Matlhodi was ten years old when I met her in 2004. She was a sweet, shy little girl whose smile lit up the room. She was a good student and a maternal, compassionate child, always willing to help the young ones at school. When I asked her about her dreams for the future, she replied that she had two requests: first, she wanted enough food to eat, and second, she wanted one more article of clothing to wear, as her school uniform was all she owned.
My daughter Emma and I became pen pals with little Matlhodi over the following year, and we went back to meet her again in 2005. She was so painfully thin that I hardly recognized her when I saw her. I received a phone call two months later telling me that she had tragically drowned as she was crossing a stream on her way to school one morning. When the teachers went to pay respects at the parents' home, not a crumb of bread or cabbage leaf was found in the home. Her father lay dying of AIDS and three of Matlhodi's small siblings clutched to the mother, wondering where the next meal would come from. Death is accepted as a commonplace happening in South Africa...as many as 30 funerals per community every week is not uncommon.