It has been a year since their mother left them promising to return on ‘Tuesday’; to this day Tuesday has not arrived and they are not sure when it will.

Lydia, 13 and and her younger sister, Shelby, 12, are just two of several hundred children who have been left at the mercy of the Jamaican society because their mothers are behind bars for drug trafficking.

These girls are, however, luckier than most, as to date most of their needs, but for one, have been met by Hibiscus Jamaica Limited, an arm of the London-based Female Prisoners Welfare Project, which caters to women incarcerated in London and female ex-prisoners and their children.

“When I asked Lydia what assistance we could possibly give, she said she wanted a mother, somebody who would take care of her and that’s the one thing we can’t give her,” acting co-ordinator at Hibiscus, Sanya Ellis tells the Observer.

The two, she says, have been living with separate families since their mom’s arrest in 2005. Lydia is now living with the 17-year-old daughter of the woman with whom her mother developed a friendship while sharing a jail cell abroad, while Shelby is being attended to by a family friend in the same yard.

“These two women came back from London last year after they were incarcerated for four years. It’s the same story: they went up as usual with drugs in their possession, got caught, and they served time in the same prison. While they were there they became friends,” Ellis explains.

Even though they returned to the island months apart, she says the friendship continued.

“The friend came back in 2004, the mother came in 2005 and didn’t have anywhere to go as the house was burnt out and she decided to stay with her former cellmate,” Ellis shares.

For a while, both women tread the straight and narrow, attending workshops put on by Hibiscus and trying to make an honest living. But the lure of easy money was irresistable and it wasn’t long before they walked into the same trap again.

“The children came back last year to tell us their mother and her friend had been caught on the street in the country with drugs; apparently they were trafficking the island or heading for outlying areas, I am not quite sure,” Ellis tells the Observer.

Lydia and Shelby learned of the incarceration in a most cruel way. “Somebody from the community who went to visit someone else in the prison asked them ‘oonuh know weh oonuh moddah deh?’ ‘They gone to country,’ they replied, not realising that this wasn’t so. It was just a by the way thing that they found out that their mothers were actually incarcerated at Fort Augusta,” Ellis says sadly.

This time round, Hibiscus cannot lend a helping hand to the women. “Once they are in the Jamaican system they are not really our clients anymore,” Ellis explains. The office, she adds, is however unwilling to turn its back on the children who have been left to the whims and fancies of fate.

“The children keep coming to us from time to time and we really can’t turn them back because this case is really special. There is nobody there to supervise them, for the most part they are left on their own and the lack of parents affects them psychologically,” she says, noting that she believes it is a case which should be handled by the state-run Child Development Agency (CDA).

The distrust and shynesss with which the two finally spoke to the Observer was not unusual and it took quite a bit of coaxing before they opened up. Even then they were cautious and skittish, giggling every now and then with a forced gaiety that was painful to hear.Lydia, the elder confesses: “Miss, ah don’t feel good, because I don’t have a mother to take care of me. Mi nuh under no parents guard.” She says even though they weren’t grown by their mother, her absence has left a gap.

“Wi nevah used to live with her all di time, but wi still miss her even though she love lick… mi need a real mother who can stay with me and spend time with me,” she says.

Right now, she admits, she does not “feel good” about her mother because in her eyes she made the same mistake once too many.

“Miss, mi nuh feel good because she do it already and she come back and do it again,” she says, noting that she also has misgivings about the thought of her coming back.

“Miss, mi wouldn’t be too happy because probably she come back and do the same thing again; mi don’t know what on her mind, but mi still want her to come back,” she says. “Sometimes mi nuh think bout her, and sometimes she deh pon mi mind”.

Her younger sibling, Shelby, tells the Observer that she doesn’t think about her mother because when she does she is ‘stressed out’ and ‘feels sad’ but still misses her and wants her to come back. They both feel their mother should have been honest with them.

When asked what was the one thing they would tell their mother if they got the chance to talk with her, Lydia was the first to declare: “Miss, mi woulda tell her seh she stupid because she a sell an meck money and she still want more money pon wah she a meck and gone to do that again.”

According to Lydia, her mother was not ‘used to children’ and so that explained her unwise actions. “Ah true she nuh used to pickny yuh know miss, she nuh grow none a wi so that’s why she do it.”

Furthermore, she thinks that her mother’s lust for more money had nothing to do with a desire to support them better.

“Well miss, she nuh really spend money pon wi yu know, so a could nevah dat. She use it on smoking and bleaching cream. An all when she have the money she seh she don’t have none and we have to go school without money. Miss, mi nuh feel good bout that because if we come back and tell her seh wi hungry she want lick wi,” Lydia relates.

As for their father, she says he is as good as ‘dead’. That’s as far as the conversation goes.

They say people in the community know about their mother’s incarceration but no one says anything. The children at school are not as sensitive.

“People know, but them nuh seh anything and when wi go school and the children ask if is true wi tell them no,” Shelby confesses.

Lydia who is more outspoken adds: “Miss, mi nuh feel no way that them know, a nuh she one inna di community deh prison.”

Surprisingly, despite the odds both are doing well in school, with Shelby being successful in the recent Grade Six Achievement Test (GSAT). Lydia, however, is dissatisfied with the school she currently attends as she claims “the teacha dem naw teach wi nutten”.

Despite the blows life has dealt the siblings, they still have dreams and they still have a heart.

Lydia likes math and computer sciences and wants to be a bank manager so she can “donate money to charities and help out those who don’t have it”, while Shelby wants to be a doctor so she “can protect the children” who come to see her. It is summer and unlike most teens they have no plans for the holidays but they are grateful they have Hibiscus.

To date, over 380 children have been referred to Hibiscus for support. The charges reside at different points in the island, living with elderly relatives, older siblings or friends. Through public, private sector partnerships, as well as linkages with the medical fraternity, the project provides bursaries and scholarships, uniforms and footwear, text books, medical assistance, psychiatric evaluation and counselling, food aid and clothing, as well as emotional support and mediation between school and family.

Some 100 children have benefited from academic assistance to ensure regular attendance at the primary and high school levels, with 25 receiving special bursaries. In addition, some 58 referrals have been made for women and children to receive medical attention, with two children undergoing major surgery.

In the meantime, household items, food, clothing and wheel chairs valued at J$4 million have been distributed to families, with 16 women receiving assistance to establish small businesses.

The Project’s main goal is to provide advocacy for women caught in the criminal justice system in London by providing home circumstance support to assist them in getting lesser sentences. It also facilitates the education and training of the incarcerated women and provides a link between the incarcerated women and their children in Jamaica, in addition to providing support upon their return to the island.