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FROM “BUSH BUNNY BRENDA“
DATE: APRIL 29, 2023
 
THE REST OF THE STORY ON GRANNY AND THE KIDS
 
On Mon­day, our dri­ver Mario fetched the entire fam­i­ly of Baby Luisa at their vil­lage mud hut.  Cape­na, our office man­ag­er and I want­ed to make sure that all the chil­dren were in good health, and we had new cloth­ing for them once we knew their sizes.

Mario told me the lit­tle 3‑year-old screamed his head off when they tried to put him into the Land Cruis­er, as NONE of the chil­dren had ever been in a car of any kind.  It was quite a shock to all of them to ride in a pick-up, as you can see by the pho­to I took when they first arrived wear­ing the only clothes they had.  Granny stat­ed that with the help of the old­est girl (14) she would keep all the chil­dren with her. 
 

5 sib­lings of infant Luisa just as they got out of our truck
 
My staff made sure that the 14-year-old girl under­stood that if any­thing should hap­pen to Granny, she was to tell the Vil­lage Chief who now has Capena’s phone num­ber. The Uncle has his own fam­i­ly, and will be return­ing to them. The adults went to the Reg­is­tra­tion Office, where Granny pre­sent­ed the prop­er doc­u­ments. Mean­while, the chil­dren (wear­ing their new clothes) enjoyed a tasty and healthy meal.
 

Eager­ly eat­ing the first nour­ish­ing food they had had in days
 
Lat­er, the fam­i­ly was giv­en cook­ies for dessert. Even though they had not had pack­aged cook­ies before, after a quick les­son their pack­ages were opened and gob­bled up quick­ly!
 

Fati­ma teach­es the chil­dren how to open their cook­ie pack­ets
 
We pre­sent­ed Granny and the chil­dren with new grass mats, blan­kets for sleep­ing, and cook­ing pans with bowls for eat­ing. They proud­ly show off all of these items in the pic­ture below.
 

Very hap­py fam­i­ly with new clothes and house­hold items
 
The 14-year-old told us that they had noth­ing to eat at Granny’s mud hut. A 10 day sup­ply of food was loaded into the truck so the Uncle wouldn’t have to come in on his bicy­cle until next week for his first food pick-up. Dri­ver Mario returned them to their vil­lage in our Land Cruis­er with the 3 year old scream­ing as the fam­i­ly put him into the truck!! Thank­ful­ly, he set­tled down after the old­est girl put him onto her lap. We now have infant Luisa’s birth cer­tifi­cate and the prop­er papers from her fam­i­ly so she can legal­ly stay with us, so all end­ed well.
 
THIS IS A TYPICAL “FAMILY” RESCUE, AS IT’S NOT ONLY THE INFANT WHO WOULD NOT SURVIVE, BUT THE OTHER SIBLINGS AS WELL. 
 
YOUR LOVE GIFTS AT WORK DOING WHAT GOD SENT US TO DO.
 
THURSDAY WAS REGISTRATION DAY AT OUR FOOD CENTER
 
All 300 vul­ner­a­ble chil­dren and their care­tak­ers are required to re-reg­is­ter annu­al­ly in April if they desire to con­tin­ue in our Food Assis­tance Pro­gram.
 

Start­ing at sun­rise, our staff checks doc­u­ments and chil­dren receiv­ing at our week­ly give out
 
This assures us that the reg­is­tered chil­dren are still liv­ing with their extend­ed fam­i­ly mem­ber, as each child has to be pre­sent­ed with their birth cer­tifi­cate. It took about 4 hours to attend to all the fam­i­lies this year. As they are cleared by our staff to con­tin­ue, they hap­pi­ly fetched their food and head­ed home.
 
PLAYGROUND REPAIRS ARE FINALLY FINISHED 
 
The giant slide was the last item to be repaired as it takes lots of courage to climb on top of the “tree house” roof (6 meters/19.5 feet) above the ground. The acid from the leaves of this mas­sive 200+ year old Man­go tree had total­ly eat­en the tin sheets. All 10 roof­ing sheets had to be replaced before it was safe for the chil­dren to play on. It was a two day job tear­ing off the old roof and putting on the new tin sheets, but all is fin­ished.
 

Tin sheets were total­ly eat­en by tree acids from this ancient Man­go tree
 

New roof keeps all debris from falling on the chil­dren
 
The play­ground only lacks a new coat of paint which will be put on in May by our Artist Teacher Ser­gio and his helpers.  Can’t wait to see what crazy design he comes up with.
 
It was a busy week that kept all of us hop­ping. Our staff sees it as all worth it when we can use YOUR GIFTS to put smiles on the children’s faces!
 
THANK YOU FOR BLESSING THESE LITTLE CHILDREN.
 
BLESSINGS FROM ALL OF US!
BUSH BUNNY BRENDA LANGE
AND THE BALAMA STAFF