Monday, May 7, 2012

Greetings from Africa. It has been a while. The Perpetual Education Fund is progressing. These kids are awesome. We love working with them. We are seeing young adults who are progressing in school, finding jobs, and changing their lives. In our spare time, we have been to a couple of orphanages to play and visit. Our French friends, Eric and Chantal invited us to go to an orphanage of older children to play one Saturday. A young French man is here teaching at the French School. (his wife lives in Geneva and is friends with Eric and Chatal - who live in France, but just accros the border from Geneva - are friends with his wife. His wife's ward in Geneva had sent some money to buy food and stuff for them. We went out, organized soccer and frisby games and visited.
The man who runs the home has a large house he has built and takes in older kids off the street. He uses his own money from his job to support them.
They played the drums and sang to us. They love to sing and dance.
Suzanne with one of the younger kids
They have a home made large checker board that uses bottle caps for checkers. They are really good. They don't have a lot of things to do. The kids beat all of us soundly.
The Geneva ward had sent coloring and craft books for the kids. They loved it.
The other orphanage we visit has many many needs. We decided to build some beds and tables for the kids. The kids are sleeping on the bare ground and getting bug bites etc. There table broke apart, so they have no place to eat. Hense, the bed and table project. Elder Billings and I built the prototype. One of our young friends came by to help.
Sister Billings is heading the sewing project to make clothing for the kids. There is so much to do and so little time and resources to do it all. But we enjoy helping when and where we can.