A visit to King's Kids Foster Home at Ha Makhoroana village

I visited King’s Kids foster home today.

All three children are doing very well. Looking healthy and happy and loved and well cared for. This home now has a couple living there who act as foster parents. ‘M’e Jane of the AFMSDD is very pleased with the job that the foster parents are doing and is hopeful that it may become a model for future foster homes. She feels very positive about the effect of having two parents here for these kids. While all of the foster moms at each of the homes are doing very good work with their children, Jane feels that the benefits of having a good male role model in the home are really showing up in how the children are doing here. When the end of the school day comes, these kids have parents to come home to who love and care for them, and that simple fact really is priceless. Right now the children are coming to the end of the long winter school break here in Lesotho. Lesotho’s school system puts the equivalent of the North American summer vacation into the middle of winter instead, with a much shorter break occurring in the summer. The oldest child, Lerato, is in grade 5 and doing well in school – her report card for the end of the last term placed her 6th in her class.

She is a bright girl with a quick smile who is on the edge of becoming a young lady. That quick smile pleases ‘M’e Jane very much as she remembers the somber girl that Lerato was just a year ago. Lerato came from a home where her mother was HIV+ and very ill. Lerato functioned as the primary care giver for her mom. At the time that Jane met her, Lerato was very depressed and never smiled. Today when she received her new school bag, facecloth, pen and a small package of sweets, she was beaming. Considerably older than the other two children, her school bag was more “adult sized” and grown-up looking, and the fact was neither unnoticed nor lost on her. I asked the kids today what foods they enjoyed the most and she immediately answered “bread.” Simple tastes. As a Canadian, naturally I was expecting the answer to be something more significant, like hamburgers, French fries, or pizza. Lerato, as the oldest child, is the one who helps the foster mother the most with the household chores such as sweeping, or washing dishes. And she is exploring the intricacies of preparing the family meals under the guidance of the mom, an important skill in this still largely patriarchical culture. Manthethe, the middle daughter, is just about sweet as you could imagine and in grade 2.

She was in grade 1 at the beginning of the school year, but the administration recently moved her into grade 2. I was fussing over the importance of such an achievement when the foster mom spoke up to explain that the change was more about school board policy than scholastic achievement. Manthethe is a little older than the other kids in grade 1. And for reasons that couldn’t be adequately explained today, had recently been promoted to the second grade. Manthethe‘s foster mom went on to explain that she is doing well in all subjects in grade 2 with the exception of mathematics, where she really struggles. Math is the most challenging subject across all grade levels in Lesotho. But they work together in the evenings at the kitchen table and it is hoped that Manthethe will do better. Manthethe really struggled with the favourite food question as well, and after some time mimicked her older sister and answered “bread and tea.” She and her younger brother Hlompho are quite small and the chore that falls to them most often around the house is fetching water. Manthethe lost her mom to AIDS, and her blind and somewhat infirm father was just not able to care for her properly. But he is a regular visitor to the home and much loved by Manthethe. Hlompho is the youngest in the family and he is one of those young children who is just so cute that you wish you could eat him up.

He has grown quite a bit over the winter. Hlompho is in grade 1 and doing well. His background is so heartbreaking. His young single mother abandoned him to the care of his elderly grandfather a few years back. Although it is believed that she went to South Africa, her whereabouts are still unknown. The grandfather simply was not able to care for him. The father is unknown. The favourite foods question did not faze Hlompho for even a second. He immediately responded “papa, moroho le nama.” (Corn meal porridge, green veggies, meat). A typical boy to be sure. And when the girls heard his answer they both immediately chimed in that they liked those foods too, clearly showing that they were dissatisfied with their original answers. The foster dad has been working extensively on the large plot behind the house and the keyhole gardens out the front. A wide variety of vegetables have already been planted in the plot and are now sprouting. The ones in the keyhole gardens are growing well and looking like it will not be too long before it is time to harvest.

There has been a lot of progress on the new church building that is situated on the same property – I think that this summer the services could be moved in there. This church is thriving despite the continued lack of a pastor. It has a strong group of church elders who voluntarily share out the pastoral duties amongst themselves.

There is also a US Embassy funded layers (poultry) project on the site and it is doing very well, producing a good income that goes towards the support of the family.

‘M’e Jane hopes that later this year there will be some new children added to the family. Both because the need is there and because the 4-room house is of a good size and has the capacity for up to 6 or 7 children. The search for new children for the home begins in the spring.