Toby’s Adventure to Africa…

About 3 weeks ago we received the following email from our social worker about three of our students living by themselves, struggling to keep warm at night. Our summer months are winter months in Zambia and temperatures can get in the 40’s at night. After receiving this email, we as the Wiphan Board knew we had to do something as soon as possible to help our students stay warm. Please read the email below and join us as we endeavor to keep our kids warm this season:

Davison Njovu (15), Mambo Phiri (11) and Gibson Kumwenda (13) are all related. They are double orphans who come to Wiphan’s Sinia Center in grades 6, 4 and 6 respectively.

Just yesterday Davison who is the oldest of them all came to school to report that he was quitting.

Davison, Mambo and Gibson are cousins who found themselves under the care of their grandmother after each one of their parents died. Their grandmother is old but has a small farm 3 hours walk from sinia where she said she would go. She has since been gone since October and left the kids to fend for themselves. The kids know where the farm is but have never found her there. A few times they have gone, desperately looking for something to eat. They do have one meal when they come to school but that’s as far as it goes. After school, they go home and sleep to get ready for school the next day. They sleep in a tiny mud house which has holes in the roof and since its been raining pretty hard lately, they just sit in a corner and hug each other for warmth because also, they don’t have a bed or mat to sleep on. After living this way Davison has totally given up and so a few days ago he came to report that he was quitting school so that he could go to Lusaka (4 hour car ride) where he hopes he could find some relatives that can take care of him and his cousins. We were overwhelmed and encouraged the boy not to leave. Wiphan has since put them under the care of a Wiphan lady (who is a neighbor to these boys and has been helpful with giving them meals). Wiphan has also given a bag of mealie-meal , beans and cooking oil to the same Wiphan lady to make sure they eat something other than the meal they have at school. Wiphan also bought blankets for the kids which were presented to them by the Administrator (as shown in the pictures). For now, they will have more than one meal and they will be able to keep warm at night. Update: The children continue to be monitored and cared for by their new care-taker and the Wiphan administration.