Many very sweet people have asked if there's any way to help me or the children at Harvesters and I want to share a perfect opportunity for anyone interested in getting involved.
As for me, well I don't need anything whatsoever. Unless there's a way to send over a Mexican platter with a chicken enchilada smothered in cheese and sour cream surrounded by heaping piles of tortilla chips, guacamole, salsa, queso and rice on the side. Hold the beans, please and thanks.
But I digress. South Sudan, being a third-world country, lacks a decent infrastructure which inhibits trade, so it's very difficult to buy products here, especially at a reasonable cost. There's also no mailing system so sending goods via post is practically impossible.
The best solution to these hindrances comes in the form of a 68,000 pound metal box, or an ISO container. Last year a consortium of churches and organizations in the U.S. partnered to fill an ISO container for Harvesters and they're doing it again this year.
I was here in early December when the container rolled into Harvesters after a three-month journey. It sailed from Virginia Beach, Virginia through the Atlantic around the tip of South Africa and landed in Mombasa, Kenya before traveling by road through Kenya, Uganda and the very southern part of Sudan. It was like a mini-Wal Mart had been sent to Harvesters and the kids cheered with giddiness as it lumbered through the front gates.
new ladders, rakes, shovels, wheelbarrows
books for the library and school
The bottom picture especially stirs my heart. You see, that's my mom's handwriting and inside those boxes are hundreds of my brother's and my old children's books combined with other books she bought at Goodwill. Opening those boxes and thumbing through my own copies of "Where the Red Fern Grows" and "Little Women" was a profound moment. The stories I'd loved as a child now await the kids here, and each time one of them opens one of my old books and delves into a world I'd once visited the ties that bind us will grow a bit tighter.
There's something powerful and binding about giving up something for another person. Whether it's a bar of soap that's used to bathe and help prevent disease, a shovel that will dig holes so food can be planted, or dolls that are given as Christmas presents and bring joy to little girls, all these things given in love have a lasting impact.
Please visit this site for more information on how you can donate: http://www.tfsworldwide.org/SearchResults.asp?Cat=51
1 comment:
Did she send Tikki Tikki Tembo?! I think that was it... for some reason I always associated that classic with your mom reading it to us. :) Miss you!
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