Finally ... we can use the dining room

Since managing to renovate the dining room last year we have not been able to use it for its intended purpose. We needed a space for an office and also for private conversations or counseling so we improvised, using the dining room and continuing to serve food in one of the activity rooms. But finally, thanks to the new office, we now use the dining room every day and it has made life easier for us, no more need to carry bowls of hot soup all the way through to the activity room. When Irina is here she's great at keeping order, as you can see from the photo below ... she doesn't put up with any nonsense at the table!

new kids on the streets

From time to time a new child or young person appears begging somewhere on the streets of Arad. For the first contact we just chat to the child and if they say they are hungry we buy them something to eat, as in the case of this young boy who was begging outside one of the supermarkets. We try to put the child at ease, over a period of time building up a relationship so that the child trusts us enough to come to the day centre.

These two rascals were begging on the main boulevard of Arad and were very suspicious when we tried talking with them. They refused to give names or any information about themselves, assuming that our intention was to take them away and put them in a children's home! We persevered for a while and then I remembered that I had some toys in the minibus which someone had donated and hadn't yet been unloaded at the day centre ... two skipping ropes later we were chatting away happily. I invited them to come to the centre but don't expect to see them for some time, it is usually a while before children feel safe enough to come.

"Inviere" - Resurrection service

Just a few images from the Easter Resurrection service at our local Orthodox church on Easter Saturday night. It's the one part of Easter that we really wouldn't miss - hundreds of people all meeting together at the church before midnight and then all walking around the church carrying candles ... beautiful and very moving. After three times around the church there follows a small ritual where the Priest knocks on the church door three times. Each time someone inside shouts out and asks who is knocking on the door of the house of the Lord and each time the Priest answers "we come in the name of the Risen Lord". Then usually the church doors are opened and everyone enters the church but this year the Priest said that as there were so many people, the service would all be held outside.

At the end of the service around 0200 a spotless lamb is brought into the service ... the photos didn't come out of the lamb as it was so dark, but it was beautiful and thankfully it's just symbolic ... no actual sacrifice takes place!

Decorating eggs for Easter at the Secret Garden

Romania has a lovely tradition of decorating eggs for Easter and each year we continue this tradition in the Secret Garden, as best as we are able! This year one of our mums gave us a lovely idea, to varnish the blown eggs and to decorate them with an assortment of tiny beads, sequins and table confetti kindly sent by Kate's uncle Bill!

The results were lovely and when Amy came for a very short surprise visit just before Easter, she loved them and took them back to Scotland, where she sold them - profits will go into the daily food budget!

Our new office ... at last!

After many months of obstacles to the building of our office, it's finally finished (well, very nearly) and in use! While the builder was working we had unseasonal flooding and a whole host of other problems which slowed down the work, but it's been worth it all.

With a grant from USAID via Peace Corps we have been able to purchase four laptop computers and other office equipment. We opted for laptops as they will be used in the office and also for computer training of both staff and clients, they give us the flexibility to work anywhere.

Shaneka, our Peace Corps volunteer for the past year and eight months worked with Amy (our daughter and former volunteer!) on the grant application and we are grateful to them both for all their hard work. The photo shows Kenneth and Shaneka using the office for the very first time to discuss (appropriately) the computer training programme. Shaneka has left us earlier than planned due to personal issues so the computer the training will be carried out by Kenneth as and when he can fit it in, until we find someone willing to take it on.

Christmas 2010

Christmas was an awesome and humbling experience for us this year (or should I say last year?) We had two Christmas parties at the Secret Garden and we were seriously worried that we would not be able to provide adequate food and drink. We had no money in the foundation bank account, minus money in our personal account and a week before the parties, no offers of help! Above is a photo from the first party, for the children and families who come for the morning programme. Irina organised all the children to sing Christmas carols and say poems for the assembled parents and other adults. You can't see them all on this photo, but the room behind the visible children you can see was pretty full, we had around 60 people in all. We also played musical chairs, several rounds of it, we divided the children into age groups for safety - you can imagine what great fun it was with 15 children in each round! Then we danced and played more games before eating. The food was donated by local people and there was plenty for all. To complete a lovely day we were able to give each person a Christmas gift thanks again to Blysthwood Trust who again sent over Christmas shoeboxes for us.

