Monday, August 24, 2009

Ecuador Update

Just thought I would let you all in on the latest action in Ecuador. The church has assigned a part time missionary in Salt Lake to develop medical work for eyes in Ecuador. He met with Dr. Zambrano for a week and returned with a great report.

The first letter you read is the missionary, Dr. Christiansen, responding to another eye doctor in Otavalo, Gaby. She is 28, lds, and has to work for the government for 2 years before she works for us.

Dr. Christiansen called me yesterday and reported that the church is going to purchase eye surgery equipment and supplies for our clinics in Otavalo and Quito. Dr. Christiansen will also have Gaby come to the states and receive more training. This partnership will blossom into providing all of Ecuador with some wonderful vision care. Dr. Christiansen will also have eye doctors going to Ecuador to work in our clinics.

One other exciting news for Ecuador. Shell Oil has contracted with CAF on serving the indigenous tribes in the headwaters of the Amazon. Once every month for a year, CAF will send a team of doctors and dentists for a week to provide health care. Shell will fit the bill.

Hope this gives you something to smile about tonight.

Be good and do good.

Gordon

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Miracle in Senagal

The Miracle at the orphanage in Senegal, Africa

In June, 2009 a small group of 8 from Charity Anywhere Foundation traveled to Mbour, Senegal, Africa to help an orphanage. As we met with Michelle, the manager of the orphanage, we found out that they were very concerned about the milk supply. They had 2 weeks supply for the newborns and 4 weeks supply for the older babies. They had been buying milk from Nestles in Dakar and were now behind $6000 on the bill . They had then changed over to buy the milk from a pharmacist in Mbour at retail. They were behind with him also. We also found out that they had 175 children there with 3 more coming that week. Half were under the age of 2.

The eight of us were very concerned about the milk supply because we had not brought enough money to pay the bill off at Nestles. We prayed and discussed various options on how to help. One option was to go to Dakar and meet with Nestles to see if they would forgive the debt. Our Senagaleze contact, Ousmane, made arrangements for 2 of us to travel to Dakar and meet with Nestles sales people. It took us 2 hours to get there and they were waiting for us. Just before we arrived, Ousmane had a relative meet us and go with us to Nestles. He was a pharmacist. The four of us met with Nestles and found out that since the bill was 3 months old that they could not forgive the debt. They did indicate that once the bill was paid in full that they would sell the milk at a special reduced rate to help the orphanage.

We left sad and disappointed. How could we get this milk supply problem solved?

On our last day at the orphanage we got all the donations we had brought out on a table to present to Michelle, the manager. As I was getting the last items on the 2 tables a big beautiful bus pulled up in front of the orphanage. Men in suits started to pour out of the bus with African women all dressed in their beautiful African attire. These were wealthy people. Once the bus was empty, they opened the belly of the bus and started to unload boxes. It took me about 10 seconds to realize that the belly of the bus was loaded with milk. We formed a human unloading line and stacked the boxes in a big pile. I was brought to tears when I realized that the pharmacist that went with us to Nestles had contacted all these pharmacists at the convention that week in Dakar and they all donated either milk or money to help the orphanage. What a miracle that was that day.