2 Jars of Pears

Almost all of us took pictures of the same thing: the 2 jars of wild pears that Margarita canned late last summer.

I didn't ask what they meant to my colleagues on the World Vision trip to Armenia, but I knew what they meant for me.

For the past hour we had sat in Margarita and Gegham's dark yet tidy living room, warming ourselves by the wood stove in the middle. We talked with Gegham first, as Margarita was on her way home from school with Tigran, their eldest son. Tigran suffered seizures at age two and now, at 7, has paralysis on his right side and developmental delays.

Margarita attends school with him, whenever possible, to give him extra help. He qualifies for physical therapy, but the family cannot afford the transportation costs to get them from their tiny village to a clinic, so Margarita does most of it on her own.

Margarita's dedication and determination reminded me so much of other mamas I know, who stay right there in it, at school and at home, making sure their kids get what they need as far as extra help and support.

The alphabet poster on the wall reminded me of the one that hung on my pantry door when the kids were little, and the joy it was to support them as they learned their letters.

(Tigran writes with his left hand now, b/c of paralysis on his right side)

 

 

Margarita is a regular mom, dealing with the challenges of raising two young boys, but with the additional burden of groaning debt brought on by Tigran''s 20-day hospitalization years ago and exacerbated by long harsh winters that make growing enough food extremely difficult.

Gegham is a hard-working and industrious man, and last summer he managed to rent a tractor and make enough money to sustain them for almost the entire winter. They paid the rent, grew potatoes,  and purchased firewood.

Until now.

Which leads us to the pears.

There is another room of their crumbling, communist-era home, which sits unused and unheated because of fear that the damaged roof will cave in. Margarita uses the room for cold storage, and on a small table are two jars of pears, all that remain of her canning the summer before.

Our visit is the last week in February, a long way off from the next growing season in this part of Armenia, one that lasts a scant 2-3 months. These pears are what Magarita and Gegham have left. To her disappointment, some of the other jars of fruit she had canned had gone bad and grown murky and moldy, so this was it.

And there the similarities between our lives ended.

Sure, I could tell Margarita that on the other side of the world I have a daughter who shares her name.
Yes, I had delighted in teaching my kids their letters, and I hope I had been as good an advocate as she had when my own kids faced difficulties (although I always think I could have done more). But I never once wondered if we would have enough to feed them.

I never once faced this on laundry day:

In feeling connected one mother-heart to another with Margarita, I could no longer deny the extreme differences in our situations.

Margarita will continue to work with her kids on their schooling, bake the bread, and can the fruits and vegetables. Gegham will find a way to rent a tractor again this summer.

But they need more help emerging from the precipice in which jars of spoiled fruit truly make a difference. This help will come through sponsorship of their kids with World Vision. Both boys gained sponsors while we were there, and as World Vision gets established in their community, the family will be equipped to build even better lives for themselves.

They already have the love.

There are MANY more children in this village and region awaiting sponsorship, and perhaps YOUR family can help. Here's more information about sponsorship.

 

(photos by Laura Reinhardt and Amy Bellgardt)

 

Meh News, Very Good News, Great News!

It's great to be home, despite killer jet-lag conveniently coupled with Daylight Saving Time.

Tim and Margaret did very well while I was gone, and I couldn't believe my plane landed despite our most recent snowstorm.

I wanted to update you regarding Nikol. By the time we came out of the rural area and back into the city at the end of our trip, World Vision found out that Nikol had already been sponsored by someone else. It's great he is sponsored, but I was bummed, of course, because it really felt like I was meant to be in his life.

The very good news is that I quickly checked with Tim and Margaret, and we decided to try to sponsor one of Nikol's older brother's children, who live nearby and two of whom were still awaiting sponsors. We had visited Varden, Ani, and their three children immediately after leaving Nikol's house. They live in a small converted railroad car with a lean-to attached to it.

Their need is as great as Nikol's family. In fact, as we were chatting with them, Varden came in from his daily trek in search of firewood to heat their woodstove. They do not have a cow for the cow dung, and there are very few trees around, so this trek can take hours a day. The rest of the time he looks for odd jobs, occasionally working overnight at a nearby hydroelectric plant to try to keep the water from freezing.

This young family will greatly benefit from economic development opportunities when World Vision gets programs established in their region. I am excited to see how their lives and futures will improve as a result of child sponsorship and economic development.

And, I will be able to stay in touch with Nikol through his brother's family, so that feels great, too.

Meet Vahan:

Looks like he got those striking blue eyes from his grandma, Nikol's mom:

Vahan is such a sweet, sweet four year old. He did a puzzle with our team member, Addie, while we were visiting. I'm so looking forward to being in his life as he grows!

Here he is with Mom and Dad and his little sister, Mariam, who also needs a sponsor. Behind them you can see the windows into the train car where the five of them sleep. The other room is where they cook, eat, and play.

