Faith

Our housekeeper, Asunta, is one of 7 children, like me, and is about my age. But in some ways her life is very different. She is from south Sudan and is one of the many internally displaced persons here in Khartoum. She would like very much to move back to southern Sudan. Her husband and two of her brothers have died-war casualties and, perhaps (though I'm not sure) AIDS. So she has custody of several (five?) of a brother's children, and she lives with another brother and his family. I think she has no electricity in her home--she always charges her mobile phone at our house. Last week her nine year old niece started complaining of stomachache. It's appendicitis. When she told me about her niece being in the hospital, I told her she should just go home for the day. She insisted on staying and doing some work and explained why. "If there is nothing I can do, there is no purpose in worrying. I just put it in God's hands."