Am I losing Kasisi?

 

Reflections on Kasisi Children's Home centenary

There are questions that arrive silently. They do not knock. They do not announce themselves with urgency. They slip in through old photographs, through yellowing memories, through the glow of a computer screen late at night, through a name remembered, through a face no longer here.

And lately, one question has been sitting beside me with unsettling nostalgia. Am I losing Kasisi?

For twenty-nine years, I have sat behind a keyboard as the webmaster of Kasisi Children’s Home website. Twenty-nine years of uploading Kasisi news, photographs, correcting broken links, answering questions from strangers who somehow became family and trying, often inadequately, to tell the world that somewhere in Zambia there exists a place where love became an institution long before technology ever found it.

Twenty-nine years. Long enough for children to become parents. Long enough for benefactors to become memories. Long enough for voices once familiar to become silence.

And perhaps long enough for a man to wonder whether he is still holding Kasisi. Or whether Kasisi is slowly slipping through his fingers.

I think back to the articles I wrote in the years gone by.

A postcard from Fiji.
Thousands of kilometres away from home, on an island surrounded by waters so blue they seemed unreal, I discovered something I had not expected. Which is that Kasisi travels.

It is not confined to brick walls, jacaranda trees, chapel bells, or the laughter of innocent children playing in the corridors. It lives in memory. It follows you into airports, hotels, foreign streets, and lonely evenings.

Even there, Kasisi found me. Or perhaps I found that I could never truly leave it.

Footprints in the Sands of History.
Some footprints are fresh, sharp, unmistakable. Others are fading, almost erased by time. I have spent years walking through Kasisi’s history, tracing the lives of those who built what many I inherited – a love beyond self.

Sisters whose sacrifices were never meant for applause. Children whose names have slowly faded from my memory. Workers who arrived before sunrise and left after sunset. Donors who gave quietly. Priests who prayed faithfully. Each left a footprint of love.

And I have often asked myself. What right do I have to walk among them? I am not a founder. I am simply the man who built a website. And yet, somehow, history allowed me to become its witness. Sometimes its storyteller. Sometimes its mourner. And sometimes, painfully, its archivist.

There are stories that still ache.

Peter! I am sorry.
This was a lesson of love beyond self. Some names never leave you. Some regrets never completely fade. There are moments in life when words arrive too late, when understanding comes after goodbye, when apology becomes less about being heard and more about honouring the truth.

Peter taught me that love is not always neat. That service is not always victorious. That memory can be both blessing and burden.

And if I am honest, there are still conversations with Peter that I continue in silence.

My father and the picture on my wall.
A picture that has become more than paper and frame. It has become a mirror.

As the years have passed, through Kasisi Children’s Home, I have begun to understand him in ways youth never allowed. His silences. His sacrifices. His stubbornness. His quiet dignity.

And sometimes, as I look at Kasisi, I wonder whether my relationship with this home has begun to resemble my relationship with that picture. Something I deeply love. Something I cannot fully possess. Something that shaped me. Something I fear one day I may only look at from a distance.

Then came Susan.

A world without Susan.
There are some people whose absence becomes louder than their presence ever was. Susan was one of those.

Her departure left a silence that words could not fill. And yet, strangely, her absence also taught me that Kasisi was never built around individuals. It was built around something larger. Something divine. Something that survives funerals. Something that survives tears. Something that survives us.

And then there was Francis.
Without fear, he walked with us.

Some people carry courage so naturally that you forget how rare it is. Francis walked not as a hero seeking recognition, but as a servant who understood that love often requires bravery.

He reminded me that fear is not the absence of danger. It is the refusal to let danger define your mission.

And now I ask myself. Am I still walking with that same courage? Or am I slowly becoming a spectator to the very story I once helped tell?

And finally…

Where angels walk among us.
Perhaps that article was never really about angels. Perhaps it was about recognising grace in ordinary people. A sister folding laundry. A child sharing bread. A caregiver staying awake through the night. A donor remembering birthdays. A volunteer holding a frightened hand.

Angels.

Not with wings. But with worn shoes. And tired eyes. And faithful hearts.

I have met many of them at Kasisi. More than I deserve. More than I can count.

And now, as Kasisi Children’s Home approaches its centenary Thanksgiving Celebration on December 5, 2026, one hundred years since the first seeds of love were planted on that sacred ground, I find myself standing at a strange crossroads.

One hundred years. A century of children. A century of prayers. A century of tears. A century of laughter. A century of miracles disguised as ordinary days. A century of love beyond self.

And I ask again. Am I losing Kasisi? Or is Kasisi preparing to teach me one final lesson?

That Kasisi was never mine to hold. Not in 1997 when I first became its webmaster. Not through the stories. Not through the photographs. Not through the names of Peter, Susan, Francis, or the countless others who shaped my soul.

Kasisi was never something to own. It was always something to serve. Something to witness. Something to remember. Something to pass on.

Perhaps what I am losing is not Kasisi. Perhaps what I am losing is the illusion that I could ever keep it for myself.

And perhaps that is exactly how centenaries work. They remind us that institutions built on love do not belong to one generation. They belong to every footprint. Every angel. Every child. Every prayer.

Ora pro nobis.