From: "Brenda Lange"
Date: May 22, 2011 7:43:42 AM CDT
Subject: Blog, May 22, 2011
90 DAY HELPERS NOW IN BALAMA
The 6 person team of 90 day wonders have arrived safely including all their luggage.
Orientation/training has begun and tomorrow we will start showing them the programs.
They received an awesome welcome by the kids at our church this morning. It only took the little ones a few minutes to figure out that these 4 young ladies had warm hugs and empty laps that needed filling.
ERIC DRY returned to us on May 20th’s plane.
With his new training program, he will soon be walking confidently once again.
BEANS, BEANS, BEANS!
On Tuesday, Dave and Don will begin their bean processing training along with our 40 man crew. Our goal is to process and properly sack the 104 TONS of beans now sitting in our barn. It will be a busy week as we must complete the bean processing and get them into the proper barns before the corn buying begins on June 1st. It’s a race against time.
ELEPHANT VILLAGE KIDS VERY GRATEFUL FOR YOUR LOVE GIFTS
The emergency food drop and clothing distribution was done last Tuesday, but did have its challenges. The road to this village is full of sand pits which trapped the smaller truck delivering the food. The widows caring for the orphans had to walk about ½ a mile to pick up the food and then carry it back to their village. They were so grateful for the food, that they said this was a minor problem compared to watching these kids go hungry.
More clothes are being made with the gifts received so far, as each child only got one set of summer clothes at this point.
Our team has never had to deal with such a large numbers of kids in such bad shape, and they were all visibly shaken by the children’s bad health conditions. The health department de-wormed the children so that our food would nourish kids and not intestinal worms.
Most of the children are in the homes of 15 widows. Thirty cooking pots were donated so that each widow received a set to better prepare meals for the children. Two of the children are crippled and unable to walk.
A water well is badly needed as area water is at a critically low level due to the elephants sucking up the surface water. My staff has contacted the water well drilling company who help us last year, and plans are being made to make this the first well drilled (hopefully in June if we can get the equipment up here).
At this time, photographs are not allowed of these children, nor are visitors allowed. Once the situation is stabilized, I plan to visit the village personally. Food buying will keep us all busy in June, so a July visit is planned.
Our orphanage manager will be visiting them again this week to deliver winter shirts to help keep them warm.
Our weather is quite cool in the mornings and June/July are our coldest months with morning temps in the low 60s at the moment.
60 Grass mats and blankets were distributed to be shared by the 111 children, as most sleep huddled together.
Sharing a mat and blanket is not a problem for them. More blankets just arrived, thanks to your love gifts, and these will be distributed at the next supply drop.
THANK YOU to all who gave to make these emergency measures possible. These kids are now part of our Orphans Unlimited family. Our ministry staff made it very clear to them that God and His son Jesus truly love them and heard their cry for help.
Now we need to pray in a pastor who is willing to live in this village and minister to them on a continual basis. The location of this village is over 40 miles from our Meluco mission station and no church exists there.
It is too far for our BBC team to visit them.
Blessings, BBB and Balama staff
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