Old MacDonald's Farm

This is the story of Don and Christine MacDonald

from the Isle of Lewis.

A former Holyrood civil servant and a Glasgow-trained gynaecologist.

A couple who went to the southern African republic of Zambia

for a bit of a change - and got more than they bargained for.

Much, much more.

CHILDREN SHOUTING

They got a family. And a farm.

And on that farm...were Don and Christine,

their two biological children, Sarah and Rachel,

their adopted children, Nico, Memory and Lucky,

up to 30 foster children rescued from the streets of Lusaka,

staff, helpers and farm animals.

Not forgetting a very large turkey.

I'd always wanted more siblings. And I got it.

There's nothing like this in Zambia.

It was the right thing to do.

But not, perhaps, the easiest thing to do.

People just don't understand the idea of having 27 children.

Creating one of the most unusual families in the world

has come close to breaking this Scottish couple.

Our instinctive reaction was to say, "Well, you know, look,

"we've given it our best shot. We can't do this any more."

Yet it's given dozens of Zambian street children

the chance of a home and an education.

Our cameras have been visiting Don and Christine over the course of

four years, covering the highs and the lows

of their extraordinary endeavour, and asking the question -

with a family this large and diverse,

can you ever simply be Mum and Dad?

The family lives in a small, self-sufficient farm holding

on the outskirts of the Zambian capital, Lusaka.

And the name? Well, that wasn't difficult.

Old MacDonald's Farm was born.

In some ways it is a little bit appropriate because the number

of people just keeps growing and growing and growing.

We arrived in Zambia with just four of us,

and then it's kind of...seems to increase exponentially,

until you reach a point where we keep adding in people and people.

You've got all the animals as well, adding in the pigs and the goats,

and it just seems to keep snowballing.

I'm not sure where it stops.

# Ee-eye, ee-eye, oh...#

If those are parallel, this is also a right-angle.

Not Pythagoraf!

From the moment they began taking in street children,

Don and Christine's ideal was to operate as one big family.

They've bonded together like brothers.

They treat our daughters like their sisters,

and they treat us as their parents,

and generally we just muck along together and get on reasonably well,

the way most families do.

But most families are not recruited from the roadsides

and squalid street markets of Lusaka.

MacDonald!

Although Don doesn't actively seek children out on the street,

he's still an easily recognised figure.

And most fathers down the market aren't besieged by youngsters

desperate to be their next son.

There are tens of thousands of street children in Zambia.

They may be abused, neglected, orphaned,

glue and alcohol-addicted or simply attracted to the thrill of begging.

However they got there,

Old MacDonald's Farm is now renowned as a way out.

It's devastating, because what can you do, you know?

You're just turning your back on these kids.

Probably nobody else is going to help them,

so what are they going to do?

Those Don HAS been able to take in often bring the mental scars

and behavioural problems of a traumatised childhood.

Not many people understand why he's doing it.

Not even, at times, himself.

To be honest, I think... I think I'm mad sometimes.

There are some days when I look at what's going on

and I just think, "How on Earth did we end up in this situation?"

So how did they?

It was certainly never part of the game-plan.

Don and Christine both grew up on the island of Lewis

in the Outer Hebrides, but only met as students at Glasgow University.

So it was love at first sight?

Er, maybe not first sight. Maybe.

THEY LAUGH

Yeah, I thought you were all right.

Well, she finally got round to proposing...

THEY LAUGH

..and we got married in 1987.

Life was comfortable for Don.

Nice home in Edinburgh, clever doctor wife,

two young daughters and a solid establishment job

as Private Secretary to Scotland's soon-to-become First Minister,

Jack McConnell.

But it didn't add up to quite enough.

When I finished up with Jack and, you know, went back

into the mainstream of the Civil Service I thought, really,

I'm not sure this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.

And one day, reading The Scotsman, I saw a job advertising

a job advert for accountants in Africa.

The job included managing the finances of Zambian Airways.

Don had been helping to run Scotland.

