I have had the wonderful privilege of spending the last three weekends at Havilah Children's Village, an orphanage about 45 minutes outside of Arusha, close to Usa River. There are 21 children there at the moment with the youngest being 3 and the eldest 13. It's completely different as mostly my role at Neema is looking after the basic needs of the babies - feeding, bathing, etc. Here, the children are big enough to be able to do all that for themselves. They have different needs though. They need more stimulation, more interaction, more encouragement and help finding things to do. Here, when chores are done, we read and colour, skip rope, do origami, explore the unfinished administration building, play soccer, watch movies, go for long walks.
The one thing that is the same at Neema is that the children need love. Constantly. They need hands to hold and arms to hug them and lips to kiss them goodnight. They need words of affirmation. They need adults to be proud of their achievements, to clap them on and encourage them. They need role models, friends to listen to them, someone to run to when they are hurt.
Life at Havilah is very tiring. Our Neema babies are exhausting, but at least they nap twice a day so there is time to rest a little. At Havilah though, only the very youngest take an afternoon nap, so things are full on from when they wake up until after they go to bed at 9pm or later.
Havilah is located on the grounds of the University of Arusha, a Seventh-day Adventist university. The campus is beautiful, lush green grounds, rolling hills and trees - so many trees. Because it is located in the rain shadow of Mount Meru, everything is so much more green and beautiful than it is in Arusha. The children's home is set up like a village, or the beginnings of one anyway. There are 4 houses, each of which will ideally have 10 children residing there. At the moment, one house has 11. Two of the houses have children in them at right now and one is for the directors, Fred and Naomi and their three-year-old daughter, Joy. The last house is for Teacher Maureen, who is living at Havilah for the time being. I stay in Teacher Maureen's house with her.
Eventually the plan is to have 10 houses, plus a large administration block that will include housing for directors and volunteers. The skeleton of the admin block is up and the children like to play there regularly.
House 4, where the directors live.
Beautiful university grounds.
The children at Havilah are really neat kids and I often think of Sam while I am there because he would love it. There are three boys around his age that I think he would get along well with. Erik, the eldest boy, is 12 and he likes fixing things. Abduli and Isaya are both sweet, but just a little bit crazy and I know Sam would like to play with them. The boys ask me lots of questions about Sam: "What does he like to do?" "What's his favourite colour?" "Does he like swimming?" "Does he have any pets?" The bigger boys were the first group that I made friends with.
Three of the big boys - Abduli, Erik and Isaya.
The little girls and boys were easy to befriend too - I played on the playground with them, pushed them on the swings, gave them paper and pens to draw with and let them braid my hair (they are intrigued by how long my hair is and want to play with it constantly, as if I'm some life-sized doll).
How many hands does it take to "braid Hannah" as they say? I think at one point there was six children working on it at once!
More braiding by Baby Dory and Mwanaidi.
Elisha.
Isaya, Cory and Veronica.
Josephu and I.
Benny - he is a former Cradle of Love (a Seventh-day Adventist baby home a few minutes drive from Havilah) baby, so is known by some of the nannies from Neema House.
The big girls (ages 10-13) were a bit harder to make friends with. They are too old to really look up to me, but young enough that they still want some attention. The second weekend I just sat down and talked to them and after that they were my friends. They just wanted a big sister to listen to them and play with them and think their pop-star show was awesome.
Three of the big girls - Diana, Veronica and Jackie.
I did think their pop-star show was awesome, with them dancing and singling along to Bruno Mars, "Marry You" and One Direction's, "You Don't Know You're Beautiful." What I liked even more was at the end of the evening all the children got sleepy and lay on the floor and sang along when Teacher Marueen played Rascal Flatt's, "I Won't Let Go." Sitting there, listening to them singing quietly was one of the sweetest moments I've experienced in a long time.
Something else that is sweet is the prayers that children pray. One of the little Havilah girls, Loveness, was adopted and before she went to live in her new home in California, she came back to visit and say goodbye one last time. After she left, the others shared the things that they loved and would miss about her. Erik prayed, "Dear God, thank you for letting us love Loveness." It made me realise yet again, how much I have to learn from children. Instead of feeling sorry for himself, that he had lost a friend and a sister, he just thanked God for giving them the opportunity to love her.
Other children's prayers are just plain awesome. "Dear God, Please help Dorcas not to eat 6 cookies and Abduli not to eat 10 cookies, and please help our grandmothers and grandfathers not to die, and please help our pop-star show to go well and that we won't forget the words. Amen." Veronica, age 10.
Something else that I found funny was when, after worship last Sunday night, Fred asked the children what they liked about me. Their reply? "She's kind and good and she plays with us and she shares her iPhone." I love the honesty of children!
Since I have been at Havilah I have really enjoyed being able to go to church again, as I haven't always been able to go regularly since I've been in Tanzania. There is an SDA church on the university campus and on Saturday mornings I walk to Sabbath school with the children and then later on we go to children's church. I must say though that going to church with 21 children is no easy task. Church usually lasts until around 1:30pm and then there is church again at the afternoon, until 6:30pm or so. Sometimes we go back in the afternoons and sometimes we don't.
A few times we have gone for walks in the evening (the middle of the day is far too hot) and the surrounding area is so beautiful. I like it so much more than Arusha. Last Sabbath we walked to Usa River, the actual river, that is, not the village that was named for it. It was beautiful - clear and cold and for a minute I imagined that I was back in New Zealand. That is, aside from the dozens of monkeys swinging and chattering above us!
Usa River is far less dusty than in Arusha, but for some reason my feet get even dirtier when I am there!
I will have only been with the Havilah children for four weekends in total when I leave, but I know I will miss them greatly and I hope to be able to visit them again in the future.
xoxo,
-Hannah
