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Dear All,
I can't believe that it's been 5 months since I last sent a newsmail !! Forgive my VERY long silence. I'm afraid time
just gets away from me so easily! But I will try and bring you up to date on the last few months' happenings!
In December, Pete, Jeremy and I all travelled to the UK to spend Christmas at my brother's home in Somerset with him,
his family, my parents and, of course, Amanda, our daughter, who attends boarding school there. Our tickets were a wonderful
gift from my parents, and the break was VERY welcome for us all. It was lovely being together as a family and it was with
heavy hearts that we parted company at the start of January for our return to Zambia.
We had planned to move into our new home before our departure to the UK, and had, in actual fact, shifted over several
boxes, with the view of doing just that. However, we found that, as our security on the property was still not up to scratch,
we couldn't risk moving in and leaving all our stuff unattended over the Christmas break. So, with a great deal of frustration,
we ended up moving all the boxes back again to our container which is parked on my mother-in-law's property(!!), but at least
went away without the worry of a possible break in.
On our return to Zambia, we really got stuck into the move, and spent our first night in our own home a few days later.
We still only have the kitchen, two bedrooms, bathroom and laundry in a liveable/usable condition, but it is wonderful to
finally be 'home', and look forward to when we can begin to furnish the rest of the house. I'm really excited at the prospect
of having an actual living room, complete with somewhere to sit!!!
Of late, we have encountered a string of problems / drawbacks: 40 meters of our security perimeter fencing was stolen
a couple of months ago; a further 12 meters was stolen at the beginning of February; lightning blew up our modem; one of
our dogs was found to have testicular cancer, and was operated on in my laundry room, with me assisting (!) - the vet had
very little in the way of instruments, and we were reduced to using razor blades bought from a corner shack, and a piece of
metal piping heated till red hot in the charcoal burner for cauterization purposes! But, through it all, we are learning
to just trust God, and to develop a more laid-back attitude to the frustrations that crop up on an almost daily basis! The
fencing and modem have been replaced; the dog has made a full recovery; and all the other problems have been resolved, slowly
but surely! There are, however, moments when it feels like 'tear-your-hair-out' time! Here is just one example....
The other day, Peter was very busy making up frames for air bricks to be inserted into the outside kitchen wall, as the
permeating damp was causing big problems in the cupboards and drawers lining that wall. One of the men came to tell him that
the water pump wasn't working and he went to investigate, but could find no obvious reason why it wasn't. He spent the whole
afternoon with the men, moving all the scaffolding and erecting it at the tank to see if the problem lay in the tank itself
but, again, found that there was no problem there. It was only later, after having wasted several hours, that he discovered
that one of the men, Felix, had inadvertently cut throught the electric cable leading from the pump house whilst slashing
the grass nearby, and had been too afraid to say anything! We set about mending the severed cable, and the pump worked fine!
Pete had the opportunity, as a result, to have a good chat with all the men, to encourage them to be open about the things
that happen. Many of these men, perhaps due to past experience with employers, are perpetually afraid of the consequences
if they make mistakes, and we are having to spend a lot of time encouraging them and gaining their trust. We are definitely
getting there - that trust is growing, and we have a lovely team of people working for us - but the process of teaching and
learning trust is a slow one, all the same.
The saga of the pump did not end there, though! The following day, red army ants invaded the pump house, and short-circuited
all the switching gear, burning it out to a molten mess (and committing suicide in the process)! We had to replace it all
(no cheap feat), and finally had our water back on two days later!
It has been lovely, lately, to have local people in the community give us gifts of produce from their gardens. A lady,
named Chilumba, who lives a few plots down from us has brought us carrots from her small crop; Patrick Zulu, one of our men,
has been (quietly and secretly!!) growing pumpkins on our land, which Pete discovered one day when we had some ground clearing
done and uncovered three large pumpkin patches! We teased him mercilessly about it, and told him that, as they were on our
land, we were going to pick them and eat them ourselves! As his pumpkins have started to ripen, he has brought quite a few
to the house for us, and they're delicious! Another of our men, Victor, has grown some baby marrows near our water tank (also
quietly and secretly!) and very proudly presented me with a handful a couple of weeks ago! They, too, were scrumptious!
