Day 6: Siazwela School, AIDS, Sponsor Visits

We sat at new desks provided by the support of the LGPC youth group. Although the youth group's building is not completed yet, it is well on its way to becoming like the new building in the picture (funded by a different NGO), only it will be 50 percent larger. Until then, some students are still meeting in classrooms like the other photo.

The teachers and students extend their thanks and their love to LGPC youth, and one parent asked me, "Where is Cherith?" (That’s Cherith MacRitchie, who was with us last year as a youth group rep.)

In the afternoon we visited 3 women with AIDS, at their separate homes. All are receiving anti-retroviral drugs. One, Julia, will not live long, leaving both children and grandchildren as orphans. Stella, on the other hand, looked quite energetic and had a very hopeful outlook. A third woman, Elita, is between the two; she is the third sibling in one family to be weakened by the disease, and her elderly mother appeared quite beaten down. All of these women are visited, assisted and encouraged regularly by World Vision trained home-based caregivers. "Without my caregiver's help," said one, "I would be dead."

We also conducted several more sponsored kids, including Emily Hawkins' Hyde (or Hide, depending on who you ask), seen in the photo. We also visited kids sponsored by the MacMillans, Carol Fay, and Lori Woods.

"For He delivers the needy when they call, the poor and those who have no helper." - Psalm 72:12