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I recently had the incredible privilege to connect with some of the awesome folks from Food for the Hungry in Guatemala.
Talk about an adventure! 6 days of off-roading, 4-wheel driving over their idea of "roads" and hiking into the distant villages all to tell the story of how Child Sponsorship is making an impact.
They go to the hard places. That's the saying around Food for the Hungry, or FH as we'll call it.
Hard places they are.
In Guatemala they're working in the areas designated by the government as being in "extreme poverty". My role was & is to tell the story. I brought along my Canon 5d, my Sony HD video camera and an iPod Nano Video that allowed me to make video notes about every place we went, who we talked to and thoughts in general.
I had no cell service, no email, Twitter or Facebook - and it was glorious.
So let's back up a second.
I've been attending Heartland Community Church and The Gathering for the past 3+ years now. A couple years ago The Gathering began a relationship with FH and partnered with them to sponsor children in Ethiopia. Today, the Gathering sponsors just over 350 children.
We sent a team over to meet kids, check out what they're doing over there and report back. When they came back they brought me 14 hours of video and over 3000 images. That video I created opened the door to working with FH on a larger scale.
Since then, I've done 3 additional pieces and I'm working on my 4th - 10th (or so it feels like)
It's been incredible. I'm so passionate about what they're doing that it's some of my favorite work to do - even over the destination weddings in Hawaii, but I'll still do those. (seriously, call me)
So what is Sponsorship?
A lot of people get this idea in their head that when they send $30 a month and sponsor a child that it's putting a plate of food in front of them every day and maybe some clothes on their back.
That's not it at all, when it comes to FH.
Their mission is to end physical and spiritual hunger in the world, one child at a time.
The coolest thing to me about them is how they do it - it's not about helping, giving a handout, or the white Americans that want to save the world coming in and doing something for someone and then leaving. All that does is create a dependency on those same Americans.
FH goes into the places they're working and walks along side the community leaders, families and children. They ask "what are your goals and vision for your community?, what's standing in the way of that?, what can you do on your own to get there?, and how can we help?" They also use indigenous workers to do it, meaning that the FH staff in Guatemala are from there, speak the same language, and are often from the same villages they're working in.
Let me show some pictures -
This is Miguel. Miguel is the Mayor of a village called Rio Azul.
His walking stick is a symbol of stature in the community as He's been the mayor for the past 6 years. It's not a paid position, but he does it because his community trusts him, and repeatedly asks him to speak on their behalf year after year.
One quick story: Miguel walked us around his village and showed us how FH has helped. FH is huge on education and believes it is the key to ending the cycle of poverty. He showed us how FH helped them build a classroom which led the teachers and community leaders to discovering that separating students into smaller classrooms made learning 10 times easier. They quickly decided to renovate an unused city building that had jail cells in it into 6 additional classrooms. FH showed them the importance of education, then the community ran with it. That's another big thing about them: they want to leave every community they work with after so many years and have that community carry on on their own, better than when they started.
The next set of images is about Hugo. Hugo was sponsored as a child, all the way through school including a scholarship for High School until he obtained his teaching certificate. These villages are so small they're lucky to have a school at all, so when it comes time for middle school or beyond, children usually have to go great distances on foot (sometimes walking up to 3 hours per day) to surrounding communities for further education. Hugo made these sacrifices and has now returned to his community that he was raised in and is not only a full time teacher, but also the secretary for two different Community Development Committees where he's able to share the education he's earned with others on how to improve their villages as well.
The other thing that amazed me is the belief that families had that the more kids they had, the more help they would have working their farm. They wind up with 5 kids to feed and little to no income and in a far worse situation than they had imagined. On top of that, their already small farm is now divided into 5 more smaller pieces for thier children, lowering their ability to ever produce more than their father.
FH is helping to change this though. They aren't just working with the children. They meet with the families and community leaders too. One of the other cool projects I saw was the women working looms. FH helps educate them and to market their fabrics in their communities and surrounding municipalities.
- Here's Domingo (my guide + translator), as well as some of the incredible fabrics they produce through this incredibly intricate process.
Here's a few more pics - We hiked almost an hour into a village only accessible on foot with a narrow muddy path. We visited a school with sponsored children where Domingo taught them a quick lesson on numbers. It started pouring rain (just like every other day) and a soccer game broke out in the middle of the class. (Ok, so maybe we started it.)
So, sponsorship helps education and health, but also the personal identity and purpose of each child. Children attend a vacation bible school class every 15 days that all of the kids told me they love and look forward to. Imagine living in the middle of nowhere and hearing that someone in another country across the world is sponsoring you. Kids learn how they are created by God and that He loves them - adding that to an education and encouragement from FH staff and sponsors, children develop a sense of purpose in their lives.
So it's not just a plate of food and clothes on their back, not that there's anything wrong with that. It's a holistic approach, teaching them to care for themselves.
Food for the Hungry works in over 22 countries around the world and every country and village has varying needs. If you'd like to be a part of changing the life of a child, their family and their community, you too can sponsor a child at www.fh.org
I'll be working on a child sponsorship video in the next couple weeks with the footage as well as a longer documentary piece so stay tuned...
Talk about an adventure! 6 days of off-roading, 4-wheel driving over their idea of "roads" and hiking into the distant villages all to tell the story of how Child Sponsorship is making an impact.
They go to the hard places. That's the saying around Food for the Hungry, or FH as we'll call it.
Hard places they are.
