Today I accompanied Bob, Blake and Pumzile to a block of flats in the Hillbrow area. Bob was asked to check up on a prostitute who apparently was beaten up the night before. We went to her room on the seventh floor of an abandoned building and found she had a broken arm as well as abrasions and cuts. Her young daughter is in grade one and attends our after school program each afternoon. I had never met her mother and almost cried when I saw the conditions they live in. The building is filthy and infested with vermin and cockroaches. The power is disconnected and they use kerosene for lighting and cooking. The room they live in does not have a bathroom and the little girl tells me she uses a pot for a toilet at night as her mother is at work and it’s not safe for her to go out. The ambulance came to collect the mother and she asked if we would care for her daughter while she was gone. Mercy House provides emergency accommodation in such cases and we were able to give her a good meal, a hot bath and hair wash, and a clean comfortable bed for the night. Pumzile gave me a lesson in braiding hair and we had a good evening with the little one. She’ll probably be going home tomorrow and my prayer is that she won’t forget her time with us. That the love we showed her will give her hope for her future and a desire for something better then she’s experienced so far in life.
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