Optimistic Voices
Vital voices in the fields of global health, global child welfare reform and family separation, and those intent on conducting ethical missions in low resource communities and developing nations. Join our hosts as they engage in conversations with diverse guests from across the globe, sharing optimistic views, experiences, and suggestions for better and best practices as they discuss these difficult topics.
Optimistic Voices
"I Grew up in an Orphanage in Africa" - From Orphanage to Adulthood: Resilience and Adaptation in Sierra Leone's Care Leavers
What happens when five remarkable young adults transition from the regimented life of an orphanage to the uncharted reality of post-orphanage life? Join us on Optimistic Voices as we welcome these inspirational individuals who grew up at the Child Rescue Center Orphanage in Sierra Leone and now stand as influential care leaders. From navigating transportation challenges and irregular meal times to adapting to a lack of protection and electricity, their stories are a testament to resilience and adaptability. Gain insights into their journey and the broader implications for care reform for orphans and vulnerable children worldwide.
Our heartfelt conversation reveals the emotional and practical struggles of reconnecting with family and integrating back into society after years in care. Our guests candidly discuss the essential life skills they missed out on due to gender roles and reflect on how the orphanage instilled discipline, personal hygiene, and academic readiness. The challenges of blending back into family life highlight the complexities and resilience required during these transitions, underscoring the role caregivers play in shaping the futures of care leavers.
The episode also touches on preparing care leavers for the world, emphasizing the importance of community integration and realistic preparation for life post-care. Listen as our guests share their experiences of becoming parents and spouses, focusing on building strong bonds with children and fostering open communication. We wrap up with a hopeful vision for the future, advocating for family-based care and inviting mission-minded communities to join forces in creating a better world for vulnerable children. Tune in for an inspiring discussion that champions resilience, adaptability, and the power of collective action.
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Welcome to Optimistic Voices, a podcast of helping children worldwide. We help children worldwide by strengthening and empowering families and communities. This podcast is for people interested in deep conversations with thought leaders in the fields of child welfare, global health and international missions.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to Optimistic Voices Podcast. My name is Emmanuel Nabil, commonly known as Nabs. I'll be your host for this episode. In today's episode, we are blessed to have five young adults who we all grew up together as children in the Child Rescue Center Orphanage in Sierra Leone. We'll be having conversations around the vital role of voices of care leavers in care reform that is transforming the way we care for orphans and vulnerable children in Suria and around the world. Our conversation will focus more on post-orphanage life, so before we proceed, let's meet our guests and learn what they are doing now.
Speaker 3:Hello everyone. My name is Rosa Staffa. I work at the Child Reintegration Centre as the post-secondary coordinator and case manager.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Rosa welcome.
Speaker 4:Hello everyone.
Speaker 2:My name is Joanne Isbam. I also work at the Child Reintegration Centre.
Speaker 5:I am a system administrator dealing with systems. Welcome to the episode JB. Hello everyone, I'm Aruna Stevens, the medical doctor at Massey United Methodist Church Hospital in Bullsirio, lyon.
Speaker 2:Thank you very much, dr Stevens, you're welcome.
Speaker 3:Hello everyone. My name is Monjema Vande Koi. I'm a final year student studying at Jalai University studying nursing. Thank you, manjaman. Hello everyone, my name is Riebe Kakuma. I'm a graduate. I'm looking for a job.
Speaker 2:Thank you. We pray that you get a job soon. Thank you All right, well, welcome. Thank you so much. So before we keep going here, let's talk. These are all care leavers, as you said. Now let's define the term. We have care leavers and we have care leaders Now. A care leaver is any adult who spent time in care or institution or orphanage as a child and aged out without ever being reintegrated into a family life, out without ever being reintegrated into a family life. The care leader now is a care leader who uses their care experiences to influence care reform at both local and global levels. So we are so blessed and fortunate to have these young adults here today who spend their childhood and teenage years in the orphanage and in an institution, and now they are all care leaders as they influence policies and then how to better care for vulnerable children and families. So let's see what challenges, uh, do you all face? You know when you first came out of the orphanage well.
Speaker 3:Well, the first challenge that I faced when I was from the orphanage, like for going to school when I was in the orphanage, we normally have buses that carry us to school, but when I was out of the orphanage, I used to walk to go to school. Sometimes I used motorbikes.
Speaker 2:So that's my own constraints, Okay that's one challenge you faced when you came out of orphanage. Anybody else?
Speaker 3:Yes, I had challenges eating late in the evening because back then at the CLC we used to have lunch at 1 breakfast in the morning and our dinner was 6 o'clock. So when I left the CLC and I went to Freetown, we would just have one meal a day and I'll be late at 7. So that was a very big challenge for me.
Speaker 5:Okay. Another that I experienced was at the CRC. We are so much protected and most of the decisions we are made by our caregivers or care managers. Then, when we are reintegrated with our families, you are left alone to make decisions on yourself, for yourself, and you are not protected.
Speaker 3:And this was a huge challenge for all of us after we integrated to the community the other challenge was that at CLC there was a light facility which some of our family went out there. There was no light, so it was very difficult for us to get study.
Speaker 4:Except we study during the day and at night we go to bed thank you, jb just to add to all of this and growing up in the orphanage of the CRC, we have a very structured life. Everything was timely. It's set up in a vast of manner. Breakfast wake up in the morning prayer. 5 o'clock prepare for school, go take your shower. 6. Breakfast, 7 o'clock get ready for process. You know, boss, take you to school. So come back from there. We have to go back take a nap or lunch or stuff like that. But just to explain, everything was kind of structured in a timely manner. Now me going to the community hope a whole lot of experience so it's kind of different?
