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8 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 21 JANUARY 2024 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 As Carmen hands me a cup of coffee, asking me if I wanted milk or sugar, she explains how traumas of her childhood still torment her to this day. "I am still traumatised. The beatings, the abuse… they haunt me to this day," she says, her words casting a sombre shadow over the cheerful and welcoming atmos- phere inside her quaint Gozitan home. 'My life was hell; she was a monster' She explains how the "nightmare" start- ed when at just six years of age, in the middle of the night, she was removed from another wing of the orphanage, and placed under the care of Sister Josephine Anne Sultana. Carmen barely finishes her sentence, when Roseanne, a quiet and reserved woman who only looked up to smile and greet us, pitches in. "My life was hell. She was a monster, a dangerous woman whose actions were consequential. We did not have a normal childhood," she says, as the room once again falls quiet. Roseanne explains how the children would be tasked with chores from the ten- der age of five. "She would wake us up at 5:30am, and everyone had a chore they must do before we went to school. Some cooked, others cleaned, but there was one constant – if you made a mistake, you were getting beaten," Roseanne says. "If you left a small droplet... rest assured you were getting a beating." Carmen recounts how the nun would be waiting at the orphanage door for the chil- dren to return from school. "She used to be waiting with wooden ruler or belt in hand. I was young… very young. If I had dust or a small tear on my skirt, she would beat me," she says. "Homework time was no different. She would patrol the hall, and if she noticed that I or any other child making a mistake, she would grab you from the back of your head and slam it against the desk." Sometimes children would bleed from their nose because of the thump. "If the blood fell onto the copybook, she would force us to copy all our homework onto a new copybook," Carmen says, looking straight into my eyes with anger and despair. "It was sadistic, it was evil be- cause after all that, I didn't know what the mistake was." A simple act of love was not recognised by Sister Josephine, Roseanne says looking back at her childhood. "Once I was washing the clothes and I remember it was raining. We had two dogs, Snoopy and Lassie. I saw that one of the dogs was wet and cold, and I laid down a piece of cloth for it to lie on," she says, explaining how the nun flew into a fit of rage when she found out the next morn- ing. "She started shouting and yelling, ask- ing who it was. She struck so much fear in our hearts through the years, that nobody spoke up. Everyone was punished, forcing us to clean the whole orphanage and can- celling our monthly visit to our parents." "What did I do wrong? It was a wet and cold dog. What was the reason for punish- ing us?" she says. But it got worse with Carmen recount- ing how Sister Josephine forced the young children to "eat their own vomit" as pun- ishment. "I did not like to eat when I was a young girl, and I remember the food being so bad that I had to throw up. When I threw up, she would force me to put the vomit back onto the plate and eat it again," she says. "It would happen weekly, and I sometimes threw up for four, five times, only to be forced to eat it again." Carmen explains how before dinner time, she would pick an apron which had a pocket on the front, so that she could put a small plastic bag in it where she would secretly stash the vomit. "Obvious- ly I would do it without her knowing, or else… I would get beaten again." Children with no name Physical abuse was the order of the day at Lourdes Home, but beatings would be accompanied by a tirade of psychological abuse directed at the young children. They detail how, in the main hall, each child had their own designated chair. Affixed to the bottom of each chair was a nickname bestowed upon them by the nun. It wasn't an affectionate moniker but rather a derogatory one. "My nickname was 'the skeleton'," Car- men says, explaining how she was called names for simply getting a chore wrong. "I had more than one," Roseanne pitches in. "Mine were iċcasata, skantata, good for nothing. She would hurl the abuse at us non-stop." Mary Borg breaks her silence thus far. She was also picked on by the nun for hav- ing glasses. "If I did something wrong, she would come screaming at me: 'Are you blind? Go wear your glasses! Are you stupid? Are you dumb?'," Mary says. She chooses to speak to me but is un- comfortable showing her face or revealing her identity. The hurt is still evident. She tells me the abuse sticks with her to this day, being unable to show affection and love to people who are close to her. "I still suffer from anxiety and up un- til around two years ago, I used to have nightmares about her screaming and abusing me," Mary says. "I find it difficult to hug my own children, because I find it awkward. Affection was far and few be- tween when I was a child. She destroyed us." Forced to masturbate in front of a priest Sexual abuse was rampant at Lourdes Home, the victims claim, each having 'When I threw up, she would force me to put the Above: Carmen Sammut u Roseanne Saliba