13 June 2005
Welcome to our orientation evening
Three and a half years go I received my destiny or you can say my Simphiwe. My husband and I have been screened and registered as Crisis and Foster Parents in our own home in Herrwood Drive. As time went by and Gods call came upon my life, the book of Joshua gave me the motivation needed, when three Sundays in a row I only heard: be bold and courageous, step out in faith and take the promise land to actually go out in faith and rent this home for the eSimphiwe babies.
Since in this home I started to work closely with my consulting Private Social Worker, Ms Robyn Shepstone, Phoenix Child & Family Welfare, Chatsworth Welfare, CR Swart Police Station and The Crisis Community Centre in Hillcrest, all working together to assist with our countrys plight of abandoned and orphaned babies.
I had three babies in my home and at the rate babies were and still are being abandoned and left on the streets I realized that something had to be done to be of more help. I also saw friends and even people in the street and at supermarkets crumble when seeing the cuteness of the babies in my care. I started to invite people over to assist me with babysitting and soon I had a volunteer base of approximately 50 people buzzing around, eager to help. This and a burning desire to be a mother to many encouraged me to do something more.
At first it was only the babies and their needs that took high priority in my life. I managed to set up a Trust Fund in September 2003 called The eSimphiwe Home Trust with trustees, Daphne Banks, Peter Banks, Christopher Greenham, Colin Crowhurst and Bradley Oliver, with two objectives:
Firstly that the Trust be established as an Institution of a public character, the primary object being of a charitable and community nature by maintaining as its aims and objectives to promote, within the Christian context, the provision and administration of a transitional home for abandoned, orphaned and abused babies between the ages of 0-24 months.
This means that it was our main aim to take a broken baby in and be there as the bridge between abandonment and finding a permanent forever home in which he/she can be safe and loved. My believe is that assuring a home to the abandoned baby today, will stop the child to become the street children of tomorrow and this will reduce crime in the future of all our children. It is much easier to work with the seed than to try and break or bend a tree.
In the past 22 months, we at eSimphiwe have managed to care for 42 babies, with the following results:
Adoptions Local: 14 Adoptions International: 5
Fostercare: 5 Re-united with family: 5
Deceased: 3 In the house: 6 Crisis & 4 Crche
The home depends solely on donations and is supported by the Unilever Foundation for Education & Development to cover just over one third of our monthly expenses. This sponsorship is granted to us on a yearly basis, which will have to be re-applied for at the end of October 2005. We also receive a lot of donations in the form of clothing, equipment, nappies etc. from the local community and can say that The Baby House as fondly referred to by pre-schools, schools, churches, businesses, banks and the community, is now well loved and supported.
When it was first known that there is a home for abandoned babies in Umhlanga, one person raised the concern that the home might attract the wrong kind of people. I am pleased to report that we only had the best of the best visiting us. With Unilever's involvement we get a lot of International interest in childcare and run with the highest standards. Being a resident of Umhlanga myself, and a mother with a pre-teen daughter, it was and is of utmost importance to me that the Baby House will give young people of our community the opportunity to be involved in a social responsibility project close to home, which hold no threat to their health or safety. In our house people learn to give of themselves and their time. They also learn how rewarding it is to the soul to do this.
Our second objective a secondary aim that the Trust be empowered to embark upon various initiatives allied to the primary object, including but not limited to the training and equipping of people with parenting skills.
I soon realised that I had to employ people to help me on regular times and to have the same people in the house at all times for the babies to associate with. This became important when I considered taking a break and going on leave while still having six babies in the house. Since I went to support my husband on a work project in the Cape Province, it was impossible to take all my babies with. I then trained three staff members to be my Au Pairs whilst I was on leave. Since most of my babies are of African origin I also have a keen interest in the culture of the African Tribes, especially the Zulu Nation.
After having my Zulu and Xhosa staff working for me a few months and building on a special relationship with them, I discovered that all of my people came from a disadvantaged background. The highlight was that they had their dreams and motivation to become more than just domestic workers. I started teaching and training them in the Western ways of childcare and parental skills and have now enrolled all of us at the National Association for Child & Youth Care Workers so that we could all start the Basic Qualification for Child & Youth Care Workers. I our team we have the want-to-be social worker, nurses and teacher. I hope in due time to be able to play a role in their and other disadvantaged peoples development by assisting them financially through funding or setas to study their dream qualifications.
We also run a program where prospective adopting parents come and learn for a period of time with us about parental skills and bonding with their new baby. Soon all volunteers will be required to work through and be tested on our manual for childcare in the eSimphiwe home.
