VIENNA, W.Va. -- West Virginia native Janine Roberts has dozens of children awaiting her return to Old Mutare in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. Her work with orphans in the AIDS-ravaged, economically struggling and politically conflicted country will continue as soon as a new work visa comes through.
Roberts says her first visit to Zimbabwe, a three-week mission trip when she was 20, changed her life. The West Virginia Wesleyan student went with a cousin on a trip that was to include a visit to an orphanage as well as a tour of other parts of Africa.
"That first time, my parents thought, 'Well, this is safe enough,'" Roberts said recently from the home of her parents, Randy and Veckie Roberts, in Vienna. "We went to the orphanage for two weeks, and we were supposed to do a safari and see Victoria Falls during the third week. We didn't want to leave the orphanage."
The first day she went into the orphanage, she met children that she would come to know and love through the next 12 years.
"God just said, 'This is where I want you.' I didn't know there were missionaries, I didn't know what my calling was, I just knew I had to be there," Roberts said.
Roberts came home with a passion to return.
"My parents thought it was still a whim. I wanted to go, but I even told myself, 'Oh, my gosh, I can't move to Africa!'" So Roberts finished college and moved to Kentucky to teach first grade.
The children of Zimbabwe haunted Roberts, so she spoke to her minister at St. Paul's Methodist Church in Parkersburg. The Rev. Paul Stadleman, who now lives in Beckley, showed her a path to follow.
"I never thought of seminary, but he suggested it. I needed a closer relationship with God before I took such a dramatic step," Roberts said. She attended Asbury Theological Seminary, and took a two-month trip in 2002 back to the orphanage.
Immediately following her graduation from seminary in 2004, she moved to Zimbabwe where 12 new children's homes had been built to replace the old orphanage. She lives at Fairfield Children's Homes with 80 children.
"The orphanage is for children who absolutely don't have relatives," Roberts pointed out.
Up at 4 a.m. every day, Roberts said each day is different, challenging and uplifting at the same time.
"A lot of times you wake up thinking you're going to do one thing and you end up doing another. Some days we have electricity, some days we don't. On those days, we just cook breakfast for the children on an outside fire," Roberts said. "The kids go to school at 6:30, and then I head to work at the AIDS clinic."
Roberts met one child, Nyarai, on her first visit. Twelve years later, the girl, now 17, thrives, living in Roberts' house and helping with the other children.
When Roberts returns to Zimbabwe, she will help expand programs that assist orphans still living with relatives in the nearby villages. These programs are known as Project HOPE, offering medical, nutritional and educational support to 200 orphaned children. Aimed at keeping families together, the outreach program gives food, money and other necessities to relatives who are willing to care for the orphaned children but who don't have the resources to do so.
The nutrition program helps children who are HIV-positive as well as those suffering from malnutrition.
"We mostly give them protein -- peanut butter and eggs -- and fruits," she said.
VIENNA, W.Va. -- West Virginia native Janine Roberts has dozens of children awaiting her return to Old Mutare in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. Her work with orphans in the AIDS-ravaged, economically struggling and politically conflicted country will continue as soon as a new work visa comes through.
Roberts says her first visit to Zimbabwe, a three-week mission trip when she was 20, changed her life. The West Virginia Wesleyan student went with a cousin on a trip that was to include a visit to an orphanage as well as a tour of other parts of Africa.
"That first time, my parents thought, 'Well, this is safe enough,'" Roberts said recently from the home of her parents, Randy and Veckie Roberts, in Vienna. "We went to the orphanage for two weeks, and we were supposed to do a safari and see Victoria Falls during the third week. We didn't want to leave the orphanage."
The first day she went into the orphanage, she met children that she would come to know and love through the next 12 years.
"God just said, 'This is where I want you.' I didn't know there were missionaries, I didn't know what my calling was, I just knew I had to be there," Roberts said.
Roberts came home with a passion to return.
"My parents thought it was still a whim. I wanted to go, but I even told myself, 'Oh, my gosh, I can't move to Africa!'" So Roberts finished college and moved to Kentucky to teach first grade.
The children of Zimbabwe haunted Roberts, so she spoke to her minister at St. Paul's Methodist Church in Parkersburg. The Rev. Paul Stadleman, who now lives in Beckley, showed her a path to follow.
"I never thought of seminary, but he suggested it. I needed a closer relationship with God before I took such a dramatic step," Roberts said. She attended Asbury Theological Seminary, and took a two-month trip in 2002 back to the orphanage.