He thought he could offer some tips for a struggling airline.

One of the directors said to me,

"If you think you're so clever, why don't you try running it?"

And being a shallow sort of an individual, I thought to myself,

I've always really wanted to be called a chief executive,

so let's go for it!

We thought we had nothing to lose!

Before they knew it, the MacDonalds found themselves

living in Africa, with Don running an airline.

They set up home in expatriate luxury right next door

to the Parliament.

Straight ahead here is the side gate to the Parliament,

and this is the house we used to live in.

Big swimming pool in it as well.

Well, it certainly beat Edinburgh.

But just down the road, the Zambian capital wore a different face.

We're coming into Garden Compound, isn't it? This is Garden Compound.

We were seeing the children on the street corners and thinking,

you know, I'm spending... In one shopping spree, I'm spending more

than those children and their families will see in a year.

You know, you're reaching a level where it's just not right.

We were living a very comfortable expat lifestyle and driving in

and out of the shopping centre where we saw these little ragged children,

we hit on the idea, you know,

I thought, I'm driving past every day anyway, why don't I go into

the shopping centre, park, buy some food and actually distribute it?

The problem with that is that you can't just throw the food

through the window of the car and drive off,

because there'd be a scrum on the street and somebody would get killed.

So you have to park and you have to start handing it out,

making sure that everybody gets.

And that interaction is quite deadly because you get to know them

as a human being, individual human beings rather than just

sort of street kids who are "one size fits all".

It led to one encounter which would change Don

and Christine's lives forever.

I met a little boy there who was about 14 at the time,

a little boy called William, who was very, very intelligent

and spoke very good English and would translate for me

whenever there was any language difficulties,

and I remember one day stopping at the traffic lights on the way back

from work and seeing one of his friends who came and told me

that William was sick. They thought he had malaria or something.

So they took him to hospital and... To the local government hospital.

I said, "No problem," this was on a Friday.

I said, "I'll go and see him this weekend."

And Saturday, I was too busy

and on Sunday, I went to church in the morning,

went again in the afternoon, and forgot all about going to see him.

And on Sunday evening I thought, "I've forgotten to go and see Willie.

"Never mind, I'll go on Monday on the way back from work."

So on Monday I stopped off and I called one of his friends.

I said, "Let's go and see William".

And he said to me, "Bwana, Willie died last night."

And that was just...

That was a terrible experience for me altogether.

And, you know, from what they said, it was as if...

Well, maybe he died from cerebral malaria or meningitis.

There was probably nothing much I could've done to have saved his life,

but the fact remains that this kid died on his own with nobody around,

and not even paracetamol for his pain,

because I was too busy going to church

to do what the man I was worshipping would have done

if He had been in Lusaka in 2002.

And that was a real wake-up call.

I think what we both felt was, you know, we didn't intend it to

end up like this, but we must never let it happen again.

And so the next kid who asked for help was actually Nicholas.

Nicolas or Nico - the first boy to join what became

Old MacDonald's Farm.

An orphan on the run from an abusive aunt, he had set up home

at the traffic intersection where he begged for food.

In December 2002, malnourished and covered in scabies,

Nico wandered into the expat neighbourhood.

And then we heard this knock at the gate

and this was Nico looking for help.

I was about to say, "Look, kid, I'm too busy.

"Go on, I'll see you on the street."

And then I felt, and then I went to talk to Christine and she,

you know, we knew, there was no way that we weren't going to take

that risk again of a child dying because we hadn't got involved.

But we were still trying to keep him a bit at arm's length.

He was staying with the night watchman and the gardener,

two young men who were sort of sharing a cottage,

the servants' quarters on the premises. He was staying in there.

And although we were feeding and clothing him,

we weren't actually acting as Mum and Dad.

We were talking about it after supper, Christine and I.

I was feeling guilty because I thought, Nicholas is getting

more and more used to us, he's gone through abandonment in his life

so often, and if we don't do something fairly quickly,

then when we ask him to go,

he's going to feel like he's been abandoned again.

