Can the puzzle change?

Twice last week I got Spencer and Chloe’s ages wrong, asking them both what they wanted for their upcoming 25^th birthdays. Spencer reminded me that he was turning 26 and Chloe reminded me that she is turning 24.  Then I planned family ZOOM call for Spencer’s birthday on Saturday, but Chloe corrected me and told me his birthday is on Sunday.  I couldn’t remember the name of one of my Sr. Supervisors, but could describe which house he lived in.

It was then that I realized I am tired.  My brain is tired. My heart is tired. My body is tired. 

I decided to take three days off as mental health days, and decided that I wouldn’t write a blog today as part of my mental health rest, but then something happened yesterday.

I got up and went in to Chloe’s room where we have a small gym and puzzle table set up – for both for mental and physical health.  I got on the bike for a while then did some stretching, then went to the cupboard to see if there was a puzzle we hadn’t done yet.  I reached up and found a puzzle of The United States of America. I have no idea how it got here, or who bought it and it was still in its original plastic.  As Canadians, I am not sure why we would have bought a puzzle of our US neighbors, but there it was, and so I pulled it out.

I started by flipping all the pieces right-side-up and then separated the edge pieces and used the box to show me where the longitude and latitude numbers came together.  The frame was complete and it was time to start the puzzle. The first piece I randomly picked up was Minneapolis.  I burst in to tears, and can hardly see my computer through tears as I write this.  I paused, prayed and laid the piece where it would soon be surrounded by the rest of the state. 

I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to continue, but saw that my homeland was up at the top so decided to start with Canada.  It was warm, familiar and while Eswatini, Africa is home for me now, I identify proudly as a Canadian.  The pieces quickly went together as I know Canadian geography well, and could place each piece where it belonged.  Then I picked up a piece and saw the word “Matheson” on it. Again, I burst in to tears.  That was my childhood home town of 3,000 people, located 400 miles north of Toronto.  Why was I crying?  What was wrong with me. I paused, prayed for Matheson and continued with the puzzle.

These bursts of tears continued as I found Chicago (where Spencer lives), southern Ontario (where Chloe lives), Georgia (where many friends and co-workers live), New York, Indianapolis and even Chattanooga brought me to tears.  I paused and prayed over each piece.

Why was I crying over a puzzle?  Why am I crying now?  Then I stopped and took the photo that you see below.  The United States of America is in pieces, and I don’t know who is going to put it back together.  Then I had this really weird feeling that if I could just finish the puzzle quickly, it would all be better. I looked for pieces that I knew where would fit, places that I have friends living or that I had visited in my business days or family vacations.  With each piece I paused and prayed and wept.  But as each piece found its place I knew that nothing was going to change by me finishing a puzzle of the United States.  I finished the puzzle, went back to the living room and the news on the television was the same.  Hatred, division, anger and tears. 

From where I stand, it looks to me that the United States are no longer united, and that is both terrifying and devastating to me.  I am a white Canadian woman living on an isolated mountain in the Kingdom of Eswatini where King Mswati III has absolute power, where a Sexual Offense and Domestic Violence law was only (finally) passed in 2019 and up until 2012 there was no Child Protection Act, so child rape wasn't illegal, just frowned upon.  Women still can’t own property here. And in case you feel that the Coronavirus news has become old, exhausting and you want to move on with life, we are still dealing with the highest HIV/AIDS rate in the world, and an estimated 70% of the population with (active or inactive) the highly infectious and deadly Tuberculosis, which is not talked about in western countries because it mostly eradicated.

I’m tired.  And I know you are too.  But let us not grow weary and give up hope. 

“Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God,

the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary,

and his understanding no one can fathom.” Isaiah 40:28

Let us join together in prayer, knowing that the creator of Universe is securely on the throne. Let us listen to one another with patience, intentionality and peace that passes all understanding.  Let us pray for justice and unity to prevail through the darkness, and bring us back in to a new light.

Thank you Spencer and Jane for marching peacefully in the Chicago protests. Thank you Chloe and Asad for making Coronavirus test kits in Canada.  I am so very proud and thankful for you all.

Live from Eswatini …

Janine

Swazi's aren't worried about toilet paper

Nine children whose names can encourage you today.

We are living in strange times, and the whole world knows it, even Swazi’s in the most remote parts of our tiny country.  And they are afraid.

