AlDS Orphans- a global issue

Alone but never alone.  We have your back beautiful one!

Larobane foster home, Butha Buthe, Lesotho

Arms in Love

An orphan's desperate cling and a warm lap for her to land on.

November 17/18

I am heading home tomorrow.  This ends my ninth trip to Lesotho.  We had dinner in Durban, South Africa tonight with my good friend, Duncan Hay.  Duncan played an instrumental role in Bracelet of Hope's first $ 1 million campaign.  A group of students from the University of Guelph pledged to raise $100,000 of that $ 1 million and they succeeded.  By 2009, the community of Guelph and the University of Guelph had reached that goal and in doing so, provided life-saving treatment to 10,000 HIV positive patients in Lesotho.  It was a tremendous community effort.  I look back now and realize how ambitious the university's goal was and how innovative these students were.

To raise what they had pledged, they contacted Duncan at the University of Kwa Zulu Natal in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa.  Duncan was the head of the Rural Development Department at the time.  His job was to support and create rural development projects which included the support of the Inina Craft Agency in Eshowe South Africa.

Inina was a small group of very poor, very marginalized women who made traditional Zulu jewellery and crafts.  Duncan directed the students from the University of Guelph to Inina.  The students ordered 5.000 beaded red and white bracelets to sell on campus.  These bracelets became the signature of our campaign and inspired our name change from The Masai for Africa Campaign to Bracelet of Hope.  That order was the first of many.  Inina was able to expand from a handful of crafters to 150 women, many working from their homes, to complete our orders.   Their lives were transformed by this work.  It gave them the ability to support their families at a time when AIDS was devastating entire communities in sub-Saharan Africa.  

In 2008, the partnership between Inina, Bracelet of Hope and the University of Kwa Zulu Natal was honoured with the Global Best Award for Africa by the Conference Board of Canada and the International Partnership Network.  I had forgotten about this award.  Duncan and I received the award on a ferry that was crossing from Helsinki, Finland to Stockholm, Sweden.  

That was a long time ago.  What I remember most was rushing back to my cabin before the evening's celebrations were done.  I was sea sick for the next 12 hours.  

There have been many awards and many celebrations in Bracelet of Hope's thirteen-year history.  There have also been many difficult, often disabling trials that have brought me to my knees.  Providing care to those afflicted with HIV in Canada and Lesotho and building a system of support for some of the most vulnerable children orphaned by AIDS was never on my radar.  My first love is my husband and now grown children.  My second, medicine.  But then, in 2006,I watched a 2-year-old die as we held her hands in a decayed hospital in Leribe, Lesotho and everything changed.  My heart broke and my view of the world was shattered.   

I have often struggled with who I am and where the real me fits into this difficult and exhilarating journey.  Am I the mom, the doctor, the AIDS activist, or the leader of an international effort? 

My closest friend from high school, Debora Anzinger, was sitting behind me during the church service at the Apostolic Faith Mission Church in Butha Buthe, Lesotho last week.  There are six orphans living in the church right now.  One of the main purposes of this trip was to break the ground for a new foster home where these abandoned kids will live on the church property with people who will love and care for them.  The funds raised in the 100 km cycle in September will be used for this purpose.  The team I travelled with fell in love with every one of these children last week.  We didn't realize that the feelings were mutual.  They raced to us as we walked into the church. We embraced them during the whole service.  Not a single lap was empty.

Leslie

One little girl fell asleep in my lap, her hands dangling over my shoulders, reminding me of the days when my own children did the same.  I am dressed in a traditional Basotho dress, bright purple with a lovely intricate pattern.  It honours the people of Lesotho when we wear their traditional clothing.  This picture moved me more than any other taken on this trip.  It represents who I am and why I do what I do.  

I am a woman and a mother with a deeply broken heart, broken by a world that stands by and watches 18 million AIDS orphans suffer more than any living thing should ever be allowed to suffer.  I am a doctor with a profound sense of responsibility for the health of my beloved patients, my community and the world.   I have found solace and healing by creating an organization that works to see the end of AIDS in Lesotho while caring for a growing number of children orphaned by AIDS and poverty.

I am a mother, holding a child in need in a country and culture I have come to love with people that I deeply admire and respect.

Dr Anne-Marie Zajdlik MD CCFP, MSM, O.Ont

Founding Director, Bracelet of Hope

braceletofhope.ca