So we were having this kind of intellectual discussion about this,

and Sarah overheard us and came out, and said very bluntly to us,

"You can't send Nicholas to an orphanage. He's part of the family."

And then we realised, cos it just kind of stripped away

all the adult pretence and all the professional, middle-class

religious whatever, you know, respectable...

Mum and Dad had always taught us, me and Rachel,

that you should do what's right, you should do what's good.

You should try anyway, even if you don't make it, you should try.

And I remember standing there hearing them say this

and thinking, "Hang on a minute, you're not doing what you say,

"You're not practising what you preach."

Look, you can take this child or you don't need to.

Nobody's forcing you. But don't pretend it's that you can't.

If you're not going to take him, face the reality,

-it's that you won't.

-You don't want to.

And that was... When it's put like that to you from your daughter...

People ask if I'd known what was going to come,

if I'd still have done it, and I don't know.

At the time, I was saying yes to Nico.

I don't think any of us thought we'd have more than that.

But it happened, so...

So we just decided, well, yeah, so we started the legal process,

he moved into the house, we had to foster him for six months

under supervision, and then the adoption process went through.

And I do remember, it was actually before the formal adoption

was completed, but I do remember this day when there was a complete

breakthrough, if you like, in terms of Nicholas feeling he belonged.

It was when he stopped being polite,

and he and Sarah had a blazing quarrel. You know.

And that was sort of a landmark moment,

because it indicated to us that he was sufficiently secure-feeling

not to have to be on his best behaviour.

Someone to call Mum and Dad.

From the beginning, that's what the MacDonalds were offering.

And right from the word go, Nicholas pointed the way.

I think if we'd had a bad experience with Nicholas,

we'd probably never have gone any further.

We'd just have said, "We tried that and it didn't work."

But because things worked out so well,

we had a lot more self-confidence in terms of when the next child asked

for help to say, "Yeah, you can come along and share with Nicholas."

And after that child, another. And another. And another.

The MacDonalds moved from their luxurious villa

into a ramshackle farmhouse on the outskirts,

where they could house more boys and grow their own food.

We're really making it up on a daily basis, as we go along.

If we had sat down and planned all of this

and taken five years to get a centre set up,

the fact of the matter is that those boys would be dead by now.

You know, the average life... The average age of reaching

the street in Zambia is 11 years old.

And the average life expectancy once you're on the street is six years.

So you know, if we'd taken six years to plan and organise this,

the current group of boys we have, on average, wouldn't be there.

As more boys poured in, beds had to be improvised.

Don and Christine even had children living in the garage.

It was chaotic, but it felt like a real family.

Come on! It's been 7:20am.

What are you doing in bed and beds not made?

You have two minutes.

From the beginning, the boys have helped out with the farm work

during the holidays.

The rest of the time, they go to school.

Don and Christine pay for the domestic upkeep

from their own job earnings,

but the boys' crucial education is sponsored by supporters back home.

I have report cards for everybody!

CHEERING

Qualifications are a youngster's only chance of getting

one of Zambia's scarce jobs.

And the MacDonald children often come out top of the class.

At basic school, 683.

In fact, it's education that's drawn some of the boys

to Old MacDonald's Farm in the first place.

They're not all orphans.

Timo has a loving home in the city, which he visits often.

But his mother can't afford to send him to school.

Because that's what the MacDonalds were offering you?

-Was the chance of school?

-Yeah.

-It wasn't because you were homeless and you needed a home?

-No.

You wanted school.

Parenthood on this scale is tiring, of course.

What now? What else do we have to do?

But especially at Christmas - fun.

CHILDREN SHRIEK

Chocolate!

Oh, some people smell nice.

Have you been putting your perfume on already?

To all the boys!

Who didn't open their other one yet?

Ah, you, you got the other one to open!

LAUGHTER

Here's another one for everybody!

You, Sam Tumba, you're just a scavenger.

But can you make a family like this without drowning out

the children with the strongest claims?