They are not afraid of not having enough toilet paper, because most Swazi’s are too poor to EVER buy toilet paper, so it won’t be missed (they use leaves or crumpled up newspaper).  Most Swazi’s are too poor to have a pantry, so there is no stocking up of food, and no money to stock up with 70% of the population being subsistence farmers.

This is a people group who are currently living with the highest HIV/AIDS rate in the world and an estimated 70% of the population living with active or inactive Tuberculosis, but that is not what scares them.   What makes them afraid is the government hospitals because here have been out of critical medications for the past couple of years, so how will they possibly be able to help really sick people?  There are no masks, there is no protective gear and there are reports that some nurses just don’t want to go near sick patients. There are only four functioning respirators in the entire government healthcare system in the country. Yesterday I had a nurse say to me, “In the west, people who are thought to be sick with the coronavirus are considered ‘people of interest’.  It is the opposite here in Eswatini – no one is interested in them.”  Ouch.

Ian and I drove to South Africa on Tuesday and spent a day going from one pharmacy to the next to get the medications that our children will need for the next eight weeks.  The borders were starting to close that day so we had to work quickly and only got 75% of what we needed.  We also haven’t been able to get critical medications for many months from Swazi suppliers so someone always has to drive to South Africa (Pretoria is a 5-hour drive) to get meds each month. We pray that the borders will reopen before our medications run out.

It has been widely reported that we have only had one case of COVID-19, a woman who arrived from Germany, but we aren’t sure whether testing is being done and/or reported accurately. That is what Swazi’s are telling me they are afraid of – no tests, dishonest reports, and no possible medical care if they do get sick, which they will.

We are all trying to practice social distancing, but Swazi’s (like most Africans) depend on public transport that are small vans crammed with as many passengers as they can fit.  If the thought of contracting Tuberculosis wasn’t terrifying enough, COVID-19 increases the risk and fear, but still it is the only way for them to get from A to B.

Then there is the practice of “sharing a meal”, which is common to most of the African continent of one billion people.  Families share the same meal from the same bowl.  We see it from the front office to Khutsala where two or three people will take turns cooking that week and bring a plastic bowl of food that everyone eats from. 

I know that the world is afraid, and I can’t imagine the fear that people are feeling as they wake up each day to new startling numbers and data, but please don’t forget to pray for Africa.  Most countries won’t have access to the testing kits that they need (if the US can’t get them, how will we?), so we really won’t ever have accurate data, and most of those billion people don’t have access to health care services at all. 

We will not live in fear, and we have put all protocols possible in to effect here at Project Canaan, and we wait. 

Spencer is in lock down in Illinois now and Chloe is self-quarantined in her University apartment in Canada. For the past four days we have been working tirelessly to get Phiwa and Nokwanda home from Boston after the Doctor discharged them on Monday.  But alas, after two failed attempts at the airport where they were turned away at the gate two nights in a row.  Now, they will not be able to get home. South Africa has closed its borders so we are now locked in the country for the unforeseeable future and they are locked out.  Thankfully, the Habelow family came to their rescue again and got them flights to Florida where they will live with them until the borders open, international flights resume and they can come home.

After herculean attempts to get the girls home, we could not.

While these are complicated times of uncertainty, what we do know for certain is that God is God and he is securely on the throne.  I took the photo below yesterday of nine of our children who have names that will surely remind you to keep your eyes on Him, and do not be afraid. He is with us, to the end of time.

Live from Eswatini … enjoying the fresh air and daily walks around the farm.

Janine

PS – and in the midst of all this, Willis fell off the top bunk, hit his head and broke his clavicle this week requiring several days in a private hospital.  And theft continues, this time it was the Dairy Manager, who we liked and trusted, stealing dairy meal. He and his partner in crime were given a E7,000 fine ($400 US) or FIVE years in prison. They don’t have access to that kind of money so will spend the next five years in a Swazi jail.  This job doesn’t get any easier.

Posters we have put up on the farm to deter theft.

A new perspective on viruses

Last week one of our workers was bitten by a dog which was thought to be rabid.  If you don’t know much about rabies, there is no cure, and you have no more than ten days to start a series of five injections or you die. There were no rabies injections in any government hospital in Eswatini, so he went to a private clinic and got his first two shots.  Ian and I learned about this when we just happened to pick him up at the front gate on his way to get his third shot.  Our family was sprayed by a rabid bat when we lived in Ontario, and we know the fear and the pain of many needles, so we gave him our sympathy. The next morning during our morning walk, Ian saw him and asked how he was doing. He was visibly upset as he told us that the private hospital was out of rabies vaccine and they couldn’t complete his five-shot treatment. He was afraid he was going to die a horrific death.