Immediately following her graduation from seminary in 2004, she moved to Zimbabwe where 12 new children's homes had been built to replace the old orphanage. She lives at Fairfield Children's Homes with 80 children.
"The orphanage is for children who absolutely don't have relatives," Roberts pointed out.
Up at 4 a.m. every day, Roberts said each day is different, challenging and uplifting at the same time.
"A lot of times you wake up thinking you're going to do one thing and you end up doing another. Some days we have electricity, some days we don't. On those days, we just cook breakfast for the children on an outside fire," Roberts said. "The kids go to school at 6:30, and then I head to work at the AIDS clinic."
Roberts met one child, Nyarai, on her first visit. Twelve years later, the girl, now 17, thrives, living in Roberts' house and helping with the other children.
When Roberts returns to Zimbabwe, she will help expand programs that assist orphans still living with relatives in the nearby villages. These programs are known as Project HOPE, offering medical, nutritional and educational support to 200 orphaned children. Aimed at keeping families together, the outreach program gives food, money and other necessities to relatives who are willing to care for the orphaned children but who don't have the resources to do so.
The nutrition program helps children who are HIV-positive as well as those suffering from malnutrition.
"We mostly give them protein -- peanut butter and eggs -- and fruits," she said.
One boy Roberts cares for is Tanaka, 10. He lives with his grandmother, he's HIV-positive, he has tuberculosis, and his grandmother works seven days a week.
"I act as an extra parent," Roberts said. "It's my favorite part. Tanaka's name means 'we are happy,' or 'we are good.' I like that."
Roberts, 32, is home in West Virginia now, awaiting another work visa. She's speaking to groups and catching up with family and friends. Recently, she went to South Carolina and Texas to drive a load of supplies to be shipped from Texas to Zimbabwe by a friend.
"The unemployment is 85 percent in Zimbabwe, so they won't give work visas if it takes a job away from one of the natives," Roberts explained. "A few churches support me, and I am sponsored by CornerStone International, a small mission that funds my expenses and our educational program."
The educational program provides uniforms and school supplies. Without these things, children are not allowed to go to school.
Roberts has published a memoir, "Dare to Love Completely" (excerpt below), that details the situation in Zimbabwe and her work there. She wrote extensively in journals for years and those journals eventually turned into her book.
"I knew I didn't want to lose the voices of the children I love," Roberts said.
"For me, right now, the hardest thing is just knowing that they don't give out permanent visas, so when I'm there, I don't know if I'll get to stay," Roberts said. "When you're a mother figure to them, you want to act like a mother to them, but you don't want them to get too attached if you can't stay.
"If I knew I was going to live there forever, although I know I couldn't adopt the children, I could have them come live with me like a family."
The recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile make fundraising difficult for missions like the one in Zimbabwe. Roberts, however, said her best advice for donations to ravaged countries is to give to smaller, grass-roots organizations that have a proven track record of maneuvering through the system, such as the one she works with in Zimbabwe. She recommends giving money, not goods.
To donate to Roberts' work in Zimbabwe, checks can be sent to CornerStone International, P.O. Box 192, Wilmore, KY 40390, Memo: HOPE of Zim.
When Roberts moved to Zimbabwe, she had to learn to deal with the daily devastation and desolation.
"I realized that in that culture, a huge population is HIV-positive, there is hunger, poverty, unemployment. ... I needed to find a new way to grieve," Roberts said. "It's painful and hard, but children just die earlier there. Once I learned to deal with that, I could move on and do my work.
"It's very much a group-oriented society. They are each others' life and health insurance."
Reach Sara Busse at sara.bu...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-1249.
Excerpt from Janine Roberts' memoir "Dare to Love Completely"
My new friend, Nyarai, a five-year-old I had met earlier, wanted to be held. Throughout the afternoon, we laughed and danced our way to music coming from a small radio. Her smile lit me up inside each time she pointed to her stomach and said yes, waiting to be tickled.
I brought her into the small kitchen attached to the courtyard and searched through my bag for my one remaining mint. When we went back outside, a boy named Moses began crying hysterically over his lack of mints. Seeing his large round eyes fill with tears, I instantly felt guilty for not having more to offer. I watched as Nyarai immediately split the mint with her teeth and placed half in the open mouth of the sobbing boy. Nyarai had no material possessions of her own but was willing to share half of what she had been given to stop Moses from being sad. God spoke to me in that moment, and I realized I would someday return to Fairfield Orphanage to stay and learn from His children.
