My name is Arnille Maria LOH. I was born into a family of 5 children, of whom I am the only daughter. While my brothers came into the world without any health issues, I was born with precarious health, which would have made my
parents suffer. At an early age, my mother and father were obliged to run with me from one hospital to another, from one town to another, without me ever recovering, without even knowing what the real cause of my illness was. It was at the age of 10 after my parents had spent all their savings and gone into debt to friends and “Njangi”, that my illness was diagnosed. It was revealed that I had a heart problem.
In 2004, my mother, inspired by the Holy Spirit, made this promise to God: “Lord, I ask you to heal my daughter, my only daughter. And I give you my word that for the rest of my life, I will take care of vulnerable children who have no one to look after them, no matter what it costs me”.
This is how the Saint Arnille Marie Orphanage was born. From a promise, the promise of a woman with
no formal education and no financial means, but who was tenacious and committed to the conviction that LOVE CONQUERS ALL. And love has indeed conquered all. I was evacuated to Italy in 2002, operated on and treated in Milan under the care of the Tertiary Sisters of St Elizabeth’s Hospital Shisong. I returned to Cameroon in 2004 totally cured. My mother, to keep the promise she had made to God, started walking from door to door to feed and bring medicines to the children in the Omnisports district of Douala. Having noticed that some parents in the houses she visited did not give the sick children the medicines she had left them and that others ate the meals she brought for the children, she decided to start taking in the first children in difficulty in my room and that of my brothers.
After that, my parents built a bigger house in Bonaberi and took in more and more children as time went by. And as love conquers all, despite the difficulties encountered, nothing marred our mother’s determination to expand her family. And that lasted a good 19 years.
19 years, i.e. from April 2004 to November 14, 2023. Date of death of Margaret LOH MBUNGSON. Leaving us alone and orphans after our father Sylvester LOH was called back to God in June 2021.