I am pleased for the men, as it means that they are able to grow vegetables for their own consumption, as well as, possibly,
even to sell..... something they would, otherwise, have been unable to do as they have no land of their own.
Over the past week, I have spent much of the time with Patrick Zulu and his young son, Samson, in a town centre clinic.
Samson has been ill for some time, complaining of chest pains, weakness and severe coughing, and Patrick had taken him to
a local clinic nearby. However, all they did for him was to give him paracetamol, and send him home. Unfortunately, this
scenario is not an unusual one, here. As I have mentioned before, people die unnecessarily in this place due to lack of funds
or sometimes, sadly, lack of compassion.
I decided, therefore, to take Samson to the clinic Peter and I use in town, which is run by an old Zambian doctor with
a lot of knowledge and a big heart. He ran a whole lot of tests on Samson, and discovered that he had pneumonia, abdominal
problems caused by worms, and pus in his inner ear. Samson then went for a chest Xray on Thursday, to reveal whether or not
he had TB but, thankfully, the results show that he does not. But the poor boy was in a bad way, suffering, amongst other
things, a very low haemoglobin count, and was quite malnourished. The doctor prescribed several different medications, along
with vitamins and tonics and I am happy to report that he seems to be on the mend.
Samson is a lovely young boy, with a shy, captivating smile. He is one of the lucky ones, but there are so many others
who are not so fortunate. I will keep you updated if there is any change.
Strangely enough, we have been paying for the TB treatment of another Samson Zulu ... this time an adult who approached
me at our entrance gate, as I was driving out one day. He showed me all the prescriptions and Xray requests he'd received
from his local township clinic, and explained that, as is so often the case, he was unable to afford to pay for any of it.
We were able to pick up the medication for him in town, and sent him off to the hospital for his Xray (at the paltry cost
of 5,500 kwacha - just over a dollar). I have asked him to come back and see me, as I would like to know how he is getting
on.
On my return from the UK, I received the sad news that two of the babies at the orphanage, named Gideon and Janet, had
died. They had, apparently, both contracted malaria over the Christmas period, and had been taken to the children's hospital
for treatment. Unfortunately, the orphanage children are not in the fee-paying bracket - they rely on the state medical care
system - and the stark, ugly truth is that these little ones died because they did not receive proper treatment. A third
baby also contracted malaria over more or less the same period, but her treatment was paid for by a compassionate visitor
to the orphanage - that little one survived.
This is an ugly reality that one has to face here. Money speaks, and there is a definite price tag on a life.
We are gratified that several supporters are endeavouring to raise money on our behalf, for the orphanage and other worthy
projects. I have recently received two totally unexpected monetary donations; and a couple in Australia, who found our website,
have become very committed to helping us in what we're trying to do. Just recently, they sent a couple of small packages
containing bedding, clothes etc. for the orphans, which was so gratefully received by the house mother. A big thank you to
all of you.
We are still trying to find a school place for Gabby, our 'adopted' young man, but his age is counting against him, as
he is already 22 years of age. However, we are still perservering and are now trying the private schools rather than the
government ones as they are not restricted to the same extent by government regulations.
You will be interested to know that someone in Australia has very kindly downloaded our entire website onto disk and sent
it with Peter's brother who came to visit, so that we can now, finally, update and revamp it. Then, once we have brought
the site up to date, we will, hopefully, be able to upload it again. It is a job we have wanted to tackle for a long time,
but have been unable to do so, due to the slowness and unreliability of the server here. We do hope we will be successful.
Well, that about covers our news for now. So ... until the next 'episode', God bless you all.
Salwa
Letter 9
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