Arrival of Angelo and Darock in the evening with the girls from Kamituga after a strenuous journey due to mud and rain

Bonanné in the flour store ( he had helped carry the sacks)

Registration of children at school

Darock with Justin and Neema.
Justin’s look has changed so much. And he never smiled when he arrived

12 and 8, lived in Kamituga with an elderly and ailing grandmother. Their mother died of a disease attributed to witchcraft, their father in a mining accident due to a tunnel collapse.

8 years old, lived in Mwenga with a mother who was paralyzed in one leg. The two older sisters became pregnant at 14; the eldest left her daughter ( now 5 years old) with her mother and went to find work in the mines. The other has yet to give birth and is helping her sick mother. She wanted to come with us.

14, we retrieved him from Kamituga Orphanage, a small center run by a local couple where a number of orphaned children are taken in, but where the quality of care is very low due to lack of means, organization and staff training. The mother had died from “sorcellerie,” and the father had lost his life in the mines. For a living he went to the forest to help a man in coal production work, and at night he often slept on the road, on the market stalls, in Kamituga, until he was taken into the orphanage. He had been referred to us for epilepsy that had never been treated. He looked sad and malnourished when we first saw him. He still had no seizures, but we immediately started treatment for extrapulmonary tuberculosis. After a few weeks he is much improved, and he has regained a few pounds, but the treatment is long. He is a very intelligent child who promises to succeed very well in school. he cares very much about studying. He is a sweet and very quiet child who has easily integrated, and he also loves school very much.

12 (?) years old, does not know his age. Casually found during a visit to the gold mines around Kamituga, where he helped sift sand and carry loads. At night he slept on the road. He immediately wanted to follow us. He was abandoned by his mother, who left with his younger brothers and another man, and by his father, who sought another woman. His mother also worked in the mines as a “twengeze” (that’s what they call the women who break stones all day to look for gold dust). At first he was very confused, seemed to have lost track of time, but after a month his narrative became more coherent. She loves writing, drawing, painting and theater very much. His drawings are full of life and color, representing flowers, plants, animals. He is a very fickle child, unable to reflect. One morning, after six months at Maison Msaada, he decided to follow Daniel and return to Kamituga. We are still waiting for his return.

14 years old. She lived many years on the street after the death of her parents, both of whom were murdered. His mother was a prostitute. It was not easy to get him used to a regular life but he also loved going to school and was proud of his little progress, as well as proud when he was able to help us with some heavier work, being a very strong little boy. Thanks in part to the affection we gave him, he stayed at Maison Msaada for six months until he decided, in his impulsiveness, to follow Daniel and return to Kamituga. We are convinced that it was his intention to return to the center, but he was probably hindered by the rapid deterioration of the situation, with the arrival of armed groups. We still hope to get him back to train him in a trade, then ché is a very skilled child with his hands.

13, found in Kamituga one night on the road with Bonanné and Héritier. He had been abandoned by his parents. After about five months spent at Maison Msaada, he decided to return to live on the street in Kamituga. He had difficulty accepting the basic rules of community life. He is a very impulsive child, unable to think through the consequences of his actions. We would like to be able to look for him, but the road to Kamituga is not safe at the moment because of the unstable situation created throughout the East of the country as of the end of January 2025. We will also need to offer him vocational training to induce him to stay with us: for this we are counting on the opening of a carpentry center once the situation is more stable.

11 years old. Found at age 2 months along a river and placed in the care of a woman who had already taken in other orphans. She began to have behavior problems at an early age, bouts of aggression and agitation. It had not been possible to school her, perhaps also because of mild cognitive impairment. She had been treated with powerful antipsychotics to control her seizures. She spent her days wandering around the neighborhoods of Kamituga.

At Maison Msaada, we took her off all medication, and although it was hard at first because she often had fits of rage and would hit the younger children, she gradually began to comply with the rules, and to help the other children with household tasks, including caring for the younger children. Despite severe learning and concentration difficulties, we were able to get her into the first grade.

Neema wanted to return to her foster mother in Kamituga in February 2025, possibly following a big fight with the other young girls in the House. She continued to attend school there (at least until it was closed due to the war) and no longer has bouts of aggression, with no need to take medication.