On Christmas Eve we had our party for the street folks. Given that a week before the party we had no food and no money for any and we were beginning to wonder what we were going to do and how we were going to feed people. We had tomato soup donated by Blythswood Trust in Scotland - thousands of tins of it ... but apart from that, nothing! By the day of the party we could not believe the meal we were able to serve to our homeless friends ... a four course meal for 40 people is no mean feat!

We were overwhelmed by the goodness of God and of our Romanian friends who brought in ready made food. When you think that Christmas eve is the main celebration meal for Romanian families and all these good people had taken up precious time (and money) in the middle of such a busy family time, it's even more special. Home made soup was followed by stuffed cabbage leaves (traditional celebration food) and then by roast chicken thighs and mashed potato, served with plates of homemade pickles on the tables. To finish we served a selection of cakes and biscuits and coffee for any who wished it and a Christmas shoebox as each person left. When our family arrived at Nelu and Mariana's house later in the evening, we were completely exhausted but still caught up in the wonder of it all ...

Our pal Conor

Conor is 10 and lives in Falkirk, Scotland. he came out to Romania in summer 2009 with his whole family and helped us with our work. Conor has a new blog which I recommend to you - it is interesting and entertaining and yes, to fans of the Highlander films, he really is called Conor MacLeod! www.conormacleod-thereisonlyone.blogspot.com

new web site

I will post photos of Christmas and after soon ... honestly, I will but it's been such a busy busy busy time and fraught with personal problems. To name but a few, my mother has been very ill, my father died (I wasn't even informed, I found out three weeks after the event which was pretty distressing), Kenny has been unwell and my laptop had to be sent away for repair. I now have Amy's old laptop which is newer than mine as Grandad bought her a new one for Christmas so I'm up and running again.

Philip has very kindly started work on a new website for us. As yet it doesn't have a huge amount on it but we will be adding to it and of course it has a link to my blog. Please click on the link and have a wee look anyway ... and I will get back to blogging as soon as possible! We are in Scotland just now primarily to meet with our trustees and support group and to attend a fund raising ceilidh being held by West Glasgow New Church in Cleveden secondary school on Saturday evening (tomorrow). The last one they held was amazing and great fun so we are looking forward to it and hoping it might cheer us up a little along the way!

a hard winter

Winter hit us in November with some very cold snowy weather, and again in December we had loads of snow before Christmas. During the week before Christmas the temperature suddenly rose from well below zero up to an incredible 13 degrees C, unheard of here in December. It was good news in terms of heating bills which are always a struggle to pay but unfortunately didn't last and on Christmas day during the evening the snow returned and with it, the cold. Since then the temperatures have remained a good bit below zero and the snow is thick on the ground everywhere. Christmas was, as usual an extremely busy time for us with Christmas parties and shoebox gifts to organise -I hope to find time this week to download photos from the camera and post some ... but don't hold your breath!

Eye Testing

We only returned from the UK two weeks ago but it seems like an age. Last week I was away at a conference Monday and Tuesday, while on Tuesday Kenneth picked up two Optometrists from the UK and headed off with them to the next county to do eye testing in two different towns. They returned to Arad on Thursday night after midnight and on Friday spent all day testing at the Secret Garden and today (Saturday) all day in another town. During the year we carry out screening clinics and then all the referred patients are re-called to be seen by the Optometrists. It's a very busy week for them and us. As I write it's 2315 and Kenneth, Jane and Ian are still busy making up the glasses - there are a lot of pairs to be made!

In addition to all the busy-ness of the last week, Angelica dropped a real bombshell on Friday - she has been offered the chance of a good job (with a good salary) in Spain from next week. We We didn't demand that Angelica works her notice because she would lose the job if she wasn't available immediately. Angelica is a wonderful woman who has been a real pleasure to have as part of our small team - in spite of pretty awful home circumstances she is never ruffled and has provided us with a calming influence that has greatly helped us all in our stressful work. Her leaving means I will have to go back to being on site pretty much all the time ... there goes the time I thought I had for looking for funding and sponsorship!

