A Place For The Children...

Posted on behalf of Jim Cook, President of Children International.

It was an emotional, wonderful, stimulating, enriching dedication of the Nina Rae Wesson Center - made possible by a generous contribution from Nancy Richards, the mother of Nina Rae Wesson, who passed away suddenly and all too soon, in order to make an enduring tribute to her memory. Her mother, along with other contributors, attended the wonderful opening ceremony, which was filled with emotional words and tributes as well as festivities that were enjoyed by all. It was really a celebration of her life as well as a dedication, and was complete with traditional dancers, singers, and words of support from members of the community and the mayor’s office.

Newly sponsored children were already playing on the playground of the beautiful new center before the last speech was even completed.

It was wonderful to see how, despite being from different places in the US, the donors immediately shared a rich camaraderie.

We concluded with a tour of the lovely facilities that will serve 5,000 youth through the health and dental clinics, pharmacy, library, and nutrition center.

It was beautiful event, and a good time was shared by all the children, their families, the donors who made it possible, and the Children International staff.

More than a building…

Posted on behalf of Global Expansion Project Manager, Eddie Welsh.

The joy of cutting the ceremonial ribbon and walking through the door of a newly constructed community center does not come without its challenges. The fresh paint serves as a visual cue of accomplishment to those who have invested their precious time and effort. The new building aroma is welcoming and gives way to the finished product. It also has a uniquely artistic way of masking the hours of planning, scheduling and coordinating orchestrated by dozens of laborers, masons and contractors.

The pure delight in the eyes of the children and families entering a community center for the first time is what motivates us to construct a quality building, one that is functional for facilitating the distribution of services provided by Children International and our sponsors.

I remember walking the bare piece of land some 10 months ago that is now home to The Nina Rae Wesson Community Center. I recall thinking construction would be tight. The small terrain, closely surrounded by a heavily trafficked park and a few moderately used neighborhood thoroughfares, was not the ideal construction site.

We began the process of selecting a contractor more than a year ago. After working through some minor design changes we adjusted our model to fit the land and requirements of our programs.

Similar to projects here in the U.S, communication and coordination on a project of this magnitude are essential. We are fortunate to have a solid staff in Jalisco, complemented by a knowledgeable construction supervisor.

As anticipated, the early challenges we experienced were with the steeply sloped and rocky terrain. The solid rock provides an excellent support for the building but required hours of jackhammering to accurately manicure the openings for the foundation.

As the building grew out of the ground and the structure began to take shape, our team continued to finalize touches that would best serve the community. It was a true collaboration between the contractor and Children International. The exterior façade was selected based on durability and local architecture. Interior finishes were chosen considering ease of maintenance and functionality. It seemed logical to have tile throughout as opposed to carpet and drop ceilings as opposed to open trusses to maintain a cool environment.

Not without its challenges, the Nina Rae Wesson center was constructed under the watchful eye of experienced professionals. It is one that the sponsors, donors, CI and most definitely the community can be proud of for many years to come. And this Friday, the 31st, there will be a fantastic celebration for the children and families living in the community of Villa de Guadalupe.

When I Grow Up...

"I want to be a a bus driver because I want to take people everywhere they want to go." – Himutinta, age 8, from Lusaka, Zambia.

Meet Brenda from Chile...

What do you like about visiting the community center?

"I get to play with many kids while waiting for the doctor." – Brenda, age 8, from Valparaíso, Chile.

Shadows from the Past

Posted on behalf of David Nebel


There is nothing quite like moving between contiguous yet different worlds.

I would wake up to the incessant clucking of chickens and the occasional bark of a street dog. Morning light filtered through the holes termites had bored into the bedroom’s door over the years, signaling the end of yet another sleepless ninety-degree summer night in the Comayagua Valley, in central Honduras.

Making my way past a narrow dirt courtyard, I would push open the old wooden door that led into my grandmother’s kitchen. Immediately I began searching for breakfast: “pastelitos” (deep-fried, bite-size pastries made with corn dough and stuffed with seasoned ground beef), “enchiladas” (fried tortillas with seasoned ground beef and topped with shredded cabbage, a slice of tomato and Honduran crumbly cheese), and “yuca frita” (fried yucca) – last night’s leftovers from the evening cooking business my grandmother had begun some 60 years ago.

Ash would sting my eyes and fill the smoky stillness of the kitchen as I blew into the earthen stove in search of embers. With the help of several slivers of ocote (a resinous type of pine), there would usually be just enough left to rekindle the fire. Happily, I would then spear cold pieces of yucca and pastelitos and place them next to the crackling firewood for a quick reheating – and a quick consumption.