Speaker 4:um, of course there are people don't even come to wake you up for prayers, or you don't have a bell like we use to ring.
Speaker 2:It's different.
Speaker 4:If you want to get up and pray, it's up to you. There are some homes you're fortunate to go. They could wake you up for prayers. But leaving the home, of course we all know our families or our guest parents take us as somebody that is different. So they want to make life very soft for us, even though that's not how they used to live in their homes. So the moment I come.
Speaker 4:they always refer ah, it's a poor boy, so they take the time to deal with us, which of course we don't need that out of here, but it was pretty difficult for us and all stuff like that.
Speaker 2:but thanks, but now you are trying to adapt to life. What are some of the challenges as you started now really facing the real world to say, okay, I'm now on my own, I need to start doing something well, I could go first.
Speaker 4:That's that going out of the compound. Well, we are not reintegrated but forced to go out of the compound. I personally, well, I was lucky because before this time we had another seniors from the CLC which they were relocated back to families. So, seeing a couple of them one, two, three times of them, I have to individually. I have to prepare my brain. I'm like, okay, this is something's going to be different. That means my own time is coming. I have to leave the orphanage or compound. So I was lucky to prepare myself, I see, even though a lot of our brothers and sisters are not ready for the challenges or so. But I was lucky. But it was different as well when I went out like to build friends.
Speaker 4:We found it very difficult. Imagine spending all my life in the, in a compound where I have brothers and sisters, just that after school boss takes you off back to the home, so I don't have time to even make with friends. So I'm going out to the community and I have to go, start to make up friends. You know it's kind of difficult for me to even take a chance to. You know how to do it, this stuff, because this is somebody different in the communities.
Speaker 4:So I face those challenges and certain times the food that we eat and what we used to eat here is different. Maybe it has every protein food, cabai, a little bit of all the nutrients, but out of here, people live on food that even sleep, sleep over food. You know how it is well, um, but that also was difficult to start with, because I used to breakfast, tea and bread. Yeah, go to school lunch. Yeah, this case is different. What you see you eat sometimes there is nothing. Go to school like that and come back. So just to a shorter part of it. It was difficult to adapt to that system.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, um, it was also difficult for the people you are living with to accept your way of life Like in our house where I was staying when I left the CLC like my own way of doing things. We are different. I don't normally eat most of the things they eat because I already have the foods that I was familiar with and I was just too mannered for them because my life has been planned so much in the CLC and it was difficult for me to accept the way others were doing things and so and we find it difficult, me and the other people to accept each other, but with time we were able to couple together and we are good to go all right.
Speaker 5:Um, another thing that really happened was uh, there was a. It was a really big change at the clc. Um, most of the kids we used to speak creole and english and when you're back home, most of the people you live with we only talk Mende and perhaps some of them we talk Creole. So it was very difficult for you to integrate with them, to interact with them. So often in a conversation they'll talk Mende to you and in response not deliberately you can talk Creole to them, and some of them may frown at it and they were not happy, but that was a challenge also. There was also a challenge because most of the way we are doing things at the CRC the European or Western way of doing things, which is different. So we lost so many cultures. We lost so many things that we have learned earlier, when, if we are living with our people, that. So it was very difficult for us to and some of those things we can. We lost so many things that we have learned earlier when, if we are living with our people that uh.
Speaker 3:So it was very difficult for us to and some of those things we can never get them again. They used to call me english girl. They say I am more english and it was a surprise to them that I can understand me, because they used to say my way of life is like somebody who is not from Africa. Yeah, but I told them I am from Africa, just that mixed races raised me.
Speaker 2:I was raised in the African and American way, so that was it yeah I can act, which one day and they said, yeah, that's not, that's really good. Some of other challenges have. They are very practical. Research shows that when children who grow up in an orphanage, they leave, they go back out, just struggle for adaptation. Those are really really rare. In terms of adapting to the community, your family, just getting fit in again to the society, to the real world, can be challenging, but thank you for highlighting those. So what do you wish you would have known as you left care, before even leaving care? What do you wish you would have really learned how to do or known Well for me?
Speaker 4:basically, we know what it means to live outside of the world, so I wish I should have known everything of how they used to operate, and that was not something we had planned for. Yeah, because when we are going to the community, we are just like, ah, all right, this is time for you to go.
Speaker 4:Yeah or somebody who uh, reached that peak of college level, so from the home you go transit straight to the college. Yeah, so there was nothing for my preparations for that. So it's a whole aspect of something out of there when you face the world. So we wish we should have known or be prepared or someone's tell us how it is, how we're going to live, what are we going to expect. But these were not all what, um, we are prepared for. We just face the world and we deal with it on our own.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the wall and we deal with it on our own. Yeah, I wish I would have known that. Um, there are some places that that we are not safe to visit. Yes, I wish I would have known that, because when I went to college, there was no adult to tell me don't go there, don't make this man your friend, don't make this man your friend. And because I have my whole life, I have so many brothers and sisters, and these are nice people. So I think everybody outside is nice, but some people are just not as nice as I was thinking, and so I wish somebody would have told me that Not everybody is nice out there. Be careful.
Speaker 5:For me. I wish I would have learned how to cook.
Speaker 5:Ah that's it. Yes, yes, yes, because, most importantly for now, I work very hard and after work I have to go buy my meals, and because I do not have the skills, I do not have what I may learn in future. But that is something I would have learned to do if I was living with my biological parents. Then I would have learned to cook, because in Africa, basically most of the chores for that are done for food preparation, are done by the ladies, and so we are often left as men out. So this is something I wish I would have learned while I was living at the CLC so do you know how to cook now?
