Orphanage

One of the reasons for the work we are doing here is the large number of orphans due to AIDS. The HIV/AIDS 2007 statistics for South Africa are staggering:

• South Africa has the large number of AIDS orphans in the world, approx. 1.4 million children
• 1 in 5 adults is infected with HIV
• 1000 people die of AIDS every day
• 71% of deaths for people 15 - 49 s from AIDS
• Over half of 15 year olds will not live to age 60
• 280,000 children are HIV+

For more info on this problem in South Africa, click here.

We spent a couple of hours one morning at an orphanage in Rustenburg and was definitely a highlight of the trip. I was surprised by how nice the orphanage was - the orphanages I was used to in Liberia were nothing like this one here. I'm not sure if this one is typical of orphanages in South Africa but I'm guessing these childrens' living conditions were better than if they were living with family.

According to one of the caretakers, they have lots of volunteers that frequently come to play with the kids so they were getting plenty of loving interaction. Of course, we had no problems interacting with the kids!

Some orphanage photos:

Kelsey

A cute one! Of course, they were all adorable

Feeding time

Abby

Angela

The backyard

I pretty much held Ottilia the entire time I was there! She had only been at the orphanage for 6 days.