Viki

We lost one of our regular visitors to the Secret Garden while we were in the UK. Viki had been ill with cancer for a good while. A very poor woman who didn't have much of a life, she used to come regularly, bringing her two daughters with her, one with severe mental disabilities and HIV positive and the other with two young children, one a baby with health problems. Viki refused our offers of help to get to the hospital in Cluj 5 hours away, where she had a chance of a new treatment. She said to me that she couldn't go because she had to look after her family for as long as she could.

The last time I saw Viki was just before I left for the UK. She came in a wheelchair as she could no longer walk. We do not yet have a disabled ramp due to lack of finances but we usually manage to lift people up the four steps. Viki was swollen up with fluid and too heavy to lift, but she struggled out of the wheelchair and crawled up the steps on her hands and knees as she wanted to have a shower. I cried as I watched helplessly at the sight of this poor lady struggling away in order to be clean. After her shower Viki talked to be about the future - she was worried about her daughters and grand daughters and she said to me "I'll do my best for them while I still breathe but when I'm gone then God will have to take care of them, there's nothing more I can do."

Falkirk mobile library moves to France!

Kenneth and I are over in the UK visiting friends, family and supporters. It's the annual marathon of rushing around the UK for a few weeks traveling to as many places as possible and seeing as many people as possible in as short a time as possible - great but exhausting! Sincere apologies to those we don't manage to visit.

Our "French Connection", Malcolm and Jan have been trying various initiatives in order to raise much needed funds for the work. Malcolm's latest project has been selling books in his local market in France. Then he and Jan came up with the amazing idea of buying the former Falkirk mobile library and taking it out to France. Malcolm and Andy from our Scottish support group set off yesterday to drive to France ... what an adventure! So if any ex-pat Brits in the Poitiers area of France are reading this blog, get over to Malcolms mobile bookshop and get yourselves some bargains!

As you can see by the photo below, Yasmina fancied taking a turn at the driving ... it was a hard job parting her from the steering wheel.

Roma (Gypsy) slavery

As a people the Roma (Romanies, Gypsies) have been devalued for centuries. Most likely originally from northern India they migrated across Europe or were brought as slaves, possibly slave soldiers. Slavery already existed in Europe when the Roma came, non-Christian groups including Muslims and Jews were enslaved and according to the customs of the times it was considered normal to have Roma slaves. Roma slavery was finally abolished in Romania in the mid 19th century.

Discrimination against Roma is widespread - Ian Hancock, a Roma university professor from the US cites several modern examples of shameless racism against Roma: A Romanian woman when asked about murders of Roma in Hidareni said that killing Gypsies wasn't murder because murder is when human beings are killed! Hancock quickly adds that such opinions are by no means confined to Romania, quoting a member of the British government who declared publicly that Roma were "not human beings in the normal sense" and an Illinois detective who stated on television that American Gypsies had not yet developed genetically "like other people" to know right from wrong. Unbelievable!

In our work at "Vis de Copil" (A Child's Dream) we work with many Roma families and we also work at building bridges between the Roma community and the wider population. Our experience is that people are people, no matter what their nationality or ethnic background - most Roma are just honest, decent people trying "to make ends meet" and bring up their children.

The Secret Garden - a safe place

Dina usually comes to the Secret Garden once or twice a week and stays for two or three hours. She is in her twenties and has mental health issues and is a very timid young woman, easily scared and very wary of us getting too close. We don't know so much about Dina's past but the scars she bears tell a sad story of abuse and neglect. There are so many Dinas in this world - unloved and unwanted, passed around children's homes and finally ending up homeless on the streets of one of the world's many cities. What can we offer this young woman and others like her? Sadly, not a home, nor a family ... but we can offer her a safe refuge and a place to which to come and not be judged or ridiculed or worse.

daily activities in the midst of renovations

The renovation work on the basement medical room is almost completed - we are just waiting for the plasterwork to all dry out before the final finishings can be done. It's taken much longer than planned because of the unbelievable weather - May and June have had more rain than ever for the time of year since records began and their have ben incredible storms and severe flooding in parts of the country. During the course of the work in the basement the workers were flooded out several times.

