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Children thrive in Colleen's Place of Hope
Di Caelers. 13 March 2003. Cape Argus. Republished courtesy of Independent Newspapers (Pty) Ltd.
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The tiny girl throws back her braids, strikes a "model" pose with hands on her hips, and yells "go girl", before collapsing in a fit of giggles as she gets a hug from her twin sister.
It could be the antics of any pretty little three-year-old, but Nicole's gorgeous smile hides years of pain and suffering as an HIV-positive child who was found abandoned with her twin Nicolette in a Khayelitsha toilet.
Her foster mother Colleen Naidoo cannot hold back the tears as she celebrates Nicole's third birthday, talking easily between the tears, shrieks and laughter of the 18 children she offers love and care to in her cramped Mitchell's Plain home.
Naidoo is one of those amazing people who open their hearts to needy children, irrespective of the fact that there isn't enough room for them all in her three-bedroomed council house.
Her husband Farrel works nightshift "because he's a big man and takes up a lot of space", to free up sleeping space for all the children in their care.
Naidoo is an emergency/foster mother who has also adopted a child in addition to having three children of her own.
"The house is small and so's the pot, but I can't give up any of these children. They've all got such painful stories. How can I say they must go," Naidoo asks, offering another hug to console a crying child.
There is little doubt that the fact that the twins, especially HIV-positive Nicole, are thriving is because of the love and care they get in the Naidoo household.
Nicole and Nicolette were brought to Naidoo after they were found abandoned in a Khayelitsha toilet at just three weeks of age. Although both twins initially tested HIV positive, later tests showed Nicolette was negative.
Nicole was not so lucky and Naidoo's tears flow as she recalls the 18 times in the past three years the child has been in hospital. But now she has new hope, with Nicole on anti-retrovirals courtesy of a programme at Groote Schuur Hospital.
Her doctor Paul Roux, head of Groote Schuur's paediatric HIV/AIDS service, says tests two weeks ago showed Nicole's viral load as undetectable.
Roux says it is not unusual for only one of a pair of twins to become infected, and often it is the baby born first.
Naidoo says she has prayed constantly for Nicole's health, and no one can deny her faith considering the bouncing child posing for the photographer, all smiles with her braids and little pink outfit. But there's no denying either that Naidoo's task cannot be an easy one.
"You need to be around here at mealtimes. The house is packed with children and there is never quite enough food to keep everyone happy," she says.
The Naidoos' own children are aged 21, 16 and 11, and their adopted daughter is four. There are also five foster children aged 16, six, four, three and five months.
And on top of that are the children who are brought in for emergency care.
"We support them on my husband's salary and we get grants for some of them. Sometimes we get some money from the courts. I've registered as a non-profit organisation and have sent out letters of appeal but have only got a few responses.
"It's tough, but everyone knows I'll never turn any child away even though sometimes I don't know whether I'm coming or going," Naidoo says.
She calls her nondescript home Colleen's Place of Hope, and it couldn't better named. Yet this remarkable woman is not prepared to accept any glory. "God gets all the glory, not me. I'm just a channel," she says.
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