Speaker 2:well, I'm trying because I had asked you to wear water.
Speaker 3:At least I can cook rice when we are staying home, but you have 14 is a coup, because you are. Allowing you guys to go to the kitchen, but all boys were stay off the home. But you are fortunate to cook because you are already. They were allowing you guys to go to the kitchen, but all boys were staying off the kitchen, but that was not enough you go into the kitchen to help wash dishes doesn't make you a good.
Speaker 3:so when I left, yeah, I joined a family of A lot of girls and we used to cook by tone. Every Sunday was my own tone. Because they are Catholics, they leave for church at 7.30. I am United Methodist, our service is 10. So me staying that long at home, I have to cook.
Speaker 4:How is your first meal?
Speaker 3:It's also tasty. I am not a good cook. I can prepare a chicken for you, just for your money.
Speaker 2:That's really good For JB's cooking ability. I know Because when we left here he went and laid me a little bit down there. All we cooked were just eggs in the morning. Just fried eggs, yeah, but that's good, that's good. So I mean, ladies, let's see. So what was the thing you think you were best prepared for? As you left care, you know some of the things we are not really prepared for. You cannot list them. What's something that maybe you were really prepared for?
Speaker 5:Maybe something you learned in care or something.
Speaker 4:For me, we For the ladies first.
Speaker 2:Let's talk to the ladies here.
Speaker 3:I think they are trying to talk, yes, well the thing that I was well prepared for, because since CRC started to take us on holidays to our caregivers, I already knew that a time would come that we would go and join them. So I've already prepared Since I went out and I know the way they are living. So I talked to myself that I'm going to adapt.
Speaker 3:No matter what it takes. Me too need to adjust with their own. I don't have to make things so difficult, so I just go with their own, whatever how they do it, ok.
Speaker 5:Dr Stevens, yes, for me, I think I was with the CRC. I was prepared enough for me to go to university. So I had all the classes, the capacity for me to go to university. So I had all the classes, the capacity for me to go to university. So I easily adapted and we were able to get grades that would promote me to the next level.
Speaker 5:Another one thing that was very important was I learned I was prepared to be very tidy in personal hygiene. So the mom who was in charge of us at the orphanage was very particular of how you could take care of yourself as a man, how you could be a very decent man, how you could talk very politely and who you become in a community, how to serve people. So I think I was well prepared, even though living in the orphanage had some disadvantages, but I had a lot of good memories and good things that I learned from the orphanage good I was prepared to say no to boys and I was, yes, to say no to boys, and I was well little boys, true of weight.
Speaker 3:Yes, I was well prepared. That true love way. You have to wait. Yes, yes, life starts after my age now I'm living my best life All right, Thank you.
Speaker 4:Thank you very much, Rosa, for that JB you wanted to say something, something you think you have prepared for. Let's go on, okay.
Speaker 2:So now, how smooth or rough you know was it or difficult, was it right to find and connect with your family and really fit in again? You know the journey to connecting with your family or tracing them and fitting in. How was that?
Speaker 4:you've been explaining that process yeah, let me go first with that. I, um, first of all is, um, trust me, it wasn't easy to blend in. Yeah, of course, we all know the story of CLC. Our home started from when the Civil War ended. We mixed up of displaced families. Some are orphans, single orphans, both are orphans. Some of us were destitute coming from the home because everything our parents lost.
Speaker 4:I remember I used to stay with my mom by then, since I was six years of age, before enrolling to the crc. Yeah, so, um, imagine, six years of age, I left my parents. Well, um, for a very long time. Yeah, it came for a very long time to the time I needed to relocate with. I was when I'm now an adult, so, assuming all those years have passed by, you know, when you're a kid, growing up, you we are thinking that, ah, it wasn't something I mean we are not expecting. I was not expecting to leave or cut off from my parents. But now, when I'm an adult, I knew now, yeah, she did it for a reason because by by them, she has nothing she needed to do, strive for herself in another town. It's like, okay, I need to let jb stay elsewhere. So me relocating back now.
Speaker 4:By then my mom was she after the one that she needed to pursue her um pastor pastoral cause like jina, yeah so and which is Freetown. So I needed to stay here and I was lucky to be part of the CRC, which transformed my life. But when I relocated back to her in Freetown after I went home as an adult, I remember sitting at home with her and I just don't feel connected. You know, because all my life, all my brothers, sisters, the parents in the home, the staffs now look at me with somebody that gave birth to me. But I can't really locate with her.
Speaker 4:So most of the time what I do is like, after CTU, I'm like, no, I'm going to see a friend, so I leave them home and carry to another part of the town, be with friends but she understands me very well like, yeah, I needed some time. So most of my time was spent with friends, not with her. But we go on with that until later. I tried to adapt to our situation, but for them, after leaving Seattle, it wasn't difficult. It was difficult. I mean, it wasn't easy for me to adapt with my parents or even the siblings I left behind, but now it's pretty much better than we used to.
Speaker 2:Thank you for sharing that.
Speaker 4:JB.
Speaker 3:For me. It is still difficult for me to connect with other relatives. I am connected with my biological family, which is my mom and my siblings, my dad, but for causes Africa, we believe in extended family my cousins, my aunt. I find it difficult. Some of them, I can't even remember their names. Yes, so it is still difficult, but I'm trying.