But as they say, the show must go on ... and we have continued the daily programme almost as normal, without the use of the courtyard for the children to play outside. Children who come daily to the Secret Garden are enjoying the more leisurely programme during the school holidays. We still put them to do a little school work to keep them up to date because the holidays are long and children forget but we do more games and leisure activities each day. Yesterday we completed the lovely forest scene pictured above - isn't it great.
As well as various activities some of the children have showers and all of them have a meal (we try to feed everyone who walks through the door!) Recently we received another generous donation of frozen food from a local company - we have had several donations of frozen fish and profiteroles, this time we received lots ... and I mean LOTS of traditional dumplings stuffed with a mixture of fillings - chocolate, sweet cheese and apricot! We couldn't store them all so we spent a whole afternoon and evening driving around delivering them to other charities in Arad and some very poor families in our own community. For two weeks now all our clients have been eating soup and dessert.We try to get the mums and other carers involved in our activities and they often take part, but sometimes they just want to sit and watch and relax a bit ... can't blame them, they have such hard lives.

Below is a tableau of paper flowers made over the past couple of weeks by Dana, Angelica and the children. It's painstaking but the finished effect looks beautiful on the wall of our entrance hall.

homes for the homeless!

After weeks of queues and form filling and anxious moments waiting for home visits to check current living conditions Irina (friend, colleague and former street girl) was one of the fortunate ones who finally received the keys to her new "social housing" apartment today! It has been a stressful few months for Irina (and us) and many others of our "clients" but today was truly a sight to behold.

Irina was so overcome with emotion that after signing and receiving her keys she threw her arms around Erica Stark the Director of social Services for Arad city! Erica used to be the manager of the emergency section of the Arad County Child Protection and we have had many years of fruitful collaboration with her.

Irina has known Erica since she was a young child living on the streets of Arad and has many fond memories of "Doamna Erica", so it was particularly special for Irina to receive the keys from her.

Argentina (yes, her real name) is one of our regulars at the "Secret Garden" day centre. This young woman and her husband and two young children have been living in a makeshift hut in one of the poorest communities of Arad for several years. If you met her, Argentina would impress you with her quiet faith and attitude of thankfulness for what she has ... which has never been much.

Argentina and family, overjoyed with their first ever proper stable home. One room, a kitchen, bathroom and store room might not sound much to some of you, but for this family it's a palace!

This wee darling also comes to our centre, her family one of the many who have come to us for showers ... now they have a real bathroom with a bath and running water!

After receiving their keys some of the disabled young men from our dear friend's Linda and Harold's foundation asked for a lift back into town ... then two of our street folks who have been given an apartment joined them ... then one of our poor families ... but will they all fit in, wheelchairs and all?

Yes of course they will ... and as my father used to say "a good day was had by all"

first aid training!

The recent visit of a group of nurses from Scotland brought with it many laughs as they tried their best to teach us all first aid! We took them out and about in some of the very poor communities doing "street clinics" where the people would queue up for advice and help from the nurses. Problems ranged from minor cuts or skin irritations to fairly serious infections and worse. We had many happy patients, particularly children who managed to get a plaster out of the nurses (band aid for our American friends!) But the highlight of the trip (for us at least) has to be the staff training ... while obviously being essential for our staff and volunteers, it was also hilarious!

sewing workshop

We recently had the privilege of having Michelle Ellel (trying saying that three times quickly!) from Humanity at Heart in the UK with us teaching a group of ladies how to do patchwork. Michelle showed us photos of some of her own work ... we definitely don't aspire to anything as wonderful, (if you're reading this, Michelle, you're an artist and ought to be rich from the proceeds of your beautiful work!) but hopefully with time and patience we might eventually produce a quilt or wall hanging!
Michelle explained to us all about patchwork making traditions in the past, where groups of women would get together and make quilts as a social event ... during the time they cut and sewed they chatted and gossiped.
Most of our women are so poor and so disheartened by life that it's extremely hard for them to find the motivation to do anything. We don't expect miraculous results but if we can offer women a relatively simple activity to do while they chat over their coffee then it's worthwhile. The main point of the exercise for us is that it's something women can do together and enjoy each others company while at the same time making something beautiful and practical.

Who knows, with time they all might end up with a pretty wall hanging or bedspread to brighten up their simple homes.