Today we will pick up Chloe at the airport and despite Covid-19 social distancing guidelines I will give our daughter the biggest hug possible as we have not seen her since December 2019! She has been stuck in Canada and we have been stuck in Eswatini and we have missed each other terribly. She hasn’t even seen Spencer in that time period as he has been in the U.S. and the Canada/U.S. border has been closed for more than a year.
I recently had a conversation with a local doctor who has been directly involved with the Covid-19 pandemic and she told me that the third wave will be much worse than the second one was. Only 32,000 vaccines (AstraZeneca) arrived in Eswatini and the first dose was allocated to healthcare workers and people over 60 years. We have had some children’s campus staff infected (and hospitalized) and some of our children have tested positive for the antibodies, so we know that virus has (and probably still is) on Project Canaan. We are still strict with staff wearing masks for 10 days after upon returning from their “off” days, and hand sanitizing happens at every building entrance. The border to South Africa is open for medical travel, education travel and employment only, for now, and our lock down restrictions have loosened a bit, so we thought it was a perfect window of opportunity for Chloe to come home.
This also coincides with a BIG news that Chloe has been hired by Heart for Africa (Canada) as their Marketing Coordinator and she is a welcomed addition to the growing marketing team. The U.S. team also welcomed a new member last week with Sam Nadolski joining as our new Director of Marketing. Sam has never been to Eswatini so we saw this as a perfect opportunity for her to come and see is during this “window” of opportunity, along with Maggie Lian (Marketing Coordinator, U.S.) who hasn’t been to Eswatini since 2010!
As the borders are still closed to tourism we cannot re-opening for volunteers at this time, but we are happy to have this very small team from the office coming to gather photo and video content for 2021 and bring some love to us all. We all need a big hug and a good laugh.
We have an incredibly busy week ahead, and I will share as much of it as I can on social media so you can be with us here in spirit.
I cannot express how thankful I am that Chloe can come home. I know that traveling during a global pandemic is not easy, there are no direct flights anymore, and flying with a mask will be a challenge, but I am SO VERY HAPPY that she is willing and able to make the trip. The children are excited to see her again too and have been doing the “how many sleeps until Chloe comes home” countdown for the past week.
Live from Eswatini … doing the happy dance!
Janine
My new book is now available for pre-order in Canada at https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B093RX61N1 and you can also pre-order it on our Khutsala website at https://khutsala.com/collections/accessories/products/hope-lives-here
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