Speaker 5:I'm trying to reach out to all of them for me, I've been reintegrated with my family for over 10 years. I'm still on the verge of knowing to know my half brothers. My dad was a polygamous man. He had 4 wives, and I think all of the wives have at least four children, so that is like 16 children, so I don't know all of them. So so that that created a huge gap between us, which is very difficult to blend, and and that created a lot of, a lot of unassuming pressure on us who, or the few of us who we are able to be educated because I was single, I was, I have been educated, but the majority of them are looking up to me. So it is. It will be very difficult for you to thrive, as, even though you have succeeded in your own pathway, it's very difficult for you to succeed because you have a lot of mouth that are ready for you to feed. So that is another challenge for you, as you, as I've been integrated thank you.
Speaker 3:It was also a challenge to me since when I was from cawks to the community to get in touch with my mother and also other family members. Till now, if I want to see my mother I have to travel a mile to go to the village so that I can just see her. It is not really easy and I cannot. For now I don't have much in touch with any of my family members except until you see that I'm leaving with and anti-matu Charlie. So so what ongoing challenges.
Speaker 2:What ongoing challenges do you, as care leavers or other care leavers you know? Children who grew up in institutions you know are currently really facing after they have left care. What ongoing challenges are you or other care leavers you?
Speaker 5:think they are facing. Yes, I think I will go first, because I am presently working in both. I happen to interface with most of them. So, as I mentioned earlier at the CRC, almost all the decisions for us we are taken by the caregivers, and all decisions to go to school, do not play, do not talk to this person, do not smoke, alright. And most of these kids were reintegrated, and some of us were reintegrated when we were more matured and some of them have been reintegrated when they are much more smaller. So they had a big pressure of peer influence.
Speaker 5:Presently, I know some of my brothers that are struggling with drugs, certainly right now. I know some of our friends and brothers who have dropped out of school. I know some of them who have not been able to graduate from school and some of them have the little support they have. Their families are looking for them, so they could not succeed. So it is very difficult for people who have been living in Nofanegis to thrive when they go to this community and it is like the Chazdawee theorem only the strongest of us have been able to survive it, but most of us have not been able to succeed through. Some of them have been able to manage their way to get a job. But this is not what will have been their path. Some of them, if they um had a family that support, that will support them, a family that will give them all the necessary family, that will give them all the necessary advice, a support community, they would have been greater personalities within the community, which will be very good. That is my input Thank you.
Speaker 3:Well, the ongoing challenges, especially, I can say for my brothers, when we are in the compound, we are all staying here. But when we have been out now, like for the two of them, fedu and Mwenina, they have been out of school. So sometimes they really go to me, they pest me, disturb me a lot, because I'm still in school and I'm focused right now and I'm trying to come out of the college. And sometimes I would just be sitting down and I just see one of them coming. He just come and greets me and I ask him where are you or whom are you staying with now? Then one will tell me that I'm not staying with nobody, I'm with my friends, I'm staying with this person. By the next time I ask the other person, the other person will just tell me different stories.
Speaker 3:So sometimes I really find it difficult because when I look at the time now for now I am not working, I am a student right now so I cannot be able to make decisions for them or to help them.
Speaker 3:So sometimes when they come to me, I feel bad because I don't have anything to help them. Thank you, thank you so presently as a family, because I consider all of us as one big family, those of us who have been in the residence, and so this is a challenge for all of us, because we have some of our brothers who are now on drugs. They are taking these harmful drugs, and it is a challenge for all of us because this is not a life we we wanted for for them. This is not a life we wanted for all of us, and so, in as much as they are struggling with their health, we are also struggling with them together, because when they see us in the streets, they ask us for money, they ask us to buy them and nice slippers, nice clothes to put on. And it is just a challenge because we are not strong enough to have another extra somebody to support. But we just have to do it because they are our brothers and sisters.
Speaker 4:we hope we'll help them someday so just to conclude that, uh, of course my brother and sisters have mentioned about um, our clc related families, and of course we have also these challenges in our um maternal appearance, of course, like for me an example. Um, I'm still, of course I'm working, but I'm still studying as well. So whatever I I do, I decide to pay for myself, and this is something our parents, they don't understand. So all they care about I'm working. So, whatever they demand something, they need it available and I'm stuck. I can't take care of myself in school, trying to survive After school. I have other related some things I need to deal with my personal care and well-being, transportations, food, um, all those things to take care of and the little that I have. I try to help one, two people, but sometimes they claim that if it's not even enough, because they don't understand my own perceptions of it, they always say, ah, I'm working, ah, I'm from my home.
Speaker 4:My grandmother, for example, is an example. She always says I'm in Creole to court, I'm a white man. Picking that means I'm a white man. Area of work I'm like it's different. It's not how it is, but those are the challenges we face on this our relative size and even friends of outside. Um, there are times when you go out you associate with even friends that know you when we are going to school, like from the ckc also, there's that these guys where they are from the home, they are from cia, they have everything there.
Speaker 4:You know even things that they don't know about. They assume you know assumptions that that's how we are living. You know even things that they don't know about. They assume assumptions that that's how we are living. You know these are something we are capable, so the times of exploits or need from us. So all those challenges are pretty difficult out of here but trying to leave it so so how have you been overcoming some of these challenges?
Speaker 2:what has helped you the most overcome challenges since you left care, you know well.
Speaker 4:Basically, of course, we know it's difficult to explain to people here in our native um centers. Even the families, immediate families, they do it. You can say no, but they assume you don't want to help. You know but I was. We are lucky to train up in a home that tells us feel free to say no or say yes, you can't, it's enough, because you can't go all the extra miles and you leave yourself out. So most of the times we do need to ask him to help these people, but we are established like no, that's all I can help.
