In 2009, a four year old boy stole my heart. Five years on that same boy has a special place in my heart.
When I first met him he was shy and reserved. But after a day all he wanted was for me to hold and cuddle him.
He was always the first child to come up to me when we had been away.
When we went on walks he always wanted to either hold my hand or have me carry him.
He has the cheekiest personality.
His name is Courage.
I was volunteering at an orphanage in Ghana when I met Courage, he didn’t live there but attended the Living Faith Foundation school which is attached to it.
Courage lived with his mother who works in the markets in the Volta Region to provide for him, so he would usually be at the orphanage until late in to the evening because his mother sometimes had to travel a long way. Sometimes if his mother was unable to make it back he would stay at the orphanage. You could see how unsettling this was for the little boy, he would never know if his mother was coming to collect him or if he would be staying the night. One evening I went to put him to bed and had to leave him there crying because he wanted his mum.
My heart was broken for this little boy. All I wanted to do was comfort him.
When I returned to Ghana in 2010, this little boy came straight up to me and gave me a big hug. He was now living at the orphanage on a more permanent basis because his mother was unable to care for him – however she would visit often. Courage’s mother is unable to speak much English but one day as I was walking across the field in Sogakope she called out to me:
‘Sister Bethan’
I walked over to her and she handed me a piece of paper on which was written:
‘Ofosu Courage
17th August 2004’
*Yes, August babies rock!! – No wonder I am so attached to him.*
She then spoke in Ewe (the dialect of the Volta Region in Ghana) to one of the women from the orphanage who translated that she wanted me to take Courage back to England with me.
My heart was broken for his mother who felt that I could provide more for her son than she could. Yes I loved him, but she is his mother and he needs her.
In 2011 Courage accompanied the Raising Hope Foundation volunteers to Santrokofi where we run a summer school. He was in Class 2 which was the class I was teaching and because he knew me and the other teachers well he thought he could get away with being his really cheeky self. On alternative evenings Courage and the other boys would sleep on the floor in the room Silvia and I were in, somehow he always managed to make his way into the bed.
When I returned to Ghana in December 2014 and saw Courage at the school, I recognised his cheeky smile straight away. He is now 10 years old and once again living with his mother which I am so pleased about. Although I saw him briefly in 2012, it had been nearly 3 1/2 years since I last spent time with Courage – he recognised me straight away but he was very shy. I hope one day to be able to spend more time with him, but for now it was good to just see him doing so well.
It breaks my heart that in his ten short years Courage has moved between the orphanage and his mother’s house more times that most children move house.
Through it all this little boy reminds me to have courage in everything I do.
