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.

Nokuphiwa surgery update – things did not go as planned

If you don’t know who Nokuphiwa (Phiwa) is please start by reading this blog from just one year ago https://janinemaxwell.blogspot.com/2019/03/nokuphiwa-no-koo-pee-wah.html Phiwa was badly burned when she was only a few days old and did not get any medical intervention until last February when we sent her to Shriners Hospital for Children in Boston under the care of the Global Medical Relief Fund and in to the loving home of our dear friends, the Habelow family.

Phiwa did not have any family who could travel with her so we asked a young lady who had just graduated from University in Eswatini and was working in the front office at Project Canaan to go with her as guardian.  A pretty big ask.  Her name is Nokwanda Fakudze and we had known her for many years and had come to trust and love her.  When I asked Nokwanda if she would be willing to take a young girl, whom she had never met before all this started, to the US for several months of extreme surgical intervention, and she said yes.  None of us had any idea where this journey would take them or the people who have come to know and love them both.

Phiwa’s first few round of surgeries was to take skin grafts from her thighs and release her lips (really, it was to create lips).  Her lips had completely burned off as a newborn which impacted her ability to speak (impossible to enunciate without lips), eat and do other things we take for granted by having lips. Those three surgeries were successful and then she came back to Eswatini.

In November 2019 Nokwanda and Phiwa made their way back to Boston for the second major round of treatment and surgery.  Phiwa has a whole in the front left side of her skull that is the size of a golf ball, in fact you can see her heart beating through the skin.  We all assumed that the doctors would want to fix that first, but we learned that they couldn’t do that because of how taught her skin was, so that is why the lips became the first priority.

In November they put a port in her skull so that each week they could inject fluid that would expand her skin, stretching it so that when they did the cranioplasty the skin could be pulled over top of the hole. (I am writing this in layman’s terms so that you can all follow – surgeons please forgive my simple explanation of a very complex surgery). After three months of head expansion yesterday was the big day for the big surgery!  The plan was to take a half thickness piece of skull from another part of her head and insert it in the hole at the front of her skull.  If I understand correctly, both sites would eventually grow the bone back to full thickness. Once the hole was filled then they would take the expanded skin and stretch it over the left side of her head where she had no hair because of the burns. She would get a new hairline on the left side giving her hair all over her head.  How cool is that?

You can't have too many fun hats.

I think those of us who understood the surgery were nervous about it – it just seems so crazy that surgeons could do such a thing.  But the Lord has protected this child for so long we knew that He would continue to do so.  All of the big kids at Emseni did a video call with the girls the night before surgery and Ian prayed over her for peace, joy and safety. But here's the thing about Phiwa – she is never sad, scared, angry or in a bad mood. Don’t get me wrong, she’s still a kid, and can be stubborn about things, but really, she never complained about her skin expansion, never cried from pain and I often comment that she might not be human.

Yesterday as they went in to the hospital she was skipping and singing (see video below). WHO SKIPS AND SINGS when going to have cranioplasty?  Only Phiwa.

We had a video call with Nokwanda, Phiwa and Eileen as they headed to the hospital and both ladies are so good and sending me updates.  Then I got this one from Eileen:

“Dr. B just came out.  He is very happy with how the skin expansion went.  She now has a hairline that goes all the way to the bad ear and back.  He says there is still a section on the back of her head that needs hair.  That will be a small skin expander next round with which he will finish her scalp and construct an ear.  They did NOT put a new piece of bone in her skull - thought it was too risky during this one.  If the skin replacement leaked it would not allow the bone to heal well enough. He said they added another layer of very healthy skin over it and feels she is protected.  We might get out tomorrow since they did not do the bone.  Check up on Monday and/or Wednesday of next week.  Then, in two weeks or so (I am going to ask for March 25 so I can be here in-person), we will have the consult planning meeting to map out her next year.”

What the heck? They didn’t do the very surgery that we thought she was getting her head expanded for?  I was so disappointed, but Eileen was not, she knows that they would only do what was best for Phiwa.  What I do know is that God’s plans are not our plans, but they are always better, so I will rest in that promise.   

May I take this moment to say thank you again to Nokwanda, who really is a Super Woman in my books, and the blanket that she is wearing in the photo below is really her cape. Thank you for your love, your selflessness and your kubeketela.

Elsa and Super Woman save the world.