The additional phase of applying for an aftercare facility came about when some new parents (maybe travelling overseas and they could not get a visa for baby on short notice, or some had long standing commitments to complete) asked us to look after their children for short periods of time. We also had request from moms who work odd hours like at the hospital, waitresses etc. to consider operating a facility to fulfil the need for a place where children can stay and be taken care off during their unusual working hours. Some of our babies are now also growing into toddlers and need more stimulation like in a playschool environment, which we cannot afford looking at the local rates for playschools.
Since we are at our house 24-hours seven days a week, it just made sense to offer such a service to the community. Criteria being that one of the parents must live or work in the Umhlanga Borders. We hope that this will benefit our community but more important secure the continued care and future of our abandoned babies. The two ways we need the Baby House to benefit is firstly the interaction with other children of the community within a learning environment for our toddlers and secondly, we need the financial support to ease our monthly shortfall so that we can maintain the house and the facilities to the benefit of both our abandoned babies and the communitys children.
My hope and dream is to see eSimphiwe/Thokomala Baby House continue growing into Umhlangas pride and joy and to get Umhlanga Community, to take ownership of this project. It is projects like these, which give to the children of South Africa and their future. We also delight to add that God has given me a vision to expand the Baby House on a much bigger scale Richmond Kwa-Zulu Natal. Any continued donations on a monthly basis, or "gifts" which can be used to raffle or even "give aways" can be used at our Auction will be appreciated.
My husband and I have just purchased a 7.2-hectare smallholding near Richmond and we have set aside 7,000m2 on which to build the new eSimphiwe/Thokomala Centre. We are desperately raising funds to enable us to start with building the new centre as from October 2005 but latest December 2005. With expanding our project, our aim is to increase our accommodation for babies in need of care, to 48 babies at a time. It is still our main objective to only keep a baby for up to 6 months where possible where circumstances allow.
Meeting with the Authorities in this area, we also feel that by adding a Social Worker to our team it will speed up the placement process of the children in our care, which is in line with what we believe to be to the best interest of each child. Added to this staff expense we will have to employ more staff to keep to the one to six ratios of staff to children and considering that these workers will have to work shifts plus get time off, we are looking at an additional 29 Child and Youth Care Workers. Having a Nursing Sister on the premises to administer medicines and keeping an eye on health matters will also be to our advantage. Cleaning the centre, cooking and laundry will need two domestic workers. We will also need to employ a Receptionist, Office Assistant, Accountant and a Driver. All these added expenses will have to be catered for.
This project will be built in four phases:
Residential care unit the Baby House with Kitchen, Pantry/Cool room, Milk Kitchens, Dining room, Sick room, Bathroom and Laundry
Staff Accommodation which will also be used to accommodate our International Volunteers and Prospective Adopting Parents (Local and International)
Crche/Preschool with Administration Block
Adult Training and HIV Awareness Centre with Conference Facilities.
The most important need we face currently is to build the Residential Care Unit or Baby House. Here we feel that if we can get an investor to fund the whole building for us, we will not mind to add this persons name to the Thokomala name of the Baby House. Other than the initial building cost the Baby House phase provides ample opportunity for additional investors and sponsors. Here we are looking at four bedrooms, a bathroom, 2 x milk kitchens, a kitchen with pantry and cool room, a dining room and sick room which will need to be furnished.
In the bedrooms we will need age appropriate cots or toddler beds and bedding. Each cot or bed can be sponsored with a person or organizations name on it by means of nameplates. The global room can have a nameplate on or above the door for the sponsor who donated the curtains, carpets, night-lights and murals on the walls. So too can equipping the kitchen, pantry/cool room, milk kitchens, dining room, sickroom, bathroom and laundry be acknowledged by placing nameplates at the doors or entrances.
Having a Baby House for two years in Umhlanga, I can assure you and your investors that every room mentioned above is equally important to ensure the best interest of our babies and toddlers. We know people like to be associated with the cots and the cute baby rooms but without the bathroom there will be no hygiene and without the kitchen no nutrition and without the laundry a big stinking mess! So the list can continue.
We will also be working into the community of Richmond and surrounding areas by assisting with a Pregnant Crisis Centre, teaching Life Skills, Parenting Skills as well as assisting and supply full training for Professional Foster Parents within our support group in the community.
Should you be able to assist us with our future project at Richmond, please do not hesitate to communicate if you need more information.
We welcome suggestions from you on how you may be able to accommodate us with a partnership that can become a long-term relationship between the Baby House and yourself.
Please read through the things to do for volunteers determine where you can be of assistance. We can most definitely utilise marketing skills and or fundraising skills from someone with the relevant background. Awareness of a project like ours is one of the most important aspects of financial success and here everyone can assist by doing mouth to ear marketing for us.
I would like to thank you for taking the time out of your busy schedules to attend this orientation meeting tonight and encourage everyone to ask questions should you still need clarity on some aspects.
Yours truly,
Daphne Banks
Founder & Executive Director
ESimphiwe/Thokomala Transition Home for Abandoned Babies