11 years old, weighs 16 kg and measures 104 cm. He came on foot from Kabogi, a village ca. 70 km from Mwenga, with the woman who took him in after the death of his mother, who was already ill when he was a baby and was prematurely widowed. He is very reserved and arrived more than a month after the others, but he is happy to be here is to be able to study

Three little brothers, aged approximately 12, 10 and 7, lived alone in a shack in Kamituga following the death of their parents. Their father had already abandoned them after the death of their mother. Justine spent all day at the market trying to scrape together some money in exchange for some services. In the evenings she would cook for her little brothers. Julie would go out to fetch water, the rest of the time she stayed in the house cleaning, washing, changing Justin, an autistic et epileptic child with a developmental delay, who never went out. Justin did extraordinary trials with us in just one month, thanks to the affection and attention of so many people around him.

12 years old. Lived in Kamituga with a sick grandmother, who had worked in the mines. Mother age died of AIDS, father had been found hanged. Older siblings had already ended up on the street, he had already had to drop out of school for three years. He also has a great desire to study and is very good at drawing. He feels at home with us.

13 years old. His father is a military man, his mother left with another man, and he found himself on the road. His friends, Bonanne and Christian, brought him to us. He is an exuberant and joyful child. After spending more than five months at Maison Msaada, one morning before dawn he decided to take the Kamituga road again. He was very proud of his progress at school: in a short time he had learned to write, was the first to leave the house in the morning, sometimes without even eating, in fear of being late. He had stolen chalk left in the classroom by the teacher, along with three other of our children. This was discovered, and he could not stand the humiliation he suffered in front of the more than 60 children in his class, and convinced Bonanné and Kika, his fellow street children, to follow him as well. Unfortunately, unlike him, the other two no longer have anyone to look for, while he still has the opportunity to search for his mother, who may have remained in Kamituga. They, like almost all street children, are also very flighty and impulsive. Our hope is to be able to retrieve them and include them in the carpentry workshop, once the political situation allows us not only to move, but also to pursue new projects. However, there is a fear that he and the other three children who have returned to live on the streets may be recruited into the militias, at this time of unrest where various armed groups are circulating.

4 (5?) years old. She was abandoned soon after birth by her young mother, who left her with her paternal grandmother, to go to work in the mines of Lugushwa, where she met her death about a year later. The father died possibly of tuberculosis; he also worked in the mines. The child was after two years placed in the care of an aunt who is ill, but who works as a “twengeze” when she can and whose husband has tuberculosis. She was hospitalized many times because of malnutrition.
She is a tiny, exuberant child with great vitality, very independent; she has adapted from day one to her new life with other children, without ever complaining, and loves to be surrounded by lots of attention!

She is 14 years old. Motherless at an early age, she lived with her grandmother in Kamituga and her older siblings had left to work in the mines. Her father, who also worked in the mines, died several years after her mother from an illness attributed to witchcraft. When grandmother decided to leave on foot to reach a remote region (the Shabunda territory), the child, no longer able to afford to pay the hut rent, went to live with a friend of her mother’s and began working in the mines. When she scraped together enough money to pay for the trip, she went to Bukavu in search of relatives whom, however, she never found. She remained on the road for a month until the police found her and took her to Ekabana Center, a shelter for street girls, from which she was sent, as she was originally from Mwenga territory. She had only attended the first three years of elementary school and is now very happy to go to school.

8 years. Taken in at Maison Msaada in April 2025. Lived in Mwenga in great poverty, taken in out of pity by neighbors in their hut, along with his mother and 4 brothers and sisters, after the shack where they lived had collapsed following torrential rains. The father, a severe alcoholic, had already abandoned the household. We found the child in a very neglectful condition. The mother works as a sand transporter. It is only women in Mwenga who carry on their backs, for several kilometers, sacks of at least 30 kilograms of sand from the riverbed to the town where they sell it for a few francs to make cement. However, demand has become low in recent months as a result of the severe economic regression caused by the war. Mukamba had never gone to school. He quickly adapted to life in the house and is taking our literacy classes.