The girls will come home next month and we will be really excited to have them back.  We will know what the next round of treatment will be after a meeting in a couple of weeks.  We do know that future surgeries include an ear, a nose and hopefully an ocular implant to replace the eye that is sealed shut and non-functional.  Unfortunately, the Habelow’s have moved to Florida, and while they have very generously and graciously kept their apartment rented for the girls to live in during these months, we will need another host home for the next round of surgery. If anyone knows a family or perhaps a retired couple in the Boston area who would be blessed beyond measure to host a very special young gal, who might just be an angel in disguise, please let me know?

Live from Eswatini … thinking about my girls in Boston.

Janine

Change of plans

Thuli, Portia, Joanna, Naomi, Phoebi, Faith moving to E5

Since we receive approximately 40 new babies each year, and each of our children’s homes have 40 beds, we need to build a new home every year.  Our tiny babies move from Kuthula  Place to the baby home, the babies move to the toddler home, the toddlers move to Emseni #1 and then the older kids shifts up the mountain. It’s a big deal and we had one of those moves today with 17 children moving.  The older kids are always telling me that boys will move in to Emseni #6 and then girls in Emseni #7. It’s fun to watch their excitement as they see a “right of passage” with each move.  In the photo below you will see where we were to build our next home, Emseni #6, and it indeed was to be for boys. But this week we had a change of plans.

Ian and I took Margie Brewer and Cheri Peters (a Canadian Board member) up to the Upper Campus, which has no buildings on it yet.  We wanted to show them were O2 is going to be built as we are starting construction next week. The new O2 building (short form for Oasis #2, but also a play on Oxygen) will eventually be a dining hall for the teenagers, but we are building it now so that it can be a recreation hall for playing games, doing homework, choir practice and other activities, providing oxygen for their minds and souls.  We are really excited about this building because it will have a second story which will be an open-air patio, doubling the usable space.  Both floors will have a huge fire place for those cold winter nights and the upper floor will have offices, a meeting room, all purpose room and lots of toilets.  

Architectural drawing courtesy of Tim Hens.

While we were showing Margie and Cheri the location of 02 we shared our concern about building Emseni #7 after O2 was built because there wasn’t really a lot of room to drive in front of O2 to get building materials (and it would be a big mess for many months) to the Emseni #7 site. Just then, Ian had an idea, and shared it with us. He asked, “Why don’t we build Emseni #7 first before Emseni #6, and build it at the same time as we build O2?”

Pause. Think.

The next home needs to be for boys, and it was to planned to be located in the Middle Campus, but then we would have a home for girls up at the Upper Campus in 2021 and they would be alone up there for a year. Not ideal.  BUT, if we built Emseni #7 before we build Emseni #6, and moved the older boys up there, then in 2021 when we build Emseni #6 it will be for girls and they will still be tucked in to the Middle Campus. Then in 2022 the next building on the Upper Campus is also for boys.  It wouldn’t’ be until 2023 that girls move up top, which means they would be 12-years-old.  This could work!  And, it’s always better and more cost effective to have our construction teams in one location, which means they could build these two buildings in tandem.

Upper Campus where E7, O2 and our Special Needs home will be built.

This would not have even been a possibility if we had not received $95,000 from our friends at Keller Williams to start building this next home for our children.  We still need to raise an additional $130,000 to finish the building, but we have enough to get started and I believe that the Lord will provide the rest of the funds needed. 

I LOVE how God works and I LOVE how He only gives us one page at a time and then throws in surprises like a change of plans on what we will build and when we will build it.   I LOVE that I get to do life with my best friend and that we get to see His goodness and mercy and provision every single day.

If you would like to help us build a home for 40 boys you can buy a block for only $25, or 100 for $2,500 today by clicking on one of these links:

In the US:  http://bit.ly/buyablockE6

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

Live from Eswatini … it’s a good thing we like change.

Janine

HOPE RISING

HOPE RISING with the Mock family

This past week I experienced something that I had never experienced before. I was invited to speak at the “Inspiration Morning” portion of the Keller Williams annual Family Gathering in Dallas, Texas.  For those of you who may not know, Keller Williams is the largest Real Estate Agency in the world, with 180,000 agents in 43 countries, and this week’s gathering was “only” 15,000 of those 180,000 people.  This is a crazy story so I do hope that you will read it all.

In early January we got an email with the invitation to go and speak at the February event, and then I got on a phone call with the marketing/event team to share my story and discuss what they wanted me to share.  I quickly learned that their theme for the weekend was “HOPE Rising”.  They didn’t know that Heart for Africa is all about HOPE.  As I was telling them a bit about how we got in to this, I started the story with me being in NYC on September 11, 2001 and Ian being on an American Airlines flight to Chicago.  One of the ladies on the other end of the phone stopped me and said, “Do you know who the first inspirational speaker of that morning will be?”  I said no, I didn’t. 