In Guatemala they're working in the areas designated by the government as being in "extreme poverty". My role was & is to tell the story. I brought along my Canon 5d, my Sony HD video camera and an iPod Nano Video that allowed me to make video notes about every place we went, who we talked to and thoughts in general.
I had no cell service, no email, Twitter or Facebook - and it was glorious.
So let's back up a second.
I've been attending Heartland Community Church and The Gathering for the past 3+ years now. A couple years ago The Gathering began a relationship with FH and partnered with them to sponsor children in Ethiopia. Today, the Gathering sponsors just over 350 children.
We sent a team over to meet kids, check out what they're doing over there and report back. When they came back they brought me 14 hours of video and over 3000 images. That video I created opened the door to working with FH on a larger scale.
Since then, I've done 3 additional pieces and I'm working on my 4th - 10th (or so it feels like)
It's been incredible. I'm so passionate about what they're doing that it's some of my favorite work to do - even over the destination weddings in Hawaii, but I'll still do those. (seriously, call me)
So what is Sponsorship?
A lot of people get this idea in their head that when they send $30 a month and sponsor a child that it's putting a plate of food in front of them every day and maybe some clothes on their back.
That's not it at all, when it comes to FH.
Their mission is to end physical and spiritual hunger in the world, one child at a time.
The coolest thing to me about them is how they do it - it's not about helping, giving a handout, or the white Americans that want to save the world coming in and doing something for someone and then leaving. All that does is create a dependency on those same Americans.
FH goes into the places they're working and walks along side the community leaders, families and children. They ask "what are your goals and vision for your community?, what's standing in the way of that?, what can you do on your own to get there?, and how can we help?" They also use indigenous workers to do it, meaning that the FH staff in Guatemala are from there, speak the same language, and are often from the same villages they're working in.
Let me show some pictures -
This is Miguel. Miguel is the Mayor of a village called Rio Azul.
His walking stick is a symbol of stature in the community as He's been the mayor for the past 6 years. It's not a paid position, but he does it because his community trusts him, and repeatedly asks him to speak on their behalf year after year.
One quick story: Miguel walked us around his village and showed us how FH has helped. FH is huge on education and believes it is the key to ending the cycle of poverty. He showed us how FH helped them build a classroom which led the teachers and community leaders to discovering that separating students into smaller classrooms made learning 10 times easier. They quickly decided to renovate an unused city building that had jail cells in it into 6 additional classrooms. FH showed them the importance of education, then the community ran with it. That's another big thing about them: they want to leave every community they work with after so many years and have that community carry on on their own, better than when they started.
The next set of images is about Hugo. Hugo was sponsored as a child, all the way through school including a scholarship for High School until he obtained his teaching certificate. These villages are so small they're lucky to have a school at all, so when it comes time for middle school or beyond, children usually have to go great distances on foot (sometimes walking up to 3 hours per day) to surrounding communities for further education. Hugo made these sacrifices and has now returned to his community that he was raised in and is not only a full time teacher, but also the secretary for two different Community Development Committees where he's able to share the education he's earned with others on how to improve their villages as well.
So Sponsorship helps fund education? Yes. It funds FH staff doing monthly (but sometimes more) visits to the child's home, helping them, and encouraging them to continue their education. This education also helps their health. Health Care is another big part of sponsorship. Simple things like teaching kids, mothers and families to wash their hands before eating cuts down on disease, and has changed the infant mortality rate in Guatemala from children dying from preventable things like diarrhea.
We grow up in America with classes that help us understand germs and things that are bad for us. In the middle of nowhere, if no one tells you the cause, the beliefs about why children get sick and die are unbelievable. Things like "your neighbor cursed you" or "you've made your ancestors angry" are prevelant in many societies. What ends up happening is mothers and fathers almost expect their children to die from simply-cured diseases and distance themselves from them, not encouraging them to become educated or to do better in their lives than they have.
The other thing that amazed me is the belief that families had that the more kids they had, the more help they would have working their farm. They wind up with 5 kids to feed and little to no income and in a far worse situation than they had imagined. On top of that, their already small farm is now divided into 5 more smaller pieces for thier children, lowering their ability to ever produce more than their father.
FH is helping to change this though. They aren't just working with the children. They meet with the families and community leaders too. One of the other cool projects I saw was the women working looms. FH helps educate them and to market their fabrics in their communities and surrounding municipalities.
- Here's Domingo (my guide + translator), as well as some of the incredible fabrics they produce through this incredibly intricate process.
Here's a few more pics - We hiked almost an hour into a village only accessible on foot with a narrow muddy path. We visited a school with sponsored children where Domingo taught them a quick lesson on numbers. It started pouring rain (just like every other day) and a soccer game broke out in the middle of the class. (Ok, so maybe we started it.)
So, sponsorship helps education and health, but also the personal identity and purpose of each child. Children attend a vacation bible school class every 15 days that all of the kids told me they love and look forward to. Imagine living in the middle of nowhere and hearing that someone in another country across the world is sponsoring you. Kids learn how they are created by God and that He loves them - adding that to an education and encouragement from FH staff and sponsors, children develop a sense of purpose in their lives.
So it's not just a plate of food and clothes on their back, not that there's anything wrong with that. It's a holistic approach, teaching them to care for themselves.
Food for the Hungry works in over 22 countries around the world and every country and village has varying needs. If you'd like to be a part of changing the life of a child, their family and their community, you too can sponsor a child at www.fh.org
I'll be working on a child sponsorship video in the next couple weeks with the footage as well as a longer documentary piece so stay tuned...
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Comments
dang, mike. the water fountain one is so cute it made me cry.
(10.27.09)