Hope – another new addition

June 15, 2009

Today John the social worker for the orphanage called and asked Esther if we could take an abandoned child they found. She said she wanted to see the child and that she could stay with us at the orphanage until either her parents were found or they were able to place her in a home somewhere.

Esther had some running around to do so Ray and I headed back to the orphanage to wait for John. He showed up a few minutes after we arrived with two police officers from a nearby village, where she was found. She was very dirty and all of her clothes were either soaking wet or filthy. One of the cooks went to wash her clothes while the rest of us fed her. She was hungry and very thirsty. After she ate, one of the older girls gave her a bath and we borrowed clothes from one of the small girls so she had something dry to wear.

John thought she was 1 ½ years old but looking at her, she appears to be younger. She walks ok but she’s a bit unsteady on her feet still. She doesn’t have all her teeth but that doesn’t stop her from eating.

She seems happy and didn’t have any problems being handed from person to person and didn’t have any problems with us holding her either. Some children scream when they see us as if we are some sort of alien to them…….oh, maybe we are strange to them.
I asked John what her name is and he said they did not know but he was calling her Chisomo (Grace in English). I said I thought her name should be Hope so the kids started calling her Hope. Mphatso said we should name her Mphatso.

After a few minutes, she was sitting and playing with the other kids. She kept following one of the older boys around and other kids started teasing him – telling him that he must resemble her father and that’s why she’s following him around.

I think she’ll be fine until they decide what to do with her. She’s a cutie. Oh, what a smile. We hope you enjoy the pictures of her.

(That night, Mphatso decided that the baby needed some clothes (which she does!!) so she went through her clothes and picked out some underwear, socks and a dress for the baby. The black and white dress is one she gave to the baby. I think I’ll go to the store and look for some nappies (cloth diapers) for her as she has none. Mphatso thinks we need to go into town and buy the baby some shoes since we are buying shoes for all the rest of the kids. I think she is right.)