Then she went on to tell me that the first speaker of the day would be Beverly Bass, the first ever female Captain for American Airlines who just happened to be flying from Paris to Dallas on 911.  Hers was one of the many planes that were diverted to Gander, Newfoundland, Canada that day where the 7,000 passengers and crew were welcomed by the small Canadian community with a population of 9,000 people.  What are the chances of this Canadian being in NY on 911 and that American Captain being in Canada on 911 and both of us being on stage in Dallas, Texas almost 20 years later. Then they told me that  “HOPE RISING”  was the theme for the event.

It was a pleasure to hear Captain Bass speak so highly of her experience in Canada and then to learn that a Canadian written Broadway Musical called “Come from Away” was being performed all over the world.  Mo Anderson, Vice-Chairman of the Keller Williams Board, surprised Captain Bass that morning by having the original leader singer from the Broadway production, who played Captain Bass herself, sneak up behind her on stage and perform the song that tells her life story.  HOPE RISING indeed.

Then it was my turn.  I have never spoken in a room with 15,000 chairs, and an overflow room outside.  My 20 minutes of Q&A with Mo flew by, leaving a few teary eyes in the audience and then suddenly there was a young choir standing beside me and Mo said, “We raise you up” and the choir started to sing.  If there were dry eyes left in the audience when I finished speaking, there certainly were none after the first 20 seconds of the choir singing “You raise me up”.  I wish I could post the whole song in my blog, but alas, blogger only allows 100 MB videos.

THEN, to top it all off, Mo handed me two checks totaling $25,000 and challenged everyone in the audience to go to their Keller Williams App and donate $20 to Heart for Africa so that we can build another home for 40 more children (Emseni 6).  What?? Who does that?? Mo Anderson, that’s who. 

Four days later, at the time of me writing this blog, more than 800 Keller Williams Agents have made donations totaling more than $45,000 and we hope to be able to fully fund the $225,000 building in the weeks to come.  While funding is critical to us continue building our homes, it was the words of encouragement spoken over us at the event and written in the “comments” section of our online donation page. I have read each and every one of them and am so thankful for their generosity and prayers.  One person wrote “As a gay HIV+ person, I would like to thank you for your efforts”.  HOPE RISING around the world.

And how did all this happen you ask?  Well, Kasey and Elizabeth Mock started supporting Heart for Africa a couple of years ago and Ian and I had the privilege of meeting them in November 2019 while we were speaking at a private gathering in San Antonio, Texas.  Elizabeth’s sister was a client at Barry Harp’s accounting firm in Dalhart, Texas, and when the Harp’s moved to Eswatini to serve at Project Canaan, Elizabeth’s sister told Kasey and Elizabeth about Heart for Africa.  Kasey Mock is the owner of Mock Ranches and Director of Operations at Keller Williams Land Division.  He shared our story with the Keller Williams Marketing department and voila … the invitation to speak was extended. And “coincidentally” it was the year that Captain Beverly Bass was also invited to speak AND the year that the theme was “HOPE Rising”.   I just can’t make this stuff up!

God is in the details and we just loving sitting back and watching His handiwork.

Ian and I were honored and blessed to fly to Dallas and back this week. It took us 36 hours of travel, each way, and our bodies feel like pretzels today, but this week was a week that we will never forget.

If you would like to buy one of our brand new HOPE keychains, they are on sale now at www.khutsala.com.

Thank you Mo Anderson, Kasey Mock, the leadership of Keller Williams and all of the agents around the world who believe in putting God first, then family, then business.  Amen to that.

Live from Eswatini … it’s so good to be home!

Janine

PS If you know a Keller Williams agent, please forward this blog to them. If you or they would like to contribute to building a home for 40 more children, please go to this link today.  If you are in Canada, please click here.  Thank you.

Loving them back to life

Seven years ago today I was called by the police about a newborn baby girl who was found in a black plastic bag and left under some bushes not far from Project Canaan.  She had been there for 2-3 days, as evidenced by her umbilical cord.  Her body was covered in burns from the hot plastic burning her skin and she was bruised, bleeding and her eyes were swollen shut.  She had maggots and other insects crawling out of all openings and open wounds on her body and she didn’t weigh more than 3 pounds.  She came to live with Ian and me for the next 18 days while we got her injuries healed, and loved her back to life.  

I am tempted to show you a photo of the baby back then and a photo of her today, but we all have to be SO careful to protect her right to privacy, and although many of you know who she is, I won’t mention her name in this blog, but I have included a couple of photos of her in the early days below, including one of my favorites, which is of her hand beside Ian’s in the doll crib that dad made for me when I was a little girl. 