Don and Christine's biological children, Sarah and Rachel,

have had an extraordinary upbringing.

-It must have had a huge impact.

-Huge.

Personally, I think it's been for the better rather than the worse,

but I guess in time they'll let me know about that.

I mean, Rachel, our younger daughter, doesn't remember any other situation

because she was only about a year and a half when Nicholas

joined us and so she's always grown up with the other boys around.

In fact, until she was about four,

she thought that they were all her real brothers and in our family,

the girls were white and boys were brown and that's just the way it was.

Sarah was obviously older.

She was eight when we started and, you know,

through her teenage years, the boys have always been around.

And I guess we do worry sometimes

whether it's had a negative impact on her.

Sometimes we are so caught up with what we're doing.

I think it's the same in any family, it's the children who make

more noise and are more demanding that will come looking for your

attention and probably get more from you,

whereas the ones that tend to be quieter and just get on with things

maybe are left out

and I don't know whether that's different in other families.

I suspect it isn't.

So it does make me think and say,

"Well, could we have done things differently?"

It's been difficult at times, there's no point in denying it.

There's been days I wish it had never happened.

What kind of days are these?

Well, when we have issues with the boys, someone runs away,

or there's a big fight or even something as simple as someone

relapsing back on alcohol or glue.

And it's always hard to see

work that you've put in ruined,

especially to see Mum and Dad getting ruined by it.

Cos every time something happens, it's another little bit out of them,

I think, and it's hard to see that.

CHILD CRIES

With kids to feed and care for, jobs at the surgery

and the airport to hold down, a farm to run,

power cuts to contend with, damaged youngsters to counsel,

fights to resolve and always the next bill to pay,

even a small family would struggle.

When you have 30 mouths to feed,

it's quite difficult to budget for that every month.

I'm also worried about... I think we're likely to see

an increase in the demands on what we can give,

and that's a worry for me as well because I find it very hard

to turn anybody away, and a sense of helplessness and frustration

when you can't help those who desperately need it.

So that all adds up to quite a burden weighing down on us.

CHILDREN SHOUTING AND CRYING

These have not been the only pressures.

With 30 growing boys whose fighting skills were honed on the street,

violence became commonplace.

CHILD WAILS

Older boys, like Nico, helped to guide the younger ones,

as they struggled to adjust.

But more and more, control had to become a feature of family life.

We had a lot of physical behaviour problems where

people were fighting amongst each other or not going to school,

or stealing, running away, taking the car,

smashing it into the wall down there, all these kind of things.

Just normal teenage behaviour.

THEY LAUGH

But there were 30 of them, you know.

Or taking knives out of the kitchen and then going after somebody

cos the other person had got the iron in the morning

and they were going to go and use it.

Or breaking a bottle over somebody's head,

and trying to smash the jagged end into their face.

Or taking stones and pushing somebody into the ground

and shoving the stones and mud in...

You can see they learned from their Scottish parents!

THEY LAUGH

They can laugh about it now.

But trying to be loving parents while at the same time

required to be police officers, security guards, law-makers,

punishment dispensers and judges with the wisdom of Solomon is tough.

A tradition on the farm at New Year is to declare

your hopes for the year ahead.

Yeah!

As 2009 began, there was no doubt what the MacDonalds were hoping for.

APPLAUSE

That's up to you, isn't it?

You're the ones who have to improve your behaviour, not me.

Now, Mum, what are you going to say?

For 2009, I think I hope for what most of you guys hope for.

That we stay together as a family

and that you continue to improve your behaviour.

You have improved a lot in the time you've been here.

That you continue to work on the little things.

APPLAUSE

BANGING ON DRUMS

Well, I don't know what I hope for.

LAUGHTER AND CHATTER

Too many worries, young man.

Looking after all of you.

We reached a point where I think we were finding it affecting us.

ALL: Three, two, one...!

