Norah

There is a family that lives across the road from us. A widow grandmother who has remarried, her husband and her two granddaughters 15 and 8 years old, both orphaned. They are poor. Very poor. Depending on the time of year, they might go the whole day without eating, and more likely, they will just eat once per day. I’ll talk about the youngest girl Nora (8). She doesn’t have shoes, her clothes are tattered and dirty (one pair of course), she doesn’t bathe regularly and is dirty. She has never been to school and looks like she never will. Her step grandfather probably doesn’t want the extra burden of caring for her and sometimes he beats her. Our neighbours told us she “fainted” once, i.e. was knocked unconscious. It’s just across the road from us and it’s one of the saddest things I know.



The reality of the situation is that this is Zambia. Our neighbours help her when they can, give her extra food, etc., but the everyday situation is that she seems like a pretty happy and normal little girl. She comes by almost every day, visits, laughing and playing, speaks Chewa to us, which we still mostly don’t understand and hangs out until we’re tired out and go inside. She seems happy and normal.

Our neighbour/good friend said she wishes that she could pay for her to go to school, but that she’s also poor. It costs 15,000 kwacha per term ($3.09)?

What do you think I should do?