The World is not Meant for You

"The world is not meant for you."

Her own mother told her she shouldn't even be alive.

The seemingly joyful reunion between Tenele and her real mother turned bitter while I was in Swazi over Thanksgiving break.  It was Lucia's first birthday, so we were going to celebrate together at Tenele's homestead with her mother and sisters.  When we (Christina, Ayanda, Johannes, Pununu, and I) got there, Tenele met us on the dirt road to walk us to her homestead.  Her eyes were tired and she gave a weak greeting; I immediately knew something was wrong.  After greeting her friends, she broke down in tears.  Pununu translated for me since Tenele wasn't speaking in English.  "Family problems," he said to me.  The walk to the homestead was confusing, as Tenele continued to cry but wouldn't tell me what was going on.  She finally said her mother told her "the world is not meant for you" and it'd be better if she were gone.

Instead of a joyful birthday celebration, the afternoon was one of chaos as I tried to communicate with Tenele's mother (who spoke not even a word of English) about what was going on.  While we tried desperately to communicate, Tenele's sobs could be heard from the other room, and I felt so helpless.  Finally, I asked the sister who spoke some English (but refused to translate because she told her mom she didn't want to be in the middle of it and was trying to stick up for Tenele), "Should we leave?"  The sister nodded hesitantly and said, "And take Tenele with you."

Tenele's mother tried keeping Lucia there and told Tenele since Tenele owed money that she would keep Lucia.  When her mother found out I understood that, she changed her mind.  She only let Tenele take one bag of stuff (which was all Lucia's) and kept Tenele's clothes there.  It was a heartbreaking end to my short week in Swazi.

On the bus ride back into Manzini, Ayanda relayed the whole story to me and said, "Her mother has a cold heart for her; I don't want Tenele to go back."  Apparently, Tenele was having a hard time living there when her mother would care for her sisters and not as much for Tenele.  They ended up getting into a fight one day and Tenele asked through tears, "Why don't you love me like your other children?"  Her mother cold-heartedly responded, "You are not my child.  You are a whore," and continued to tell her she was worthless and the world was not meant for her.

After it was all over, I told Tenele she was a strong young woman who has been through so much time and time again.  She looked at me still with tears in her eyes but peace in her heart and said, "Some day she'll remember me... some day."

After all that was said to her and all the pain (built up from when Tenele was sent away as a small child) Tenele still had the grace to understand that she wasn't going to harbor bitterness but that she knew someday her mother would understand what she has done to Tenele and the guilt would be there, and she'd "remember" (care).

So back to square one with my T-bell and baby Lucia.  Where do they stay now?  I tried asking a few Swazi friends to help them out but nobody seems to want to sacrifice for a teenager and her baby.  There's a lot of "talk" about caring for each other and being the hands and feet of Jesus but little action.  I was quite heartbroken actually at the lack of care from my own Swazi friends who don't want to inconvenience themselves by letting Tenele stay with them for awhile.

So she is back in Mangwaneni, and Cedric (Lucia's father and who Tenele usually stays with) is in prison.  Christina has been trying to care for them, but even the food she had given to Tenele was stolen.  Tenele said she's scared sometimes because she doesn't know where the food will come from.  She doesn't know when she and Lucia will be able to eat.  Lucia got sick again, had worms, and a bad skin condition.  Tenele, out of desperation told Ayanda she doesn't want Lucia anymore and wants to send her away--not because she doesn't love her, but out of her desperate situation.

Through all of this, Tenele has been so steady though; when I talked to her on Christmas, she was hopeful, and that is a beautiful thing.  Because she is hopeful so am I; I know she will be okay; I know God will take care of her; I know she will still change the world someday.

 Her mother was right, the world is not meant for her, because she is meant for bigger things than the world.

Happy Thanksgiving from Swazi

Happy Thanksgiving from Swazi!

Obviously they don't celebrate Thanksgiving in Swaziland, or any other country for that matter.  So the whole rule of thumb that you can't celebrate Christmas before Thanksgiving is non-existent.  Santa Claus has been planted in the local grocery store for weeks and you can hear Christmas music every once in awhile.  Christina and I did our best to stay away from any Christmas spirit until after today, when we finally celebrated Thanksgiving.  I love this holiday; it's kind of like Valentine's Day in the respect that what we celebrate on these holidays (love and being thankful) are what we should live every day, but I still think they are days worthy of setting aside some extra love and thanks!  Being away from family is hard on holidays, but for this one I was home. 

The Thanksgiving day started like any other Thursday.  Christina and I got groceries for our big dinner in the morning and then we headed to Enjabulweni to collect letters and deliver grade 7's letters.  Of course the other students hadn't written letters back yet, and when I delivered grade 7's letters, I realized I was about 20 letters short.  The names the head teacher had given me were only half of the students in his class! Eish!  But, like loaves in fishes, we multiplied letters by changing names of some that were doubles (because originally my students outnumbered the ones at Enjabulweni).  The students' faces were so priceless, seriously.  They way they held the envelopes and letters so tenderly made it look like they were holding treasure.  In fact, many of the students call them “love letters.” 

After Enjabulweni I took Tenele and Ayanda on a long walk up to the local prison (remand center) where Cedric was staying.  Apparently, Cedric had been selling cell phones and one customer wouldn't pay him properly so Cedric took the phone back.  The customer called the police and they arrested Cedric for stealing.  Of course, that's the story I got from Tenele's angle, so I don't really know the full story.  Anyway, we went to visit him and brought baby Lucia, his daughter, with.  When she looked at him and heard his voice, she lit up with her gorgeous toothy grin.  After a little while she kept crying and Cedric tenderly said, “Lucia, don't cry.  Daddy's coming.  Don't cry.”  Upon hearing his voice again, she calmed down a little.  Clearly, she recognizes and loves her daddy and he cares for her, too.  He has made the trip out once to visit Tenele's homestead where she stays with her real mother and sisters.  It's great that Cedric is making the effort to stay connected and involved in his daughter's life.  I know being in prison doesn't give a very good picture of Cedric, but I really believe he is also starting to become a changed man.  Tenele snuck in to see Cedric with me, because she actually can't see him without an ID; but the policeman inside the cell building was kind and let Tenele stay with us.  

We said our goodbyes and Cedric gave his appreciation and we started the walk back into town.  I was exhausted at this point but excited to cook a feast!  Christina and I were about to embark on a journey we had never taken before: cooking a turkey!  We bought a beast of a turkey at the grocery store to feed the ten plus people for dinner that night.  It was a wonderful three hours of cooking; yes, wonderful!  Ayanda also helped us in the kitchen, as we created the feast of turkey, cheesy mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, stuffing, corn, and puppy chow!  The greatest reward was sitting at the long table with all of our guests (including Betty, Mzie, Ryan, Majabani, a few others, and of course Tenele, Ayanda, and baby Lucia!) and hearing their surprised complements of how wonderful the food tasted.  I was shocked myself at how delicious the turkey tasted!

As I sat at that table I couldn't help but laugh with amazement at God's goodness of those surrounding me, especially 1) Christina and 2) my kids. 

1)                  Christina amazes me; her utter devotion to God and her spirit of abandonment in following him to Swazi, sacrificing more than I could begin to write, is overwhelmingly inspiring.  She is adored by her housemates, her coworkers, the MYC boys, our kids, her family, and of course me!  What a blessing to be able to be in Swaziland to celebrate a day of thanks for her, to give her a taste of home, and support her in all the incredible work she is doing!  Y'all should follow her year in Swazi at: www.christinahealingheart.blogspot.com.

2)                  The time I've had with my kids so far feels like I never left them.  Though Lucia was afraid of me initially, she finally warmed up to me.  When she cries, I pick her up and sing her our song (Siyahamba “We are walking in the light of God”) and she literally stops crying every time.  It's crazy!  Even today, she was getting really fussy, so I simply put her on my hip and hummed around the kitchen as we cooked the turkey and other food.  She was seemingly at home on my hip. :)

It amazes me that God has put these special young ones in my life, not for me to change their lives but for them to change mine.  I have learned so much about myself through them.  They cry and hurt when I am gone, but they don't know that I can't live without them.  The longer I stay away from them, the more the breath inside of me slowly drains.  The way that God has renewed Tenele is still like a dream to me; I see a miracle every time I look at her and the way she tenderly cares for her baby girl.  They are wise and they make me a better person; they challenge me and they read me like a book.  Ayanda simply reads my facial expressions and knows exactly what I'm thinking; it's almost too spot on!  In the car ride the other day, Johannes, Ayanda, Christina, and I were talking about trust in relations to specific experiences in our lives.  I told them I wouldn't be able to be in a relationship if I didn't trust the person, and to make a long story short and keep the conversation confidential, basically Ayanda blurted out, “Mary-Kate, you are in a dilema.” “What?” I said surprised.  “Someone broke your trust and you're putting up a wall; you say you don't trust this person, but you trusted _____ with *this.  You can't go with your mind even if your heart is hurt.”   Johannes proceeded to claim Ayanda as the winner of what turned into an argument about whether or not you could/should be in a relationship with someone you can't trust.  Needless to say, I learn something from them every day, and I could not have asked the Lord for a bigger blessing than these sweet ones he has given me!

With a thankful heart!

Longest Week: Day Two and Three

Monday morning started with a lovely reunion at Enjabulweni!  I went to deliver letters that my students back the in States had written to their pen pals.  Unfortunately, it was actually the worst week for me to try to deliver letters because the students are writing exams this week, which means they don't actually have class.  So, it was quite a mess trying to deliver letters to the students, but the looks on their faces and the excited exchange of letters among themselves was so priceless.  They especially loved seeing pictures that the students sent them.  They passed pictures back and forth to one another and read their letters over and over again.  What a priceless gift!

After Enjabulweni, Christina and I eagerly stopped for our date at Baker's Corner and indulged in consuming some donuts. After our absolutely necessary pit stop, we swung by the house and picked up Ryan to head to the girls' home.  The progress of renovations was actually much further than I had thought, but there is still SO much work to do!  It was so great to see the difference, though, and the best part was looking at all the land!  The land we have at the house is massive!  We are going to have gardens upon gardens of room for growing food.  Even without the garden, we have food already growing on our land: a mango tree, a papaya tree, an orange tree, and a grape vine!  Incredible!

After the girls home trip, Tenele and Baby Lucia came to the house, and I took her to the clinic.  She was quite malnourished when I first saw her and wouldn't even smile.  She had a large head for her thin, frail shoulders and body.  But after the clinic visit, we went to the grocery store and got some food and nourished her back up to health.  By the next day, she was a completely new baby!  She was smiling and giggling nonstop and cuddling up to her mommy.  It was SO precious.  And her cute little baby teeth are just darling!

On Tuesday, Christina and I met with Laurence, the maintenance man who is overseeing the work on the girls home, and we set up a plan for the week.  I interviewed Christina for Hosea's Heart promotional videos, and I met with Lungile, who is a past student of mine.  Lungile stole my heart from the beginning of the year when I taught at Enjabulweni.  She is extremely smart and a dedicated worker. She could do BIG things with her life; unfortunately, she has been out of school for the past year because she cannot afford to pay for it.  In fact, when I saw her this summer, my heart broke because she looked like the life had been sucked out of her...and it had.  She had a black eye and refused to tell me how she got it.  I prodded her when I met with her on Tuesday; yet, she remained very locked up, which is not like her at all.  She agreed to do an interview for us, and she told the camera about her life.  "Life is difficult without parents..." she started, and gazed off into the distance with dreary eyes.  She began to cry.  "I don't have hope," she managed to say.  It was absolutely shattering to hear her say that--to hear it come from the mouth that told me "Mary-Kate, since you come to teach me English, I seen a lot of changes. You bring hope to everyone."  I reminded her that it's not me who has the hope to give, but I just have the message to share!  And that she still can have hope, even though she doesn't feel it now.  I want to find a way to pay for her school fees and get her back into school starting in January... Anybody want to sponsor her? And let her know SHE CAN HAVE HOPE!

The Start of the Longest Week of my Life: Day 1

Before leaving for my very short trip to Swaziland, I prayed that God would make this the longest week of my life. It has been three full days and it already feels like a week has passed with everything that has been packed in so far! Yebo Jesu!

I left for Swazi on a Thursday evening flight from Chicago to Germany. During the eight hour flight, I sat next to a nice man around my age who was traveling to Chicago for his brother's wedding. He was kind and even offered his shoulder for me to sleep on after I kept rustling back and forth trying to find a workable condition to attempt to get some zs. The only problem with the young man was that he had caught a cold from someone on a previous flight the day before. He was constantly sniffling and coughing on and off. I hoped I wouldn't catch his cold, but after the eight hour flight, as soon as I stepped into the Frankfurt airport, my nose started running. I had thirteen hours to kill, yes it was THIRTEEN hour layover, so I found a nice corner by some windows that had a little work table (so I could correct all my students' papers to pass the day). Within minutes of nestling into my spot, my runny nose cost me my last package of kleenex, so I resulted to “borrowing” a roll of toilet paper from the bathroom. Starting to feel quite miserable, I prayed, “Lord, please don't let me have this cold on the plane ride; that's the worst place to be sick.” Throughout the day I drank lots of liquids and used the airborne tablet. Ten hours and a toilet paper roll later, I was bustling up my luggage and heading to my gate sniffle free!

The twelve hour flight from Frankfurt to Johannesburg was the best plane ride I've ever had! For the first time in numerous travels, I slept for the majority of the ride! The Lufthansa plane seats were fantastic, and I arrived in Johannesburg feeling exhilarated and excited! I took a shuttle bus five hours to Swazi and finally found home! Upon hearing the rolling wheels of my luggage, Christina Hostetter lept from her balcony seat of the volunteer house, ran down the stairs, and embraced me with the best welcome home hug ever! I knew with her embrace this is exactly where I was meant to be.

My first full day in Swaziland was Sunday. After church in the morning, Christina and I swung by Mangwaneni to pick up Ayanda, Johannes, and Pununu to take them with us to visit Tenele's homestead. It was an incredible forty minute drive with Christina and I in the front and our kids chattering excitedly in the back.

When Tenele, baby MK, and Tenele's mother met us on the dirt road to take us to their homestead, I wasn't sure my heart could be any fuller. Little Lucia had teeth! And Tenele looked so happy, as did her mother. Tenele's mother cannot speak English, so much of our converstaion is through smiles and embraces. Once at the homestead, Tenele introduced her other two sisters and their babies as well. It was a full house, and although the land looked promising with growing vegetables, the living conditions weren't great. Throughout our conversation, Christina and I politely swatted away the swarming amount of flies in the room. Lucia looked very thin, and I was worried about her.  Her head looked oversized compared to her thin and somewhat bony body structure.  Tenele told me she had been sick, and it looked like it was more than just being sick, so I told Tenele to meet me the following day in town and I'd take them to the clinic to check on Lucia.

Later that afternoon, Johannes and Ayanda came over to visit.  My lovely students back in the states had decided to sign and send a soccer ball for Johannes as a get well gesture after I had told them about Johannes' heart condition.  So, I presented the ball to Johannes and his reaction was unexpected.  One of hte biggest smiles I have EVER seen from him spread across his face as his eyes light up the room.  He held the ball tenderly and gave me a big, long hug saying, "I've dreamed of having a soccer ball of my own."  How incredibly humbling to have a young man so appreciative of something so seemingly small.  He tossed the ball around and looked and each and every name of the students who signed it, asking for me to pronounce the names for him.  Another student of mine had donate a bunch of clothes, so Johannes tried on a few and loved the shirts so much he started to model them for the camera.  

The first full day of Swazi closed with a trip to the grocery store with Christina and a joint effort in making the best chili I've had!  

Wow, what a trip and it's only day one!  The time I spent with Christina and my children is already worth the travel and cost of being here.  God truly is making this the longest week of my life. 

To be continued...

Wholly Broken

Wholly Broken

People often wonder if I left my heart in Swazi, why don’t I go get it?  Why don’t I move there?  Why don’t I live there if I miss it that much?  Sometimes I don’t know the answer to that; many times I wish I did live in Swazi; sometimes I think about moving the next chance I can.  I bury myself with my job here and busy myself with life so that the pang of separation from loved ones and desperate sting of longing to hold my children would go away.  But it never does.  The wound will never be healed; my heart will never be whole because I live in two worlds—two worlds starkly different from each other, two worlds that can’t possible coexist together, two worlds that hold two halves of my very soul, two worlds that will never mend a broken heart.  So the real question is, which world would I rather live in?

My heart leaps at the answer, “Swazi” but there’s a gentle voice inside my being that stings, “stay.”  The choice is daunting, and the longer I stay the more I burn.  Sometimes it feels like self-infliction.  How can I possibly live like this much longer?  How can I embrace life with an injured wing?  How can I stand in front of a room full of my high school students with my Mimio board and all the technology I want at my fingertips, yet ache so passionately to be standing in front of that hot, colorless, boxed in room with a piece of chalk and a blackboard, teaching students who giggle at my accent?  All the technology in the world means nothing next to teaching a 14 year old prostitute the ABCs.  All the parent teacher conferences and staff appreciation mean nothing next to a fatherless teenage girl who thanks me for giving “hope to everyone.”  All the money I get in my lofty teacher salary means nothing next to paying for a bright young lady’s education when she had been kicked out of school for being pregnant, though she had been raped.  All of the comforts of family and friends being a phone call away mean nothing next to holding a baby that has been nick-named in my honor.  So if my all is in Swazi, why is not all of me there?

As I stand in front of my American students, I look into their eyes—no, I search their eyes, and I find my answer.  Are these two worlds really that vastly different from each other?  The eyes of my students say, “look deeper, look beyond your pain, and look at mine.”  The worlds are unquestionably contrasting, but the need for love and hope in both worlds are in fact one and the same.  I need look no further than the young faces before me to see that they ache for the same things my Swazi children ache for: to be noticed, to be wanted, to be loved.  My American students’ eyes hold my answer, their eyes hold my purpose, their eyes hold my broken heart.  Some smile and joke and laugh to cover the scars; some never try because they’ve been told they’ll never be good enough; some are loud and obnoxious, overriding the sting of feeling forgotten; some are quiet and reserved, never volunteering an answer in fear of their classmates’ laughter; and all, all of them come with a wound or more that still needs healing.  Some wounds are physical, the scars of bloodied arms from a razor, the scars of self-infliction, the scars that say physical pain is better than emotional damage.  Other wounds are invisible, unless you search their eyes.  Some eyes tell of untold horrors, of abuse she has witnessed, of abuse she has endured.  Some eyes are dry from the waterfall of tears that soak his pillow at night because he can’t cry in front of anyone else.  Some eyes search mine, begging me to see what they don’t want to say.  And when their eyes can’t say it any longer, the brave ones put it on paper.  Their writing moves me, breaks me, consoles me, and shows me I do have purpose here.  They show me that their hunger is more than bread and butter, it’s for truth and love.  They show me that they aren’t so different than the ones I desperately love in Swaziland; they give me a reason to stay when my heart groans, “go.” 

Maybe these worlds aren’t so vastly different from each other after all.  I was a vessel of hope for my students in Swazi; I am a vessel for healing in students’ hearts here; I was a mother to many children in Swazi, and I am tenderly nicknamed “Mama Kate” here.  Yes, my heart is split between two different worlds, but I am a teacher, a mother, and a lover all the same.   And maybe that’s the whole point.  My purpose here is not to be whole, my heart is not meant to be mine; I am called to fulfill His purpose for His people everywhere, and He means everywhere.  Therefore, I glory in my brokenness and put my heart in my heavenly home, because only then and only He can make me whole.