  I guess I feel both.

We have received four newborn babies in the past week.  We welcome Mary, Isaiah, Glory and now Angel.  We thank all of the people who give to Heart for Africa on a monthly basis because without you, we could not continue to say “yes” when a baby needs a home.  We pray that funding will come in for these four soon.

Thanks for reading and praying.

Live from Swaziland … we have 45 babies living at Project Canaan.

PS - Now, for a bit of shameless self-promotion, my 50^th birthday on November 19^th and my friends at Heart for Africa asked me what I wanted for my birthday, then they put a “wish list” on the website. All of my birthday wishes are for the babies at Project Canaan or the women at the Kibbutz.  Feel free to buy a goat or a chicken or contribute to the next children’s home on Project Canaan to help me celebrate!

In the US: Click here

In Canada :  Click here

Thanks friends.