Wow, I have just looked back at the blog and realised how long it is since we last updated it!

So instead of going back over the last few months I will just update you on the next little while. As I write Dan is just coming to the end of two weeks in the DRC. It has been an amazing and difficult time for him seeing poverty like nothing seen before, attending a funeral of a 8 year old. Sleeping in a house way out in the bush with a 5 year old who lives on his own. I will leave him to share it all with you when he returns.

I am struggling to get my head around this time of year. Marley and Sonney are coming back from school singing Christmas carols, there are crackers and pictures of Father Christmas in the shops but it is so stinking hot!!! In my mind this weather is reserved for July or August not November!

So on 6th December we fly out to visit the UK for a few weeks. I have put my order in for Snow as Marley and Sonney have come to expect that that is what happens in England when we visit at Christmas !

We are trying to organise some things for anyone who is interested to come along and catch up with us but as yet I don’t have details so please watch this space.

See you all soon!

So it is a while since a wrote my first post on John and I know many of you have been wondering about his progress. Well I wish I could tell you that he had come on leaps and bounds but unfortunately not.
Coming to terms with a sudden onset paraplegia is a huge thing for any person to come to terms with, yet alone a young lad like John who has already had to deal with so much. Loosing both his parents, an aunt that was supposed to look after him who left him all day locked in a room are only some of the things that we know about.
So each day with John has been a battle to say the least. It is hard to tell if he is just being a stubborn teenage boy at times or if it is to do with the fact of all he has been through. We have acquired a childrens wheelchair for him so at least he can be mobile. Each time i see him, which is not as often as I would like, I just try to show him as much love as I can – even if at times it makes me seem like the bad one. So for now I hope that just by my regular visits and my love shown towards him that I can bring him round to even want to try to get better.

The other day I (Jen) got a call form a local clinic to go and advise on a patient. When I got there the person I was meant to be seeing had been discharged but said they did have a lad, John, who they would like me to see instead. Now one of the things that caught my interest was that John was the only child in an adult facility, so there must be a really good reason for him being there.

John is a 12 year old lad. He was orphaned of both his parents at about three years old. Up until January John had been going to school. At some point after this he fell ill and so was unable to go to school anymore. Then two months ago something happened to make John unable to move his legs at all. Everyday for the last two months, the aunt, who cares for John continues to go to work. John is left locked in the house, alone, all day. He has no food and no way of getting to the toilet. All he has is a long stick that enables him to switch the television on and off. This has been his life. Occasionally a concerned neighbour will bring him food. You can only imagine the state that the nurses who visited him found him in. He was unwashed and had been left lying in his own bodily fluids. He was covered in nasty bedsores. When they admitted him and began to clean him up they also found signs of witch doctors’ intervention on his body. Such a vulnerable and traumatised young lad.

So where do I fit in? where do you start?

So today I leave to Zimbabwe for ten days. There is a team of 5 of us going with the purpose of training some key leaders from Zimbabwe and Mozambique (I’ll talk more about that later on but needless to say I’m the hopelessly unqualified member of the team but will be learning from some true masters in this in Levy and Emily with Fortunate and Audrey alongside them).

A few days ago I was speaking to someone here who was visiting Hands at Work and when I mentioned I left for Zimbabwe on Saturday they asked “Did you ever think 10 years ago you’d be saying ‘I’m off to Zimbabwe for two weeks’?”

So I’ve given the question some thought (I bet when she asked the question she had no idea how seriously I’d take it) and here are my answers…

So firstly, yeah I probably did think ten years ago that at some point in my life I’d be travelling and visiting countries like Zimbabwe, in fact I’d even go as far as saying ten years ago I knew that at some point in my life I wanted to be working with the poor, the orphaned and the widowed. So in that respect “no” it doesn’t feel at all strange.

Secondly however, what does feel strange is how normal it feels and more than that how at home it feels. This will be third or fourth time to Zimbabwe and in 2009 we stayed there for three weeks with our friend Farai. I genuinely have a sense of excitement to be seeing Farai , Mildred and their kids again. I last saw them back in March in Zambia and Mildred was quite pregnant. She’s since popped their fourth child out and are proud parents to a little boy (they have three older girls so cue the constant challenges of “go on try for a fourth it could be a girl!”). I’m of course going armed with bags of our old baby clothes. Farai co-ordinates our work out in Zimbabwe and feels like a big (he is very big) older brother.

So does if feel strange? On one hand not at all but on the other hand I catch myself and think, “I’m not sure I ever thought I’d be visiting family in Zimbabwe” but that’s exactly what I’m doing…

Today I’m feeling quite old and slightly squeamish as Marley twisted out his first tooth. Ridiculously, this new season of parenting seems to have snuck up on us slightly. Oh well at least it means I get to dress up as a fairy (that’s how it works right?)

 

So as I write this I’m sat in the passenger seat of the now famous Volkswagen Combi (of two drives to Zambia fame) winding through some stunning scenery to the Swaziland border. Six of us, lead by my friend Levy, are on our way to a leadership training conference for Swazi pastors where we’ve been asked to speak and then train. I have the humbling, daunting and privileged opportunity to speak on God’s Heart for the poor. 25.9% of people aged between 15-49 are HIV Positive – The worlds highest rate.
Orphans and Vulnerable children make up an estimated 15% of the population.
On the whole the church in Swaziland is either just looking on at this or has closed its eyes.
This is an incredible opportunity. An opportunity that I’m hopelessly unqualified for. As a team we go humbly as broken, damaged servants just trusting that God uses people like us.
Please pray that God would speak gently or loudly to his Church in Swaziland so that they would step up and care for a country that’s dying.

Like I said I’m currently writing this on my phone but will write properly when we’re back on Friday.

We went for a walk to a place called Mac Mac Pools

We’ve got visitors! Our friends Dave & Emily Hannah are here! Dave & Em are good friends from the UK and are spending nearly three weeks with us here in South Africa. They are also Tommy Malster’s (he’s a lad from Ipswich, England volunteering with us) former mentors so are also here to see him. Add too this a desire to find out who Hands at Work are, what we do and how we do it and what’s going on here in Africa and you’ve got the reasons for them being here.

I’ll keep you up-to-date with their time here with us and will also try to persuade them to write some of their thoughts here as well.

Last week in an area called Bushbuckridge, a community about 2 hours north of where we stay here in South Africa, I visited this house. Normally, Sarah (17 years old) stays here with five other younger orphans some of them siblings and others cousins. Sarah is the oldest and cares for the others who range from 15 years old to 4 years old. Tragically a few weeks back someone smashed the window, broke into the house and raped Sarah. Sarah has understandably now fled the house to stay with some relatives and is terrified to return. As horrific as this story is the consequences get worse. Sarah as care giver to the five other orphans receives their grants that the South African government give orphans. This money has gone with her so the five kids are left alone with no money. A kind relative has moved in with them to help care but things are getting desperate, they literally have nothing. The people Sarah is staying with are stopping any money going to these other five kids. What stays with me, as we sat and listened to their story, was the fear in the kind relatives eyes as she faced the reality that they had nothing to eat and she had no way of providing it. They were starving….

but….

There is some hope. And once again it comes in the form of the two careworker’s I was with. You see these local volunteers see this as their problem, the kids are their kids, Sarah is their daughter, the relative is their sister. So no magic wand was waved but the car workers phoned Sarah and left a kind message for her and will try to meet up with her. The aim is to see her back with the kids that need her.

So why didn’t I jump in and do something….I’ll save that story for my next update.