Newsletter: June 2008

The Knitting Gals

Mom at 81 and Monique 84 years old are knitting and crocheting up a storm; of blankets, jerseys/sweaters and dolls for the kids.

We met Gogo (granny) Regina, second left, via Jan (café owner’s mom) at Flavour Café, one of our favourite food hang outs in Pmb.

Gogo has 12 children living with her and under her sweet and tender care. What a gal! Her youngest is 6 weeks old and the eldest is 12 years, some are her grandchildren, their mom having died of Aids. Four of her kids including the baby are HIV positive and doing really well with high CD4 counts. She keeps them healthy, feeding them plenty of vegetables and diligently keeping their ARV schedule. She has a little house in Ashdown near Edendale Hospital, the main house having 2 bedrooms a living room and kitchen. Two Canadian women who are attending medical school in Cape Town and a man literally built her another two rooms behind her house. They mixed the cement and used concrete blocks as is the way out here. Isn’t that fabulous!

Anja met Gogo whilst working at ‘Little Angels’, a project for Aids babies in Pmb. They developed a bond and Anja and her family in Edmonton offer her some financial and moral support. Anja and I are in contact and I look forward to meeting her in CT later this year when I drive Sherri down; my first visitor!

Mom as some of you know has been knitting since I can remember! If her mother had anything to do with it; I always remember her telling me ‘the devil finds work for idle hands!’ I’ve no doubt the devil’s had his way with me in the past….maybe!?

Mom already had a pile of beautifully crocheted baby blankets just waiting for little ones! She also has plenty of yarn from her shop and collected over the years, and years, here at home. Between her and Monique (second right in the first picture) they have been and are a little factory.

They knit for Gogo’s kids and ‘our’ orphans in the Feeding Program. Monique has also knitted the most adorable dolls as you’ll see in the family picture; the kids love them. The kids have had so much fun choosing their sweaters and lining up for mom to measure them!

We met with Gogo and her friend Hilda at Flavour Café to hand over the goods thus far; meet and enjoy breakfast together. Gogo is holding an adorable baby she saved from the edge of life, HIV positive. Along with this exquisiteness was her intense pain when the father came to retrieve the baby, the very person who’d neglected her! It’s all about the grant; money rules!

Her current little 6 weeks old is an orphan, mom died at birth, and Gogo has adopted her.

We were so taken with Gogo and her work of dedication and love that we continue to support her. The Feeding Program took her a trunk full of fresh vegetables yesterday. For $20 I bought: 3kg. butternut, 3kg. onions, 4 cauliflower, 4 cabbage, 4 bunches beetroot, 4 bunches spinach (large leaf), 3 kg. apples, 4 kg. carrots. Not bad hey!?

Gogo also took us, mom and me, to visit women who are cultivating vegetable gardens in the area. Enterprising women, who are using an empty piece of land between their houses, have fenced it off to keep the goats and pigs out and are growing veg for their own consumption and to sell. The beds and the veg look wonderful; healthy and lush. We bought beets and cabbage. They have to cart water from the river and use the tap from the closest house. We will take them a long hose so they can water from the taps at the 3 neighbouring homes thereby sharing the cost. The local councillor is not interested in helping these innovative women by authorising pipes be laid for the plot. Elizabeth tells me she can connect them with someone who will support their enterprise so that they can access the river and have a sprinkler system; I will keep us all posted!

Women with ideas; many of them are fostering HIV kids which gives kids a loving and nurturing home; and they are also talking of trying to set up an old age home in the area. There are a number of grannies living alone and not able to care for themselves very well. They would like to group them to look after them and feed them well. They could use the granny’s grants to accomplish this; they just need to get the facility.

I was saying to mom on the way home; I think my perfect job right now would be managing some wealthy philanthropist’s fortune; identifying appropriate causes, funding them and monitoring them all myself. One woman show! That would be bliss and something I could do till I’m ancient!

Mom has fallen for the kids too! And it is mutual……there weren’t enough dolls to go around and mom asked the older kids what they wanted; one said a car, another, after being quiet for a while, said Kentucky Fried Chicken! A little fella was crying because he couldn’t have a doll ‘cause they were or the girls! Not really but that was how it panned out that day! So Monique knitted more dolls and made a stunning Red Riding Hood with clothes and all, for one of the older girls. She was delighted! The next time we went visiting, mom had bought toys for the kids and I’d picked up a bucket of KFC on her behalf; the kids were ecstatic! What a total delight and joy to treat kids who are happy with just hugs and caring hearts never imagining they’ll get what they request and never expecting things the next time, just happy to see you!

The youngster standing behind me, Gogo’s grandson, made us a thank you note; beautifully written and illustrated! Talent in the waiting…..

My heart and soul is gloriously overflowing thanks to kids! As is mom’s I’m sure! Ongoing and never ending thank you to you all as well…..

With love from sunny South Africa, Carolyn