Ian spoke with our nurses who were able to find a pharmacy in Nelspruit, South Africa (a 3-hour drive crossing two international borders) and we said we would drive and get them. The nurse asked us to please get chicken pox vaccines too as they have not been available in Eswatini for 7+ years.  When we got to the pharmacy, I told the pharmacist that I had strange list of prescriptions:  rabies vaccines for an employee, chicken pox vaccines for our children and blood pressure medication for me, which I need because I deal with rabies and chicken pox!  She suggested that we stop at the liquor store before he headed back to Eswatini!  Meanwhile, that huge pharmacy had already sold out of hand sanitizer, but that happened months ago before the coronavirus scare began.  She pointed to a poster that told us how to make our own hand sanitizer – good to know. She also told us that they had been out of chicken pox vaccines for months, but we ended up driving home with rabies vaccines, blood pressure medication and little tequila.

Eswatini has the highest HIV/AIDS rate in the world. HIV stands for Human Immunodeficiency Virus, and it is the very reason we moved here.  There also is no cure for this disease, and medication is antiquated, sometimes out of stock, but effective if take properly twice a day, every day at the same time of day (7AM/7PM).  It’s effectiveness is also dependent on proper nutrition and protein.  People don’t die from HIV/AIDS, they die from a common cold or the flu or Tuberculosis (TB), which 70% of our total population are estimated to have active or inactive TB.  If their TB is inactive it can be activated by getting sick with something as simple as a cold, or the flu, or coronavirus. 

Most of our 315 employees have children, and most of those children are cared for by elderly parents or grandparents while the employee is at work.  Many of their children are sickly with conditions that could be treated if hospitals weren’t out of medicine, but they are.  We are a country with a very broken healthcare system, virtually no hospital care and both clinics and hospitals have run out of many/most essential medications.

This morning we had our first coronavirus patient confirmed to be positive in Eswatini. She came from the US, traveled to Lesotho, and then came back here and tested positive at a private clinic.  It bears repeating that this is a country of very old and sick people, very young and sick people and an HIV/AIDS rate that could be as high as 40%. 

As the world is facing unknown fears, which includes health and economics uncertainties, I would like to say two things to you today. First, I am personally committed to post on social media every day with words of encouragement from our children, our staff and our volunteers so that you know we are thinking of you and praying for you.  Second, I am asking if you will help us raise the funds we need to build the rest of Emseni #7 for 40 big boys.  When I spoke at an event last month in front of 15,000+ Keller Williams agents, they collectively gave almost $100,000 towards the $225,000 cost of the building. Only a few short weeks later a gathering of that size is impossible, and none of us know when there will be speaking opportunities again to build awareness and raise funds for our needs here. I know that this is a time of financial fears for many people around the world, but I also know that we need to get this building finished quickly as the children are still coming and they are in desperate need of a home. 

Please consider putting your fear aside today and help us do what we can do for these children while waiting to see what happens as the coronavirus spreads throughout the Kingdom.  Please buy a block for $25 or 100 blocks or 1,000 blocks and help us get this done. Would you also please share this post today? Everyone is looking for content to read and looking for hope for the future. I hope that our lives can be a beacon of hope from afar in the days and weeks ahead.

In the US:  http://bit.ly/buyablockE6

In Canada:  https://www.heartforafrica.ca/emseni-childrens-campus/

Just yesterday as we drove back from South Africa we got a call about two different new born baby boys that needed a home. We haven’t received a new baby in SEVEN WEEKS, so this was a surprise.  One was the result of a violent rape and the other was found in the bushes covered in his own waste which burned his face.  Both tiny boys were in government hospitals, and very vulnerable.  We stopped and picked up baby Solomon and baby Rocky (the one who looked like he had been in a fight … a fight for his life!), and we brought them home, along with the rabies vaccinations.  That is the world we are living in.  We may not be able to stop the coronavirus (although we did a hand washing seminar with all our 315 employees yesterday and gave everyone a big bar of soap), but we can help these two little guys who are not safe in a government hospital.

Isaiah 41:10 says, "So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand."

Live from Eswatini … we are washing our hands and praying.

Janine

P.S. There are rumors that our borders to South Africa may close soon.  90% of all food is imported, so that will cause another problem.