Speaker 4:Even though we try to explain to the donors, they will be like, well, it's fine with me, but that's all I can help. Even though we try to explain to the donors, that will be like, wait, it's fine with me, but that's all I can give you or that's all I can help you for now because I have my other things. I do it, of course, our friends, I'll be like. We try to explain to them like no, it's not all bed of roses, as you assume. We are from ciazio, taking care, you see. So jumping into balls, going to schools like, ah, they are well to do, yeah, but we try to explain to these people to come to our ears like no, now we are in the community, let's face reality. Let's all that be so.
Speaker 2:We try our best to manage or have a dialogue with these people, but whatever they think so what would have helped you the most to be prepared to overcome when you are growing up here in the institution? So what would have helped you be more prepared for the obstacles you faced when you left care, because you kind of highlighted most of these obstacles after you left care. What would have helped you, you know, be more prepared for the obstacles you face when you left care. So for me, so initially, when this year started.
Speaker 5:We are so much, so much segregated from interacting with the entire community. Community outside, community outside yeah. So if, for instance, we, the awards programs we are in, we can interact with our parents or other social activities, then that will have break the chain of what? The seclusion from the entire community. So initially, if there was free room to of interaction, even though we are protected by this, you had at least you go for vacation or weekends, the you will land some of the things you have missed whilst we're away. Then that will have better prepare us for future challenges we are facing. The knowledge of family should have been explained to our relatives.
Speaker 5:Unfortunately, people are assuming a lot of illiterate people in our community. So they think if you are a medical doctor, you have all the money. If you are the IT, money, as long as you have a job, you have been paid enough. So a lot of expectation. So another thing that we'll have done that will have prepared us the challenges we face. I think if I was not only supported, if my family was supported in this process, then the challenges I face today I may not experience it. Because if my I was not only strengthening, my family was strengthening like now, as the CFC programs are. They have a lot of family strengthening programs. They have microfinance program that can give loans to women and also help the kids at the same time. So strengthening the family also can help the rest of us and that is very good for future purpose.
Speaker 4:So to add to that asuna was saying Of course he mentioned Almost everything Our interactions with the community Are pretty difficult for us. I remember when we were going to school we had the friends we stayed with in class. We Now boys, love football. So the moment During the weekends, that's why we watch, they watch football, and here in the home we have time. In fact we don't have dstv, so we have nothing, but we are just blinded to the world. So so when we go to school, our friends will be talking about my it's all messy messes, call ronando this. So we are like no, excluded out of that conversation. So because we are not given the chance. So when you come back home we tell our the mothers is it?
Speaker 4:I want to go what? Give me a night. No interactive friend no, so sometimes. And when friends comes visit us, yeah, they have limited amount of time. When parents our parents come visit us here, they have limited amount of time. When parents our parents come visit us in the home, very little amount of time. So they don't spend that time we don't even know To really get to know them.
Speaker 4:Get to know you so imagine you come just spend 10 minutes. I mean, 10 minutes can take us nowhere. So if I see you out of here I'm like ah, just spend Just a high high before you know it, they'd ask you to leave and you should leave. So we are all um segway out of this community, but there was no interactions with this. Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 2:So now the question if you you are in a position to help a young person right living an orphanage, you want them to really be prepared before they go out. What, what advice will you give to them? How you help them really make sure they are prepared when you go face the real world out there?
Speaker 4:also fall. I'll tell you the hard truth. How is it to stay out of fear? Because this is something we are not taught in the CRC. Now. People just continue pampering us. They worry to be fine out there, and it's not. You don't expect us to go out, and they were just like trying to keep our spirits on high. Yeah, it's fine, go out. You meet good people.
Speaker 4:Not talking about the negative part of how outside of this is we're going to meet a lot of different people hooligans, you know, different races, different um calibers, but we are not thought this. So I will tell you the hard fact, man, when you go out of here, you have to prepare your mind mentally, physically and of course, you have to decide how you need to blend into this complete uh community. But also, until you have to be wise and make certain wise decisions because, if not, most of these peer groups are led into. As my brother Aruna said, and Rosal we are mentioning, we have some of our brothers and sisters we spend in the home.
Speaker 4:The women who went out, most of them followed the trade, they went to universities and they couldn't make it because of peer groups. Join, no, but so I would. Some of us survived because we have to prepare ourselves mentally. So if I meet someone who is not a caregiver I was about to go out I would just give you all the basics, my man. You have to ready to adapt, whatever it means they are to eat it. Don't be segregated because even though you become hungry for the rest of the day not how you used to yeah well for me.
Speaker 3:I like when people learn from their own experience. I prefer people um advise themselves based on what they have experienced, be it positive or negative. So if I was to advise somebody living in an orphanage that is about to be reunified, I'll let you go out, no adult supervision. Go to clubs if you want, go to any place you want to go, and whatever experience you get, I will use that experience to advise you and maybe to widen your, your, your mind that you are going to see more of that. You are going to see more of bad girls, bad boys, bad adults. You are going to to experience the good and bad part of life in. Then I will prepare you how to handle each of them as they come by them.
Speaker 4:He or she has already sure life already.
Speaker 3:She should have advised them before well, um, I would prefer, you know, let me use myself as an example like, um, let me say two months.