 

And here's Dad on his quest for firewood:

 

So there was some meh news (I wanted to sponsor Nikol) and some very good news (I get to sponsor Vahan AND Nikol has an awesome sponsor!) and here's some GREAT NEWS:

Remember Aida? As the week progressed, 5 of her 7 kids needed sponsors and YOU came through. Yep! An Inch of Gray readers sponsored each of the remaining children! This family will blossom with your financial, emotional, and spiritual support. THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart. Our big family is helping her family!

If you are interested in sponsoring a child, but have not had the opportunity to do so, there are many more children in need of sponsorship. Learn more here.

Warm Boots

I was excited to be able to give a World Vision worker money to provide Nikol with a new pair of boots and possibly a few other things while we were here. Nikol and the worker went shopping and Nikol proudly picked out the pair he wanted. With the extra money, he bought apples, sugar, cooking oil, and coffee for his parents. I bet his mom is going to be super happy about that coffee.

Here are some pictures taken in the World Vision office of a happy boy:

Much More than Money

The widow opened the cabinet door, placing a colorful stack of letters on the table. Nine of us huddled under the eaves of her apartment, a make-shift space that she shared with her only child, 12 year old son Menua.

The letters were a source of pride for him and his mother, reminding them that even though they have been alone and marginalized since Menua's father's death, they are not forgotten. Menua explained that his sponsors in America encourage him through their letters.

I was humbled.

Having sponsored several children over the past 26 years, I've always thought that my monetary contributions were the most important part of the relationship. Sometimes I would receive 2 or 3 letters from my sponsor children for every one that I wrote. I would get busy and so focused on my own kids, I would forget to write.

But here was a real live boy (who loves math, is super-shy, wears glasses, and sings in the choir) whose life was made less lonely by a husband and wife from somewhere in the U.S. who send him Christmas cards, ask him about his studies, and tell him never to give up.

Another member of our team, Benjamin Corey, sums up these moments far better than I can in his latest post.

Something we've heard again and again from the kids on this trip, and I really needed this reminder, is that sponsorship is truly a relationship.

And speaking of relationships, right before this trip, remember how Tim, Margaret and I decided to sponsor a little girl named Anahit, 15 months old?

I got to meet her this week!

She is simply adorable and reminded me a lot of Margaret at that age. When I gave her a few little gifts, she was a very busy girl, carrying them around the restaurant where the sponsors, children, parents, and translators for lunch. She explored that place, all the while carrying the blue jay beanie baby I gave her, and a bunch of toddler spoons.

 Can you believe those cheeks?

I am more committed than ever to being here for her and our other sponsor kids as their "family from far away."

P.S. What should I write to a 15 month old???? If she's as active as I think she is, maybe my first letters should be encouragement for her mom!

If you want to learn more about child sponsorship, please visit World Vision

Get Off the Bus, Gus!

I could have stayed on the bus.

No one would judge me for it, and there would be plenty of opportunities to connect with other Armenian families later in the day. I knew today’s story didn’t need to be THIS story, of a 12 year old boy in need of a sponsor.

I got off the bus, but you probably knew that already, didn't you?

You knew that even though life is hard, opting IN is what helps me. It’s what keeps me going and tethers me to the world in a healthy way that I could not have taken for granted just a few years ago.

I had read a little bit about Nikol’s family early this morning, and I wanted to learn more, so I walked up the snowy path past the huge haystacks and into Janet, Andranik, and Nikol’s stone house. It was spacious in comparison to the house we would visit next, which was actually a cramped metal boxcar intended for temporary use following Armenia’s earthquake 27 yrs ago, now all these years later serving as a permanent home for a family of five. 

But Nikol’s stone house, while spacious, is falling down around the family, who can not afford to make repairs. In fact, Nikol recently changed where he slept because he is terrified the roof will cave in on him in the night.

 

 

I’ve joked a bit about my age on this trip, as I am quite a bit older than the other bloggers. I mean, I can’t believe I worried whether or not I should wear skinny jeans on the trip. These young bloggers are hip. And my use of the word "hip" just now pretty much shows that I’m not.  However, when I meet Nikol’s parents, who are 52 and 56, I would not have been surprised to learn they were in their 70's or older, so harsh have the years been on them.

As it is, they are as old as many grandparents in the region, and it is a cause for regret that they are barely able to feed their family at this stage in life, let alone spend money doting on their adult children and grandchildren.  As part of the old guard who remembers living under Soviet rule and having all of their needs met, Janet and Andranik find their current reality hard to fathom, let alone accept, but they have no choice.

Despite various physical ailments, they, along with Nikol, walk to a neighboring area twice a day to care for someone else’s farm animals. There they are surrounded by manure, but are not allowed to take any home to heat their house. 3 hours of labor in the morning, and 3 in the afternoon, done by the family together, yields a total of $1.40 a day. Enormous debt the family has carried for years (with interest rates up to 36%) looms over them, spreading a feeling of hopelessness and despair. When winter is over, the cows will be taken elsewhere, and that meager job will disappear. 

Yet here is Nikol, with his huge brown eyes and ready smile, who shows us some Judo moves (doing a few on me at my request), plays a few notes for us on a Euphonium, and tells us about the World Vision summer camp he attended last year. He is playful, respectful, curious, and kind. Our guides will tell us later that it is hard for him to make friends because in such a small village, his abject poverty sets him even further apart from his peers.

