“The Day a Stranger Handed Her a Child”

 A heartwarming story about two children from Africa who came to live with a stranger in West Virginia after a chance encounter at a local pharmacy changed everything. What began as a temporary act of kindness turned into years of love, family, and unforgettable memories. Through language barriers, cultural differences, and life’s unexpected turns, this remarkable story shows how compassion, faith, and community can truly change lives forever. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

So you have two kids. Um I have a daughter.

SPEAKER_00 0:13

Okay. Because when we did the thing on Facebook, my daughter called me. She said, Mama, did you forget that you called? I said, I didn't write it. I didn't write it. No, I have three kids. I have two sons and my daughter.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

Okay. So three kids. But you said you raised ten. So walk us through that story a little bit about how that all came about.

SPEAKER_00 0:35

Well, I had the three two my daughter and my two boys. Uh, of course, Floyd is a public defendant. Eric is a teacher. He he's had a stroke, so he had to kind of sit down a little bit. And my daughter is a nurse.

SPEAKER_01 0:50

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 0:51

And she works up in Maryland, in Virginia, and she's a traveling nurse. And she used to work at the pavilion here in Bluefield.

SPEAKER_01 0:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:00

And um, but I had uh I had some gr grandchildren that I I I watched, I took care of, and two other little girls that were friends, their mothers were friends to my ch m children. And uh and then I got two little African kids. And uh uh I got the little African kids in the strangest kind of way. My granddaughter's name is Kamara. And uh I went to the pharmacy one day and the pharmacist was there, and he's an af he was an African pharmacist with right aid. And he asked me, he said, Who is Miss Anderson? And I said, I am. He said, Well, I see that you have a child named Kamara. I said, That's her name. He asked me to take a seat. So I took a seat and sat there. And when everybody left, he came and sat down beside him and he told me that God had sent me to him. And I said, Why? You don't say that. He said, because your granddaughter has the same name of a tribe in my town. I said, okay. I said, oh really? He said, yes. He said, and I have a little daughter that needs somebody, needs somebody needs to watch her. I said, oh, okay. He said, would you watch her? I said, sure I will. He turned around and called this little girl by name. And she came from behind the thing in the pharmacy. Wow. And he set her between us and he said, spoke to her in his language. He said, she doesn't speak English. And he asked me, he said, Well, I need you to take her home. Because his wife was in exile. They had left her out of this country because her visa wasn't right. And she couldn't come back to this country. And when they were coming home about three weeks before that from Africa, she had to go back to Africa and he had to bring his daughter on with him. They wouldn't let her go back to Africa. So there he was stuck.

SPEAKER_01 3:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:35

So I said, yeah, I'll keep her. He handed her to me along with a Kroger bag full of clothes.

SPEAKER_01 3:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:45

And I took her home with me. She was five years old. My granddaughter was five. And the other little girl that I was watching was five. They were all five years old.

unknown 3:57

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 3:58

And I bought her in the house, and I told them, I said, she doesn't speak any English. But down the steps they went with this little girl, with Anta. They went down the steps with Anta. The next morning I had to go to work.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:19

And they were the other two girls were in kindergarten. And I'm assuming that she was gonna be in kindergarten too. So I took all three of them to work with me. But when she came out of the basement, she could say good morning. They taught her how to say good morning. So I took her and kept her that year. Along with her father, I had no clue where he lived, nothing. Oh my he know nothing about me and I ain't know nothing about him.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

Did you ever see him after that much? Yeah, yeah.

unknown 4:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:52

One day I went back to the pharmacy and and I told him where I lived, and he told me where he lived up in Junipo. But I kept her at my house.

SPEAKER_01 5:03

How did you work like with the language barrier? How did you work through that?

SPEAKER_00 5:07

I don't know. The children did that. Wow. That's amazing. And she learned to speak English. But in their country, they are taught English from birth. That's their second language. They speak they they but it's very broken language. Yeah. But from birth they speak a little. So she had a little idea, you know. And we worked through that. And she went to school at uh at Kemble Elementary with my kids.

SPEAKER_01 5:39

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 5:40

And uh she was the ninth one.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 5:44

And uh but I just kept moving. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:48

You know, I didn't it didn't stop you.

SPEAKER_00 5:51

I didn't stop. I mean, I just had the ki the kids and and I was working and and cooking and the children were playing and they were happy and the community had lots of children to play in and they played together. And um and then he went home for Christmas. And when he came back, he brought his son with him. He was a little boy. He bought him, and he dropped him off with me, and I kept him. So I kept the children until their mother could come, and it took about seven years for her to come. They went to school here, they went to high school at Mount View at Mountview. They both graduated. My granddaughter graduated high school.

SPEAKER_01 6:44

Uh and uh what did they what did they end up doing at all?

SPEAKER_00 6:50

They went to West Virginia University, the great they did. My granddaughter went to West Virginia State.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

Okay. Wow, that's awesome. So they ended up having a successful career then. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

They live in Atlanta. Wow, that's awesome and I still see them and I visited them. I went to Africa uh nine years ago. I flew to Africa and visited in Gambia with the family, and we still talk. As a matter of fact, they used to live on Stewart Street.

SPEAKER_01 7:19

Wow. When you talk about their family, um not them specifically, but their family from Africa. Okay. Wow, that's amazing. Did uh how long did the father is he still alive or did he pass?

SPEAKER_00 7:31

Yeah, he's still alive.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 7:33

No, he's still alive. He just he retired from um Walgreens three years ago, I think. He stayed with with Rite Aid, and then they switched over to Walgreens. And then he got transferred out to Mullins.

SPEAKER_01 7:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 7:52

And he worked at Mullins, and his mother, uh his wife, she was a hairdresser up to the mall where uh Catherine was.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

And they were involved in the community and went to the Catholic Church and and everything. So it was a it was a whole nother lifestyle.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

Wow, yeah, I'm sure. Wow. That's an amazing story. Yeah. And I'm wow.

SPEAKER_00 8:14

And I took the I took her because of my granddaughter's name.

SPEAKER_01 8:17

Yeah. And it was just That's something.

SPEAKER_00 8:19

And it just happened.

SPEAKER_01 8:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:21

And it was and it worked out. Yeah. You know.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

That's amazing. Especially what um was the was the little boy, was he able to speak much uh English too, or is it about the saying? Not a lot. He was about to say. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 8:33

And uh my mother was living at that time.

SPEAKER_01 8:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 8:36

And my mother fell in love with him, and he fell in love with her, and and and and he loved French fries and he learned to speak English, and they did well, but they did well in school, though. Yeah. They did well in school. It took them a minute with the language, but after a while they caught on, and they did well in school.