Back to Freedom Park

Since Noel is back from his family's vacation, we were able to do outreach at Freedom Park again yesterday. I had hoped to blog about our afternoon last night after dinner so that I wouldn't forget anything, but the internet was down. It happens sometimes...kind of like our random power outages. You just never know when it's going to go down.

Usually we all pile into Noel's bakkie (truck) to drive out to Freedom Park, but since we had several more people than usual (including my flatmates Sarah and Charity), we piled into 2 vehicles instead.

We arrived at the AIDS clinic near the entrance from the main road, and Noel set out to find a couple of caregivers who could come with us and translate. Since the kids are still on winter holiday, a whole bunch of kids were playing in the area around the clinic. We waved at them and gave them high fives, and before long we were holding them and giving them piggyback rides and having a really fun time.

Sarah with the kids

Even though none of them spoke English, I was able to use hand motions to explain that my name was Sam. The little girl I spent the most time with was Gatisa. She held up her fingers to show me that she was 6 years old. Gatisa had a big scratch on her right cheek and eyebrow and explained with motions that she had fallen down and hurt her face.

Charity and a new friend

Noel finally found a few caregivers who could spare a couple hours, and we drove across the main road to the government houses recently built in Freedom Park. Families can purchase them for the equivalent of 30 U.S. dollars, but sadly most of the people in Freedom Park can't even afford that small price. The government houses are really tiny - not much bigger than a dorm room or your bedroom - but they are at least made of bricks instead of pieces of tin.

government housing

We visited several families in the government housing, gave them food parcels and blankets, and prayed with the people who are sick with AIDS. More than 70% of the people living in Freedom Park are HIV positive, so there are thousands of people there who are very sick and dying of AIDS.

One woman we met was lying in bed under a heavy blanket even though it was warm outside and even warmer inside her house. She was telling us that the AIDS treatment has been giving her diarrhea and that she can hardly get out of bed because she is so weak. Her husband died (probably of AIDS) last year, and she has 4 children from age 6 to 16. They have no source of income because she is unable to work, so the 16 year old son quit school in order to get a job. Sadly, these types of difficult circumstances are very common in South Africa.

We drove back over to the main part of Freedom Park and visited a few of the government houses built near the shacks. One of the families we visited there consisted of a 14 year old handicapped girl, her young aunt, and the grandmother who suffered from a bad stroke 2 years ago. The mother of the girl died 3 months ago and was finally buried just the day before we visited. The aunt cannot work because she is caring for the girl and the grandmother all day. The girl could be placed in a home for handicapped children, but she cannot because she has no birth certificate or any form of ID. It's a really terrible situation for all of them, and we just prayed that God would intervene.

Please keep praying for the people of Freedom Park. So many of the people are suffering from extreme poverty and disease, and they don't have a lot of hope for the future. Please pray that God would continue to work in these difficult situations and that he would fill their hearts with hope.