 

 

 

When Nikol opens his notebooks to show us his drawings, I feel a pang, but in a good way, thinking of my own brown-eyed boy and how each of his interests became our own and how he was (and is) a light to us as Nikol is to his parents.

We find out that Nikol’s school is going to start requiring students to have a computer, and that his teacher already gives out links and websites as part of assignments. To hear the words "links" and "computer" while standing in a room with a collapsing ceiling, a water tap nearby in the yard, and an outhouse down the way, is jarring and incongruous. How much more will these loving parents borrow just to get what they need for Nikol?

When an elderly woman prays that her ailments and stiff joints will ease up enough to allow her to milk another person’s cow in the hopes they will have enough money to PURCHASE MANURE, how ridiculous does talk of computers sound? What about Nikol's father, unable to use one of his arms because of a war injury? Where do computers fit in his reality, which at first glance looks like stepping back in time to a century ago? 

I don't know, for although they are kind enough to invite us into their home, to open up about their fears and struggles, I cannot truly put myself in their place.

“Nikol has a very tender heart,” our guide says, explaining that even at 12 he is a doting uncle who loves to play with his little nieces and nephew. “Yes,” I think, “I bet he does.”

And I know right then, even though a tear has slipped out of my eye.

Even though I can't transport the parents back to their youth, when life looked so very different from this daily struggle for survival.

Even though I can't wipe away the debt.

Even though I can't help Nikol fit in the way every middle schooler wants.

I know that Nikol will be our family's next sponsor child.

And now he is.

There are other children in Nikol's village who are in need of sponsorship, including his one of his nieces and his nephew. Here's information if you are interested.

A Mother-Woman

“I have my children with me and there are healthy,” she beamed.

And in that moment, in the run-down 2 room house on the side of a snow covered mountain, I envied her. I wanted what Aida had, all of her children healthy and with her.
 

We had asked, after spending some time in the tiny home, with its saggy plywood floor, sooty walls, and three narrow beds for 9 people, what she found joyful or beautiful about her life. It was natural to want to end on a high note for this mother, only 28 years old, who had generously opened her home and life to us. She had answered our questions about the ways her family barely subsists in this tiny Armenian village, where winter can last up to 9 months a year, and jobs are scarce.

With nowhere to go outside in the deep snow, and only one pair of boots for all 7 children, Aida’s family life takes place in these two rooms, each only a little larger than my bathroom at home.

The burden of rent is often too much, and the landlord threatens to kick them out, adding a larger dose of worry to Aida’s plate. The small wood stove used for cooking, washing, and heating water for bathing, is fueled by cow dung, but Aida’s family does not own a cow. Her husband muck stalls for someone else in order to earn a very low wage plus get cow dung for the family.

 Even though World Vision is just beginning to establish a presence in their region, Aida’s family and the others in her village will eventually benefit from all that sponsorship offers: parental training, agricultural training, nutrition programs, child protection, Sunday school, and economic development opportunities for the parents. The good news is that while those programs will take a while to establish, Aida’s family has already been identified as extremely vulnerable and will be given help in the meantime.

In fact, we were able to deliver the news that because of a donation made through a World Vision Gift Catalog, their electricity bill had been paid and the electricity will be turned back on after a week of being off. They will also receive an emergency food kit.

Aida IS grateful to have all of her children healthy and with her. It is what every mother wants. But behind her warm smile as she holds her adorable second youngest, is likely another desire: to make a better future for her children. I'm guessing some days that seems impossible.

No, I am not jealous of Aida. That unwanted flicker passed in an instant as it does on many of my days, but now Aida holds a place in my heart as one mother-woman to another. And I've got to tell you, that after just a few minutes in those little rooms, it became harder and harder to see the lack, even though it most certainly was there. Somehow, the warm intensity of mother-love made the rest start to recede from view. 

 

Child sponsorship is the backbone of World Vision’s programs. I get to meet my new sponsor child, Anahit, tomorrow!  You can find out more about child sponsorship here.

 

 

We're Here!

After a long 24 hours or so of travel, which may or may not have included a frenzied run through a Paris airport when our terminal and gate were switched (which may or may not have resulted in an early need for the spare undies in my purse) I'm in Armenia.

I'm hanging out in my comfy hotel bed waiting for the rest of the capital city of Yerevan to wake up.

Today will start with breakfast and devotions, then we will hop in vans to head to another town, about 1.5 hours away, which will be our home base for the week as we visit World Vision development projects and meet with Armenian people in their homes.

I think today will be about learning:

Learning more about the other bloggers I'm here with.

Learning about this beautiful country and its history at two museums, including the Armenian Genocide Museum.

Learning about the customs and language of the Armenians as we pepper our generous guides with questions.

And perhaps, my finally learning how to use Instagram and "THE TWITTER" to get the word out about the trip.  We'll see...

I'm so glad you will be here every step of the way!

P.S. To learn about child sponsorship through World Vision, check this out.