Last week this little girl turned 7-years-old and she enjoyed birthday cake with two other children who share the same date (different years).  It’s hard to believe that seven years have gone by and that this sweet girl is now in Primary School. Where did the time go?  She is happy, healthy, silly, a bit shy from time to time, and a complete joy to be around.  We have not seen any side effects from her rough start.  She was loved back to life.

And then there is little Buck who came to us and the end of last year.  He was severely malnourished and has been in and out of the hospital with a bulging fontanelle and fever, but all tests, including Lumbar Puncture’s and bloodwork have come back clear so we assume these are side effects of the malnutrition. This little guy is now 18-months old, and while he doesn’t walk (or crawl), he might just be the world’s fastest “scootcher! 

I know many of you will be celebrating Valentine’s Day this weekend and so I will make this blog short and sweet and leave you with some photos that might just bring you joy!  This sweet baby is Treasure, and when she turns her (significant) frown upside down, her smile lights up the whole room. On Monday I sat with her and took some selfies.  As you can see below, she got the hang of it very quickly, mimicking each face I made to the phone.

February is Child Sponsorship month at Heart for Africa and we have had FIVE new people sponsor a child and ONE existing sponsor increase their monthly gift.  Would you consider sponsoring a child today or increasing your monthly gift?  We would very much appreciate your love and support.

🇺🇸 US: http://bit.ly/hfahopestarts  
🇨🇦 Canada:  http://bit.ly/hfahopestartsca

Happy Valentine’s Day weekend!

Live from Dallas, Texas … it’s Saturday morning!

Janine

ABC’s of living in Eswatini (Attacks, Birthdays and Crocodiles)

Attacks: On Tuesday I was notified by one of my female staff members that she and her elderly mother, her Aunt and her teenage son had been brutally attacked by a drunk/high man from their community. The attack involved threats of murder and rape and while he threw hard punches and big rocks, whereas my Supervisor responded with a bush knife (machete) and verbal assaults.   Once they got the attacker to run off, they called the police who told them that they must make their way to the police station (10 miles?) to make a report because the police did not have a vehicle to go and investigate. They went, made the report and then took the Aunt to the hospital for her head injury from the rocks.

The next day the man went back to the homestead when everyone was at work or school and attacked the elderly mother again.  The police were called again, and this time it resulted in an arrest.  On Thursday morning Ian, Shelly and I made our way to the police station to show our support (and disdain) at the hearing for the attacker. We waited 2+ hours before we witnessed the man confess to his crime.  Later that day he was sentenced to 6 months in jail, or an E600 fine ($40 US). He paid the fine and left.  He was then immediately arrested again for assaulting his own sister and goes back to court today. Who knows, maybe another $40 out the window.  While I appreciated the speed to trial and sentencing, I am always appalled by the ability to pay their way out of violent crime.

Birthdays: Wow, did we have a lot of birthdays this week?!  Just yesterday we celebrated Jacob (6), Deborah (7) and David (8) and we are all struggling with the question “How in the world did they get to be that age??”.  I told my staff that the first eight years of Spencer and Chloe’s lives seemed to go so slowly (well, not slowly, but just the right pace), but these kids are growing up faster!  Gabriel and Rose will be 10 this year!!!  As you likely know, this month is Child Sponsorship month and Jacob does not have a sponsor, so we have to use operational funds to pay for his care, school and birthday cake.  Once he is sponsored that takes extra pressure off of the organization.  It takes a village to raise 261 children, and we really need to expand our village this month. Will you sponsor a child today for $30?  $50?  $100 or even $225 per month?

🇺🇸 US: http://bit.ly/hfahopestarts

🇨🇦 Canada:  http://bit.ly/hfahopestartsca

Crocodiles: And in other news … it appears that we have crocodiles in our dams again.  It has been reported by several people that there is a large one in the Living Water Dam and a small one in Dam #2 (and I’m guessing there are more??).  We had a big croc a few years ago and he was eating our small dogs. There is a saying in Africa that if you are going to cross a river, you must let your dogs go first because crocodiles prefer dog meat to human. Good to know 🙈.  All crocodiles in Eswatini belong to His Majesty the King so we can’t kill them, they must be captured and released. No small task I assure you, but I am certainly on the watch for them on our morning walks.  Like the saying goes, I don’t have to outrun the crocodile, I just have to outrun Ian!

Life in Eswatini is always an adventure, with highs and lows, frustrations and celebrations, and I can’t imagine my life anywhere else.

Live from Eswatini … happy Saturday.

Janine