CHEERING AND DRUMMING

I have ongoing background depression anyway, I mean,

I have a depressive illness that's been with me for most of my life,

and you know, when things kind of pile in and then Christine's getting

sick, but to be honest, I think if you asked what it felt like,

I think the real issue was, we just felt so completely tired.

You kind of think, well,

surely the guys can see that we're struggling, and step up to the mark.

We certainly felt so worn down by it that our instinctive reaction

was to say, "Look, we've given it our best shot.

"We can't do this any more."

SINGING

And then, you know, we sort of look at each other

and we take a deep breath and we kind of try

and counsel each other and say it would be completely unfair

to turn round and say, "We're closing down and you all have to go."

We were both just so discouraged and I remember Thandi and Emmanuel

coming in to see me in the kitchen and just putting

their arms around me and saying, "Mum, you know you mustn't give up."

Erm...and then you think, OK, if we do give up,

if we say, "We've had enough, we're not going to do this any more,"

then what is going to happen to everybody?

We kind of called them all, had a bit of a summit up there

and said, "You know, we were looking to you to help us out.

"Some of you are, some of you are causing trouble

"at a time when we feel particularly vulnerable and fragile.

"And we don't think that's a fair or a nice way to behave.

"So we're giving you warning now that we're going to be keeping an eye

"on what's going on and we will be able to identify who is

"misbehaving and if you don't change, you're going to have to leave."

Eventually, with the boys now grown into young men,

Don and Christine decided they had to take action.

They began to expel the worst offenders from the home.

From, in effect, the family.

I think the alternatives were either to carry on as if nothing was

happening and then eventually have breakdowns ourselves. Mmm?

Or the other extreme which was to say,

"Right, out you all go, we tried and we can't manage."

So, we avoided either of those extremes,

but we also were able to give a very severe warning shot

across the bows of the trouble-makers and they didn't take the warning.

The ejection of persistent trouble-makers

changed the family picture.

It brought stability, but the more drastic approach to punishment

came at a cost to the family ideal

they had struggled so hard to realise.

Especially when it was Nico's turn to go.

Their first boy, their legally adopted son,

had developed a taste for alcohol which made him violent.

After failing to heed warnings, he was asked to leave.

Nico now lives in the Garden Compound,

back with the same abusive aunt he ran away from as a child.

So how many in the house in total?

Nico accepts that he can no longer live at Old Macdonald's Farm.

Can you tell me what happened?

Had they given you a warning before?

How do you feel about this? Do you think it's fair?

You're thinking, where did we go wrong?

But there's no sense of, "This foolish boy,

"he should be grateful for what we've done for him."

It's just this sort of deep dread in your heart that, you know,

this is our son and he's got this problem and what are we going to do?

And the repeated sort of failures and the breaking down,

and the problem and you just think, what are we going to do?

And you absolutely feel helpless.

Painful as the expulsions are,

the tougher, rule-based approach has saved the MacDonalds' sanity

and preserved a future for the other boys.

But how many sons can you dismiss and still be a family?

It doesn't help that the government has started imposing its own rules,

which make it even more difficult to be a family.

In the eyes of Social Services,

Old MacDonald's Farm is just an institution.

Mr Kapambwe works for the government's child protection unit.

It's his duty to inspect the farm.

Social Services demanded a new, separate dormitory.

This means the boys no longer live in the same house as the MacDonalds.

It seems everything conspires to make it more difficult to live

like the family they want to be.

We were told that it was... We were keeping the children

in an inappropriate environment, and when we questioned what that meant,

we were told, well, they're living with you as rich Europeans.

They're never going to be able to fit into where they came from.

I said, they came from the street.

We hope they never have to fit in to where they came from again.

The whole point is to stop them fitting in.

And what we found is there are some people, very unimaginative,

bureaucratic application of rules.

The format of the accounts Mrs Kyumbo was advised to obtain...

Like some of the boys who had to leave to maintain family order,

the MacDonalds are in their own way struggling as individuals

with rules created for the many.

Having had to register as a business,

a charity and a childcare institution,

they now meet every three months with a board of trustees.

