Hannah’s Haven

If we can stop one child, just one child, from shedding tears of loneliness, neglect, pain or abandonment, we shall not have lived in vain – Hannah Kitele

Hannah runs a home for abandoned and abused children in Kelvin, Johannesburg called  the St Jane’s de Chantal Haven.  I started getting involved with the home 2 years ago with a few of my colleagues, and  have blogged about the home everytime I’ve visited the place (Some of the posts are HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE if you want to read more) , but I haven’t actually taken photos there for 2 years (I was slack and did actually get to the home for quite a while too).

A few weeks ago, I went to see Hannah again with a boot full of donated goods, and I asked her if I could take photos of the children, which she was quite excited about (she wants me to put them on her Facebook page).  I’m going to print all the photos for her, and see whether I can get them framed. I can’t actually do justice to the photos without telling you a few of the stories behind them.

This little one, K, is 11 months old.  He’s minute.  He’s the size of a 4 month old (he’s the same height as the next little one photographed), and he has full blown AIDS.  His grandmother died of HIV, and his 14 year old mother arrived at Hannah’s door about a month ago, holding K, who at the time was barely breathing.  She’d never taken him to the doctor ever!  She was too scared.  She’s also too scared to get herself tested. K’s mom stayed in the home with K for a week or so, before disappearing back to Alexandra where she’s living in a shack and getting food by sleeping around.  Hannah is also convinced that’s she’s pregnant again. K is the size that he is because he was malnourished, as his mom would leave him locked in the shack at night to go out with her men, and would sometimes remember to come back over the weekend to feed him.

Since Hannah has looked after K, he’s had his ups and downs, but he’s doing quite well at the moment and he’s responding to the treatment he’s receiving.

Little wide eyes here is Hannah’s newest charge.  She wasn’t at the home when I went there 2 weeks ago.  She’s 4 months old, and her mother is also 14 years old.  Her mom took her back to the hospital because she couldn’t cope, and the hospital phoned Hannah.  Again, the young mom stayed with Hannah for a few days before she disappeared.  Hannah is not sure yet whether this little one has HIV.

How cute are these little girls?  I remember them from 18 months ago, and it was so very cool to see how well they’re doing.

While my colleague and I were there yesterday, a lady dropped in to deliver balls and bubbles for the kids.  As you can see, they were quite excited about them… and they LOVED the camera

Mr Ben10 here amazed me.  He was running around with the other boys and was the goalie in the soccer game for a while, when he just sat on the grass and rubbed his leg.  It was only then that I realised that he’s got a prosthetic leg.

At the moment, Hannah’s haven is home to 22 children, but she says the numbers vary all the time.  She tends to have more children staying in the home on weekends and closer to Christmas because she’s so close to Alexandra and the kids there know about her… so she often gets kids walking to her house from Alex to stay for a few nights.

I was so very emotional after my visit a few weeks ago because of some of kids circumstances but what got to me the most was that she can’t keep the kids in the haven after they’re 12 or 13 years old (in terms of her license as far as I can make out).  When they get to that age, she has to either find them a new home or foster home or she has to send them back to their families.  Because of that, she keeps in contact with the families and tries to help them learn skills etc so that they can look after their children then.

On that note, she’s looking for someone to teach her and her carers how to use the donated sewing machine and overlocker that she has, so that they can make curtains and sheets and be more self-sufficient.

When I was there a few weeks ago, she told me about a young boy that she had to send back to his aunt in Alexandra when he turned 13 a few months ago.  When he lived with her, he did very well at school and wanted to become a lawyer.  3 weeks after he went to his aunt, Hannah went to visit him to see how he was doing.  In the 3 weeks he’d been back, his father had killed his aunt in front of him.  He was involved in a gang and had started stealing and breaking into cars.  He’d dropped out of school.  She’d tried to get him to go back to school and has tried to talk to him since then, but she says he’s got a dead look in his eyes now.  That broke my heart.

There are happy stories too, where the kids have been adopted by wonderful familiies who keep in touch with her and let her know how the kids are doing.  Some of the adopted kids are in Johannesburg, and others live as far away as Italy now!

Now go back to the beginning of this post, and read her quote again… that’s why she does it.  It would kill me that I couldn’t save every single one of the kids and make then safe until adulthood, but she’s doing the best she can. The least I can do, is try and help her achieve that.