Speaker 3:So my unification. I wish they would have just opened the gates. Let me go outside, let me go to club, let me go wherever I want to go, let me stay in the streets and let me just be prepared that this is what I'm going to see. And then, if life hits me hard, then I will learn the good parts of CLC. If life hits me good, then I appreciate CLC the more. But so far I'm thankful, I'm thankful to CLC. I'm a good girl, I'm a good woman. Now I'm thankful. I thankful to see. I see I'm a good girl.
Speaker 4:I'm a good woman.
Speaker 5:I choose life the positive way for me, for me, I think, the all care institutions around the world, even though, do you are making decisions for these kids you have in your under your care, but let the kids be part of the decisions you are making. Yes, so there are times I remember there are kids that want to become do accounting, do your force, because on your results you're not going to commerce, you're going to art. But this is not what you wanted.
Speaker 5:So let them be part of the mission if they want to. Some of them dropped out because some some said I want to become a doctor, but they know themselves better and this is not what their skillsets are skill sets for. So allow them to to design what they want to do. Another one that's really helped me personally was there's a Korean adage that says if you know Sae Komo, you know Sae Digo. So if you know where you're from, then you know where you're going.
Speaker 5:So I know that my mom had a single room that I lived with with me with my other three sisters, and I had no place I I I don't think I could live in the same with my mom after the orphanage. So I think I have to work harder to get a job, at least to pay for your place where I could sleep. So that is an advice I could give to everyone living in a care or living in a home If you know where you're coming from, and certainly you may not want to live there where you go, so work hard to prepare a place for yourself and see a life after.
Speaker 3:I would also advise them to be determined, because the life now you are living in the orphanage is different from the one in the community, because here you are having everything and over there you will not be having everything, because here you will be having breakfast and dinner, over there except. You have to strive for yourself and you. You will meet different people, different people, different lifestyle, different races. So you have to be determined. If you are not determined, you'll be easily carried out and you will go the wrong way. I saw for me when I was in the CLC. Since I was a child, I determined myself and I told myself that I want to be a nurse and I was praying towards it and finally, by the grace of God, very soon I will be a nurse, a state registered nurse. So I was determined and I worked towards it. So that is my own yeah beautiful thank you
Speaker 3:like how my sister just said, determination pays. When I was living the CRC, when I met the kind of life my cousin, my uncle, my aunt were living after school. Go to the bush the kind of life my cousin, my uncle, my aunt were living After school. Go to the bush, pick some wood, come back, beat rice before we eat. And I said to myself I need to determine, I need to take my family to that peak. So I determined and I'm so grateful to CLC because CLC has really been part of my life and even who I am today. It's all because of CLC If I never have taken the opportunity they gave to me.
Speaker 3:I left this deep off my hand. I should not have been where I am today. So as for me, me, the advice I only give them when you go out there, don't follow peer groups, because these peer groups might influence your mind in a different perspective, where they will tell you to do things that even doesn't suit you, that will pave you away for what you're supposed to do. So, when you go out, just know the kind of friends you will mingle yourself with, because, like how my brother just said that the decisions we have made, some of some wanted to do doctor but they couldn't because of I wanted to be a dentist so you see, some wanted to be another thing, but due to the decisions they had to make for us.
Speaker 3:Some couldn't achieve that purpose.
Speaker 2:My girl is disabled, Alright well, thank you, thank you for that, thank you for sharing that. So the next thing is, some of you are adults, adults now. Some of you are, um, already parents congratulations, by the way and some of you are my heads of family, like you know. You're married, which is great. So, as a parent now, as a married uh, a person, you know what the most important thing about being a parent, or a married uh woman, or a married man?
Speaker 2:well for being a parent yeah, your parent, okay, and him for being a parent for being a parent.
Speaker 3:It's great somehow bond yeah, it's great bond between you and your child your child, yes, like when your child and that bond is what is the most important.
Speaker 3:That love, right, yes, the love and you, as a parent, you don't have to be harsh on your child. You have to bring her closer, him or her closer. Tell the child, please, when you are going through this, I ask you not to do this. But if you are doing it, it is not good. And if you are having a girl child, tell the girl child that. And if you are having a girl child, tell the girl child that don't allow man to be calling you or to approach you. Yes, you should be telling that girl child. So true that by talking to her, by not pushing yourself away from that child or being too difficult for her, when that happens, she will come and tell you Mom, this is what is happening. I don't like it. Maybe the mother will step in to prevent that. Yes, so that's why that's good, that's awesome, thank you.
Speaker 5:So that is so true. Yes, in the African context, certain conversations we are not allowed to have with our parents. So me, I have a nine-month-old boy. Nine-month-old Congratulations. But I wish I could. I could get more conversations with him, conversations I didn't get with my dad.
Speaker 5:Growing up, yeah, growing up this is something you could talk about. We are forbid to talk about certain things. Yes, for instance, kids are not allowed to talk about their body parts. Yes, as if it's a taboo to talk about our body parts. But if the child has been educated about our body parts and what is useful, and then somebody cannot rape the child because she's already aware, she's already familiar, and here there are a lot of social teaching about that. But most often the girls are quietly raped because they and some of them, some parents, are very harsh, are very angry with their kids, so they do not always want to listen to their own part of the story. So I've been growing up as a parent. I am willing, I'm ready to land for my, for my, for my, for my kids coming up. I I wished I could get more conversation with them. I think I should live as an example. So every life I live should be an example that is needed and the way I want them to grow up. I should be a living testament to my kids.
Speaker 2:Thank you, thank you, thank you. Any more about being a parent or being married, like how do you learn what's the most important thing?
Speaker 3:I am now married. I am carrying somebody's last name and I think so. Any decision I'm making now I don't only consider myself, I consider somebody else, and my husband is proud that she also raised me. Sometimes he will say to me that I am different in the way I do things, and I will probably answer back that yes, I was differently raised. It is good.
Speaker 2:Thank, thank you.
Speaker 4:So just to conclude the parental system yeah, we have been taught our responsibilities living in your home. Yeah, because this is something. If, way, we are not trained to be a parent. You know this is something. Um, if wait, we are not trained to be a parent. Okay, you know this is something, but the moment you trying to go into the stages of life, you know it's time now, because now, imagine, you have to keep paying rent, if something I need to provide for the home, you know this is something, um, pretty much inspire you, push you harder to work harder yeah in life for you to care about your families or your parents.
Speaker 4:Um the difficult class all over, um it's been clouded by something called love because, where there is love.
Speaker 3:You know, you go through all those stages, yeah yeah, and also as as somebody who now has our own family sales. It taught us financial management. I am helping my husband to manage our little finances. You know, these are one of the things that I'm proud of that sales. He taught me so well to budget my life. My life, my entire life is being budgeted. Good, I penned down every little penny that I used so I don't just waste money on things that are not needed.
Speaker 2:Yes, thank you, thank you. So so you have a child. You talk about that. So if something happened to you, right? What will you want for that child? Where will the child go? Something will happen to you as a parent. Where will you leave your child or where will you want to try to go if something? Happened like if something will happen to you, let's say yeah of course I would love my child, my, to go through.
Speaker 4:I mean, feel the love of um. Of course the mom stays back, so not somewhere separate um out of the family, no, okay you don't want them to go to an orphanage.
Speaker 2:You want them to stay within family.
Speaker 4:Let them grow up with the family so that I'll go for my, my after me.
Speaker 3:The best option for my children are my, my, my, my sisters, my sisters. Yes okay.
Speaker 2:And why is that? Why not? Why don't? Why don't send them to the to live in orphanage? Why do you want to leave it in your family of?
Speaker 4:course, of course we've. We've talked about all the challenges. We we lost a lot of things. We knows when we went out of the orphanage what and what we face.
Speaker 3:There are a whole lot of difficulties, of course, nothing different I don't want my children to experience what I've experienced and I know my family. We give them everything they need to know growing up as children. Yes, so I trust my family to raise my children. Yes, thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you. So now this is where you put yourself in the leadership role of your country. If you were in charge of child welfare in your country, what would you do differently when it comes to the care of orphans and the most vulnerable children, and why would you do that If you were in charge of, let's say, child welfare, like Minister of Children and Children's Affairs?
Speaker 3:Let's say I was the Minister for Children and Children's Affairs, I will prefer family care. Yes, I prefer the family care to that of the orphanage care or residential care. Yes, that of the orphanage care or residential care. Yes, I want, and this is my, my, my wish for every child that they grow up in a family. Yes, yeah thank you.
Speaker 2:Anything else, if you were in charge of your country or like the affairs of children, what would be when it comes to caring for orphans or vulnerable children? What will you do differently?
Speaker 4:of course me. I will stop all orphanages. I won't even go back. I will just stop all orphanages. Of course there should be home to care for, because we have their city and stuff. But these are kids. I prefer the kids to stay with their homes um the families, whatever. There is no immediate family, they can stay with the foster parent, but just let them feel that little amount of love and the family done and they seclude their sight, call on F1H, spend their whole life and later they go out and decide to strive, find it very difficult to adapt Because when they are in the community they face all other challenges too. They go through that and they also feel the love of the parents or families.
Speaker 2:Thank you. So we all know we're hearing more and more about the importance of engaging young people in care reform. Like you were talking about changing the way instead of supporting children, instead of in orphanage, put them to families. That's all what we are talking about. But why do you think it's important for you, for care leavers, for the voices, for your voices to be heard, to be part of this conversation, going forward to make sure your voices are heard, your opinions, you are part of the conversation to make sure this really happens, as policies and governments are trying to make this decision happen. Why do you need to be part of that? Why do you need to be engaged in care reform as care leaver?
Speaker 3:Because we've already gone through it and we have the experience. We have known what we've gone through and what has happened to us. So for being part of the program to tell others, we just tell them that we have been there and we know the challenges. So for being in the orphanage, I don't think it is a good idea because when you are out you find it difficult to associate yourself with others. So even do the other hard works like getting water from the well, going to the farm, cutting wood, bringing it for you to cook. All that, coming from school, cook late and eat All such things will be difficult for you. So my best advice is for them to be to their families my best advice is for them to be to their families.
Speaker 5:There is a saying that says he who feels it knows it. So we've been there and we know exactly how. So some people who are stakeholders, who are making decisions for children, they have not been part of it. So, both as caregivers, as care leaders, we have been part of it. Yeah, so, both as care leavers, as care leaders, who have been part of it. So our voices must be heard. Yeah, so we know what, what it feels to be in an orphanage. Yeah, we know what we've missed when you have been separated from your family for a very, very long time yeah you know what skills or what opportunities you will never get.
Speaker 5:You know what ties, what bridges that you will not build again for the rest of your life. So I think care leavers should be considered in terms of making decisions for the kids who are living in the orphanages. Then, lastly, I want to emphasize that family is very, very much important. If you can give all the riches in the world, then you do not have a family. It's a very big problem. So, as for me personally, if I could get a loaf of bread, I would like to share it with my son than me having it alone. That's very powerful, yes. So if you have, if I could have a plate of rice, I would like to eat it with my siblings than eating it alone. So family means a lot thank you.