The difficulty with government anywhere in the world

is that it functions on the premise, we need to protect the vulnerable.

And it's very easy for children who are not yours

to be abused in all kinds of ways.

So what the state does is to come in with all forms of regulations

and legislation and so on.

And that then makes those who just want to follow their hearts,

it makes them very frustrated.

Being made to live like an institution has affected this

couple's ability to be the parents they want to be.

They believe it contributed to the behaviour that led to

the expulsions.

We both know in our hearts that those boys who were misbehaving

would not have reached that level of misbehaviour

if they had been in the house with us.

It's because they were able to get away with it,

and were feeling that sort of sense of separation from us,

both in terms of being watched, but also emotional separation.

But that must be extraordinarily frustrating.

It is. Unbelievably frustrating.

Christine used the phrase there, we didn't fit into any of the boxes

with what we're trying to do here.

And that's exactly right - we don't fit into any of the boxes.

But what are we doing trying to put children into boxes?

This is what I can't get over.

You know, we draw up these regulations and say it applies

to the average child. There's no such a thing as an average child.

They're all individuals. You have to treat them all differently.

Any parent knows that.

Well, any parent of more than one child knows that.

That you can't just say one size fits all.

And we're just regimenting and institutionalising these children

and saying, you know, you've lost your family.

Well, that's tough luck. And now, you fit into this box.

So have you become an institution then?

Well, I hope not. I refuse to be institutionalised.

Hey, Simba, you're feeding the rabbits?

The irony is that this passionate champion of the individual has had

to impose stern regulations in his own home to protect the majority.

That's meant that some individuals, even the ones he loves most,

have been left wondering who their family really is.

Has this experience left you feeling

that you don't know where you belong?

Right from the beginning, Nico has represented the family ideal

that the MacDonalds have tried so hard to create

out of their accidental orphanage.

Even when that ideal is under strain,

keeping in touch is important.

Hello? Is that Nico? Dad here.

It's a holiday on Monday and we are going to try and make a roast pig.

So Mum told me to give you a phone to see whether

you could come to church tomorrow and then stay overnight,

so that you can help her get it organised because the last time

we tried without you, it didn't even get started till about 12 hours.

OK, see you then, son. Bye-bye.

Nico is coming home for the big feast.

Six years to the day since Don and Christine

moved to Old MacDonald's Farm,

there's a sense that the family is edging closer again.

# Hallelujah, Hallelujah

# Hallelujah, Hallelujah

# Hallelujah, Hallelujah...#

# You're my friend and you are...#

He's going to have to have his own level of independence

at some point anyway.

And God willing, he'll have learned at that point to control

his addiction and be able to function reasonably well.

Last night, when you were all singing together,

and he was standing beside you, you looked as if, the pair of you...

Don't make me cry.

# You alone are my strength My shield

# To you alone may my sprit yield

# You alone are my heart's desire

# And I long...#

I think he feels a little bit sort of, he's kind of messed up,

and kind of separate from the others.

# You alone are my strength... #

We want to emphasise to him, you know, yes, you've messed up,

but you're always welcome back.

Do you think you'd be able to come back here?

-Because of the rules?

-Yes.

OK. Thanks very much, guys, well done.

APPLAUSE

# Courage, brother Do not stumble... #

This family will no doubt continue to have its ups and downs,

its triumphs and disasters, like any other.

Just on a larger scale.

But here's the greatest triumph -

that these two Scots have given every boy here a chance that other

street children will never have -

the chance to be part of a family.

And it's given Don and Christine something they value deeply too.

You know, when I look around,

I think it's just such a blessing to be able to share life,

share my life with, and my family with,

such an amazing bunch of young people.

And when I look around on evenings like this and yes, it's been

a hard day and there's stuff to be done and still waiting to be done

and problems are still there, but, you look around and you see

all the love these guys have for each other,

the love they show for us,

and what we feel for them - I think I'm really very blessed.

THEY SING AND CLAP IN TIME

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd