Gift of presence

Well, all week we did so much and met so many people, it a lot to process. So I will tell you of a few stories I encountered.

We helped to pass out food Parcels on Tuesday at  JL zwane and I met a couple of people reciving them.

Sonoria: she lives whith her son and grandson her brothers live in shacks behind hers. She has bounced from family members home to another after her mother died.

This women was so jolly and cheerful and helped us hand out the heavy food parcels the entire day and to me that felt great to know that those in need still can hold a since of happiness and also help the others  who are in need as well.

Lindile Fikizolo 32yrs: lives in a one room shack with only enough room for a bed. He has AIDS and and has been bed ridden since 2007. We had traveled there with the St.Lukes  Hospice the only one in the entire township of 300,000.

When we arrived he hadn’t had his brief hadn’t been changed since the day before when the nurse had come and we got there at 11ish in the morning. His  cousin helps to care for him and because they only have a few of them and try not to use them all because they can’t afford to by more.

He has extremely bad bed sores. Some of which could have probably been prevented by proper care, but the families aren’t educated enough about how to care for their love ones and there are many who have no one to care for them.

His mother had just arrived there from another town to care for him and had no idea he was in such bad condition. I noticed her crying to the side and could only imagine her pain of seeing her child suffer so much.

You could smell the rotting and infected flesh as we stood outside the room while the nurse dressed his sores.

Me and others decided to give them a personal donation because the head nurse was discussing about seeing if there were any food parcels left to give and we knew they were all claimed they had nothing to eat in the home.

I felt pain at that moment. 

The lesson of the week when going to different homes was presence. The people while some others don’t really just appreciate someone listening to their story like Lydia she has aids and birth a child who was given only a few months to live because he was born with aids but he is now seven although he plays like normal child he is sick and has to stay home from school because he has quiet seizers where it appears like he is sleeping.  She tells her story to inform people she forgot she had aids and when she first found out she had it was after a bus accident.  She speaks to help, she was extremely ill after having her son Neo. She and him have overcome more than what anyone predicted.

The past week was filled with many things we helped many visited many places and met many people. I am not gonna blog about it all because I’m not good at expressing things I blogs and bc there was some much that took place. For those I know I will tell all when I treturn Ifeel like some explinations are better in person.

I will just say there were lots of ups and downs.