Fikile

I got a call from Mthobisi late afternoon on Tuesday. "Hey are you at Thandanani?" 

"I'm across the street at the grocery store. But I will be there in a few minutes."

"Do you want company?" Ever since Mtho and I did the therapeutic camp together, we have talked about hanging out sometime after work. Cool, I thought, I wont start making dinner in case Mtho and I go get dinner. She said she would be there in half an hour. An hour later, she pulled in front of my door. I noticed that she wasn't alone and instantly realized what she meant by "company."

"Is it okay if I ask you to keep a child for me over night? There was some confusion with the orphanage we took her to, and I don't know where to take her until we can sort it out." I smiled and agreed, half excited about doing something helpful, half scared about the language barrier I was going to face. Mtho waved a teenage girl out of the car. A cleanly shaven head, a shy smile and a single grocery bag containing all of her belongings, she looked at me and seemed as scared as I was. "Fikile, nguBrittan la. Brittan, this is Fikile," Mtho introduced.

I took her in, showed her the bathroom, the kitchen, her bed. She knew little English, and I knew even less Zulu-- I had no idea how to pass the time and not bore this girl to death. I made friend rice, which she didn't seem too keen for. Then I had an idea-- I would teach her how to play the card game "Uno"-- simple enough, just colors and numbers. After a few tries, she got the hang it and we played several rounds, seemingly alternating who was winning. But, you can only play Uno for so long. I unintentionally played lots of charades trying to communicate with her. Generations, a really, really popular South African "soapie" came on and she was excited to watch, but in half an hour it was over and it was back to me wondering how to entertain her.

I had an idea: "Do you want to make cookies? I mean, biscuits?" I took her to the kitchen and together we made cinnamon sugar cookies [thank you mommy, for the cookie mix!]-- she had never made cookies before and she enjoyed mixing the butter into the dough and rolling said dough into balls. As we waited for them to bake I discovered our mutual love of Beyonce and brought some tunes into the kitchen. I danced around as I rolled the dough into balls [unintentional side-effect of listening to Beyonce], she looked at me and laughed... and then danced a little too. Just a little. We took the fresh cookies out and shared them, putting the extras in a ziplock baggie for her to take with her the next day. I asked her if she liked the cookies: "So nice!"

I learned more than she enjoyed her first taste of sugar cookies. Fikile is 14, oldest of 4 siblings [don't know where the others are]. She doesn't like candy, but instead prefers chips. Loves listening to the radio and singing hip hop [I don't think she ever turned off the radio since she got here-- even when watching TV and all through the night]. Fikile also likes Jay-Z, Chris Brown, and Ne-yo... but she said Rihanna is a "beach." Fikile doesn't like wearing dresses, and there is nothing in the world she loves more than soccer. She can name all the countries she loves to support and we stayed up late into the night watching Egypt and Nigeria finish 1-1 in the African Cup of Nations.

The next morning I made scrambled eggs and let her sleep in, despite the fact it was the first day of school for all the other children around South Africa. Fikile proudly wore her #7 soccer jersey. Nozipho was supposed to pick her up that day to take her to an orphanage, but as she waited bored to death in my room we realized that afternoon it wasn't going to happen-- if I had known I would have taken her to the field with a ball and played soccer where there were proper nets. I took her to KFC for lunch, went to the library to get a big book [with many pictures] on the history of soccer and some possible boredom-beating movies. That evening I went with Fikile to the grocery store and told her we could buy anything she wanted to eat for dinner that night and breakfast the next morning. She was so excited when she pointed to the CocoPops and I said, "of course!" She went to bed that night just as she did the night before-- falling asleep to a soccer match [Cameroon vs. Gabon].

Fikile left early this afternoon to Greytown Children's Home. If school wasn't an issue, I would have let her stay here as long as she needed to-- I am sure we would have figured out the communication. Between learning to play Uno, baking cookies for the first time, eating CocoPops and falling asleep every night to soccer, I hope I provided a comfortable transition between what is probably a somewhat difficult stage in her life. I enjoyed having her around.