Speaker 2:So yeah, as a wrap up here, how can care leavers right be more supported now? How can care leavers be more supported?
Speaker 5:so having podcast, so so you have to watch over your brother. So for CRC, we know who are care leavers, we know who are the people that need support. So for now, for me, a medical doctor has a job, so I may need support, but I may want support, but I do not need support. There are others that are on the streets that have lost their way, that they actually need support not only financial support.
Speaker 5:They need support morally they need support medically, they need support financially, so in all forms, because they are even provoked in the community. They say you have been staying at the CRC, you have been given everything, you have an opportunity and you do not make use of this opportunity. Yes, but they do not make use of the opportunity.
Speaker 5:But it is not all by themselves yeah they are broken chains along the way, even though they have contributed in other ways, but they are broken chains. They are broken links that are not caused all by themselves. There is something that has deviated them, but all is not lost. So I think we can support them physically, emotionally and spiritually. We can pray for them. Instead of working, we can pray for them.
Speaker 3:We can support them by giving them a second chance at life. Maybe the first option they chose did not go well and they might have learned their lessons and they want to do better this time around. So for our brothers who are now on drugs, they need another support too. Maybe go learn skills, learn jobs, go back to college, just to start all over again, and maybe this time around, now that they have experienced the good and the bad, maybe this is the best time for them to make a very wise decision okay yes, yes and so put it that way it is different for everybody.
Speaker 3:Yeah, some may need school supports okay right now most of them are dropped out. They have been dropped from college, from school. Some of them did not finish secondary school yes, especially some of them.
Speaker 3:Most of them did not finish secondary school, so they need to go back to school and complete their course or to go back to college, and some need financial support. Yeah, others, if you ask them now, they don't want to go back to college, they just need some finance, a little capital to start up a business which can sustain them and their families.
Speaker 3:Yes, thank you and secondly, the other thing is that, when we are done with discourse, to get a job is another thing. Yeah, yes, to get a job is a very difficult in this country since you have the connection is very hard for you to get a job yeah then some need psychosocial supports, counseling. Yes, I, I think most of the care leavers they need counseling. They need somebody talking to them, not to make decisions for them, but to just guide them.
Speaker 2:Yes, okay.
Speaker 4:So, to just be like a conclusion of this, of course we know from the name care leaver this is somebody who has gone through all this system. So, being these caregivers, these are some people, these are us that also need support financially, because when you support a caregiver, you are not only supporting the individual, because when you transit me into another person there might take care of families. Yeah, you know those people that are depending on us because, as you know, as we are now, we are not in a better food stage, of whatever things, but we're doing our best to strive. Yeah, like, for example, like I'm studying, at the same time working.
Speaker 4:So, imagine family depending on me? Yeah, yeah, which, of course, I have to take care of myself through college, to pay for my tuition and all that stuff. So, if I'm being supported, like, okay, I'm trying to lift myself for my family or for the chain of whatever people, to change our country as a whole, if I'm being supported in one way of having access to financial support, okay, I will take care of your schooling Then that leaves a burden for me. So I will have to work with supporting my family. So, when I'm being educated, when I have achieved whatever I'm going through, then I start supporting whoever comes after me, so we care leavers also need the support for us to help transform the community as well thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2:So thank you very much. So last question here we normally ask all our guests you know ending the days optimistic voices. Now you know being positive about something like hopeful. You know this ministry, what we do, so go around to talk about what are you really optimistic about, what are you hopeful, what are you positive about?
Speaker 3:yes, you're optimistic about yes. Yes, I am hopeful that there will be a day in syria that um will not have any record of of an age. Okay, yes, that will hear the good news that all the children, yes have been into families. Thank you, I am hopeful for this.
Speaker 2:Thank you and more optimism, positive thinking.
Speaker 3:I'm hopeful that all those that have dropped out from school, from colleges, that they will become somebody through this meeting, to what we are saying.
Speaker 2:They will become somebody tomorrow, thank you very optimistic but, all the caregivers who have not be able to have somewhat challenged. Yeah, um, the conversation we are having today, you know, will be of use to somebody making a decision, somebody influencing something.
Speaker 5:I am hopeful that there will be a day in life where all parents, mothers and fathers will no longer want to have their children in orphanages. They'll be in position to provide and care for them, even not all their wants, but at least their basic needs. Thank, you?
Speaker 2:Yes, thank you.
Speaker 4:Well, my hope is one day, of course, our voices will be heard in Sierra Leone and the world as large, as we're working together to transist homes from furnages to family-based care, as this year also took a very bold step couple years ago when you were the director. It wasn't easy, but we're working towards that and we thought it was difficult but then we found out no, it was easy and it better and it's safe, release and possible thing for us. So hopefully our voices will be heard someday as we try to work together and also get support for us to push further so that other people or kids or other care leavers will work on their footprint well.
Speaker 2:Thank you all for joining us today and for this, and thank you for sharing your experiences and your knowledge, your expertise. I am very, very hopeful and sure that your voices will be of use and will make a difference. So thank you to our listeners for joining us for this episode of Optimistic Voices. It is a big messy world out there and there is no shortage of need, but we here at Optimistic Voices believe that with radical courage and radical collaboration together we can change the world. Thank you very much. Here's a joyful invitation to other mission-minded churches out there. Whether you are a pastor, a mission and outreach leader or an active church member and you want your church to have incredible opportunities, to experience great joy and excitement about its ministry, I joyfully invite you to consider joining a team of churches that partner with Helping Children Worldwide to help create a healthier and happier future for vulnerable children, families and impoverished communities. Thank you.
