B-Squad arrived at El Shaddai orphanage on a rainy day, which made our approach much more exciting than anyone could want. It’s a 1.5 hour journey from the nearest city (which happens to be the capital, Mbabane), and much of it is on a little dirt road that winds its way up and around green, rolling hills. As the mud waged war on our little van’s tires, you could hear sharp intakes of breath and squeaks from our group at every lurch and slide. But accompanying us on our precarious trek were views like this:
But we did make it safely, and that night met for a meeting run by 3 of the 6 staff members of the orphanage.
In short, it was overwhelming.
It’s relatively common knowledge that Swaziland is the most HIV-affected country in Africa. It’s also well-known that experts predict the population will die out by 2050, and Swaziland as a country will no longer exist. But I was not prepared to hear that most children in this country are sexually abused by age 8. Or that we weren’t allowed to pick up and carry the El Shaddai orphans, because for so many of them, even being held is enough to trigger sexual arousal that was awakened in them by abuse. I also wasn’t prepared to open a 4th-grader’s math notebook a couple of days later, during a tutoring session, and find a warning to kids on the inside front cover about inappropriate physical contact from adults, and what to do if that happens to you.
Listening as the ladies continued by sharing their visions for the orphanage, I became frustrated – there’s so much opportunity in this little haven, so many things that could be done, if the resources were available. But with 6 staff and 65 orphans, it’s all they can do to continue schooling and feeding the kids, and keeping up the property. We learned that El Shaddai actually owns a lot of unused land on their mountain – the hope is that one day, they can use it to be a completely self-sustaining community. They do already have pigs, goats, cornfields, and gardens… but the disparity between what is and what could be is daunting.
Despite getting the wind knocked out of us by that first meeting, we soon got down to business. Because our entire squad of 49 is here, we’ve been able to split up and tackle several different ministries – I’ve gotten to try something new almost every day.
There’s an intercession team, a cleaning crew, work/gardening crew, preschool volunteers, and daycare helpers, among others. My favorite day was spent volunteering with the 48 pigs. I also had the opportunity to go into town very early on, as I helped buy groceries for the whole squad. (Moment I felt craziest: “Are we really about to put 56 loaves of bread into this shopping cart?”)
Some of El Shaddai’s piggies
One of the biggest gifts of this month is the ability to work and live so closely with the whole squad – relationships and community have been growing deeper, and we’re all aware of how hard it will be next month when the teams will go their separate ways again.
Audra and I show off our room, where about 15 of us sleep, in the “upper village”
Audra demonstrates a bucket shower in our bathroom
We’ve had to settle here with the knowledge that all of our work contributes baby steps towards El Shaddai’s development. In fact, everywhere we look we can see evidence of previous World Race squads: murals they’ve painted, notes they’ve written about each kid’s educational development and how to best help them continue, manual labor projects they’ve completed. And in a couple of months, future Racers will see what we’ve done. They’ll see the new baby pigs we helped bring into the world. They’ll hear the songs and prayers we’ve taught the kids. They’ll smell how fresh and clean the rugs in the baby-house are (how they smelled before we got to them… I don’t even want to go there).
We’re essentially extra hands and feet to keep this place running. It’s the only place these kids will know protection, love, and education. It’s the only place they’re told they have more potential than what the statistics tell them. It’s the only place they’re introduced to the God who formed them with gentle hands, and calls them precious. This place is so, so important to Swaziland.
It’s been a privilege to work here these past few weeks.
The “lower village” at sunrise
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