Soon after, my grandmother rose out of bed. As she shuffled her way from behind a plywood partition and into the kitchen, I would rush over to her, bend my head down to her level, and receive her blessing: “Que Dios me lo bendiga, hijito (God bless you, my child)”, she said, softly kissing my forehead. And with a warm smile on her face, she would hobble off into the brightness of the morning sun…

Life in Honduras placed me at the doorstep of poverty. Though not extremely poor, the maternal side of my family was not far from it. And there were plenty of families who were in worse conditions. It was, however, a normal aspect of life. To me, its normalcy made poverty acceptable.

Working with Children International has granted me the opportunity to return to my past and remind myself that there are degrees of poverty that – although commonplace – are not acceptable.

Meeting the sponsored children and their families as part of the team that visited Ecuador just this past week took me back to a previous world. These are the same people of my childhood and adolescence, with whom I lived side by side, with whom I shared food, laughs and sorrows. Yet, to my older eyes, they have changed: they are now more beautiful and important than ever.

They represent the forging elements of my being – the reason why I am able to appreciate the rare but quiet dignity of people at the edge of survival and gratefully acknowledge my own present condition. Their calloused hands, blemished skin, and the torn soles of their feet speak of countless hardships and the crude reality of life for many human beings. A decade later, they represent a reason for my existence.

Photos by David Nebel, from Children International's office in Kansas City.

A City of Hope

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is doubtless one of the most recognizable cities in the United States. Founded in the mid-1700s, Pittsburgh is the second largest city in Pennsylvania and boasts a rich colonial history. The 2000 U.S. census reported that 312,819 people live within the perimeter of its 55.6 square miles.

One publication listed Pittsburgh as America’s most livable city for 2007. But imagine for a moment what life in Pittsburgh would be like if things were not just as they are…

• Imagine if Pittsburgh had virtually no access to medical services, leaving over 300,000 people to simply stay home and suffer when they are sick because they cannot possibly afford to visit a doctor or pay for medicine.
• Imagine if practically no one in Pittsburgh earned more than two dollars a day – but had to stretch this income out to pay for food, housing, clothes and any other expenses.
• Imagine if, instead of over 150 gleaming skyscrapers, Pittsburgh were made up mostly of crumbling, dilapidated shacks thrown together from scraps of lumber, plastic sheeting and rusty tin...
• Imagine if Pittsburgh were just another poverty-stricken city in just another developing country.

Poverty this stark and this overwhelming is hard to imagine on such a large scale in America. Yet, were you to gather the over 300,000 desperately poor children that Children International reaches out to in eleven countries around the world into a single city, you would have a population that easily rivals or surpasses that of Pittsburgh.

Figure in these children’s relatives and you have a tragedy of epic proportions.

With the help of our sponsors, we are providing reliable – and free – medical and dental care to children who would otherwise have nowhere to turn. We’re helping children trade the fields and the sweatshops for the classroom…fighting parasitic infestations…treating malnutrition…teaching job skills…funding micro-enterprise ventures for income generation…providing safe housing…in short, we’re turning this “city of tragedy” into a city of hope.

The obstacles are sobering and at times it seems like change is frustratingly slow. But while we can’t provide a quick fix for poverty, we are convinced sponsorship can make a significant difference in the long run. So please, get involved. You really can make a difference. You can help build a city of hope.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Mother Nature Pays A Visit

Being from the midwest, I'm no stranger to the forces of Mother Nature.

Thankfully, we weren't physically shaken by the devastating earthquake in neighboring Peru, however our communications coordinator, Andres, frantically tried to reach his father via cell phone in Lima. Several hours later we learned that his father was safe and the weight of not knowing was lifted for Andres.

Mother Nature, however, paid another call today. Just shortly after returning from the rural hillsides of Quito, we arrived for a break at a local community center. Clouds shielded us from the intense, but cool, rays of the sun for most of the morning. Suddenly, the skies opened up and rain began to fall. Not in a gentle, picturesque way, but in a deafening roar as the raindrops and then hail pounded the metal roof over our heads.

The center was full of parents and children who were lined up outside waiting to receive school supplies. As the rain went from a trickle to a torrent, our staff quickly moved them under a small tent. Conversations soon stopped because you could no longer hear the person sitting next to you. Looking out the window, the dirt road we just drove down suddenly became a muddy river. We noticed a steady stream of water entering the third floor where we were. Thinking we were dry from the storm so far up, I quickly discovered that there was a road at third floor level on the opposite side of the center. As water poured in from the road, we scrambled to get our cameras off the floor before they got wet, then realized that along another wall sat dozens of boxes of school supplies. We immediately moved them so they wouldn't be ruined and the children wouldn't have to go without them.

As the storm pounded down on us, all I could think about were the familes on the hillside we just visited. They had little or no protection from the cold wind, rain and hail. How does a mother keep her children dry under a rusty tin roof and walls made of loosely fastened scrap wood? I could only picture them huddled together in a corner, trying to stay dry and wait the storm out.

Twenty minutes later the storm passed and daily activites resumed as if nothing ever happened. Hopefully, the families on the hillside braved the storm without troubles. If they did, luck was definitely on their side. This time.