Despite the challenges a mother faces living in a remote village in Uganda, she boldly steps up to take in her orphaned nieces and nephews.

Sarah adopted her cousin’s son, Ivan, above, and his four siblings after their parents died.
Ivan, 7, is the fourth of five children. He lives with his siblings, a cousin, and an aunt in the remote village of Kachomo in Eastern Uganda. They live in a small house owned by their Aunt Sarah, who is their guardian.
One recent morning, as we set out to visit Ivan and his family, we were told by his Child Champion at the Hope Center that Ivan was in school, but his little sister and aunt were at home to receive us.
As we enter the home, we hear a little voice humming from the back of the house.
While standing in front of the house, Brenda, a Child Champion from the Hope Center, calls out for anyone in the home to receive us.
A little girl peeks from behind the back wall of the house, then runs toward us smiling before she kneels and extends her hand to Brenda for a handshake — a Ugandan cultural greeting.
She then turns to Cecilia, another Child Champion from the center, and then to me for the same. The little girl is called Ivy, and she is Ivan’s youngest sister.
“Where is mom?” Brenda asks, referring to their Aunt Sarah.
“Over there,” Ivy says, pointing toward a banana plantation on a farm behind their house. “She is digging.”
Brenda asks her to go call her aunt.
Ivy runs toward the plantation giggling before shouting, “Ma! Ma! Ivan’s visitors are here.”
Coming in from the farm, Sarah cleans up before joining us under the shade by their house. She sits on the ground, as is the local custom when receiving guests, while she offers us small wooden folding chairs to sit on.

Sarah with her niece, Ivy, who is Ivan’s youngest sister.
Sarah tells us she registered Ivan at the Hope Center over two years ago. She first heard of it when Cecilia visited her at home to talk about the program being set up at the Revival church in Kachomo.
“My child,” Sarah says, referring to her nephew Ivan, “was at the school-going age, but hadn’t joined school yet. And so were his older siblings. I was struggling to find fees for the older ones so there’s no way he was going to join school.”
This motivated Sarah to try and get Ivan into the sponsorship program.
“Him being in the program makes me feel like God is finally looking out for my late brother’s children,” she tells us.
Tragedy Strikes Family
Sarah says that she never thought she would be responsible for kids other than her own.
“No one prepares for the eventualities that come with death, and it is hard to imagine it,” she says.
Ivan’s dad died in a traffic accident. And then shortly after his death, Ivan’s mom died too, in what was suspected to be a heart attack.
After the death of both parents, Ivan, his two brothers, and two sisters were orphaned and alone. In Ivan’s community, when a parent dies, the children left behind automatically become the responsibility of the surviving grandparents.
But these kids didn’t have any living grandparents, and Sarah knew that if no one stepped up, the kids would be left to suffer alone.
“Most of the kids that wander around with no home in our village or those in orphanages are there solely because their parents and grandparents are dead. No extended relative is usually willing to step up and care for the kids,” Sarah says.
But she knew she wanted to change the narrative.
“I felt pity for the kids. I wondered how I would have wanted my child to be cared for if I died,” Sarah says.
Though she was already busy caring for her 14-year-old son, Sarah took in five more kids.
Family Gift Provides Relief
Shortly after taking them in, Sarah says, her husband walked out of the marriage and five years later is yet to return.

Sarah stands with Ivy in their doorway.
She suspects that the burden of caring for the extra kids in her household drove him away, but she is glad that her in-laws have allowed her to continue living on their land.
“Despite my husband leaving, my in-laws have allowed me to continue living with these kids here and I have been allowed to farm on a small piece of land that would have been my husband’s, and this gives me hope for better days ahead,” Sarah says.
In addition to farming to earn a living, she also has a small grocery kiosk where she sells snacks and vegetables and earns the equivalent of $2 daily, which is not enough to cover the family’s basic needs.
Looking around her small plot of land with a few banana trees growing in the back of the house, Sarah tells Brenda, Cecilia, and me what a challenge it is to raise six kids with a meager income.
She needs about $10 a day to cover their basic needs.
But today, she is grateful that the sponsorship is helping give hope to the whole family.
A family gift from Ivan’s sponsor enabled them to renovate their house after a huge storm brought down one of the walls.
As we listen to Sarah’s story, I am impressed by her strength and compassion.
Today, Ivan is finishing kindergarten and will be joining primary school soon. Thanks to his school fees being paid and school supplies being bought by the Hope Center, he looks forward to becoming a teacher when he grows up.
They tell me he is a little shy, but is comfortable around Brenda, and looks up to her as a role model.
As we conclude our visit with Sarah, we head out to Ivan’s school for a quick visit before we leave. At the school, Ivan whispers to Brenda to ask me if I can take a photo of him with Brenda and Cecilia. He says they are his favorite teachers at the Hope Center.
Sarah’s hope for Ivan is that he can study hard in school and be a beacon of hope for his siblings and for the family. Thanks to Ivan’s sponsors and these dedicated Child Champions at the Hope Center, I can see that he is well on his way to doing just that.
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