Mission Field

Hogar Infantil San Gabriel in Guachipelin, Escazu

Here we are at the cash register in PriceSmart, like Costco. Praise God for the funds donated by mom, doña Ester and her daughter, Aracely. With it we were able to buy pampers, sugar, coffee, salt, cooking oil, rice, beans, mild, powder milk with all kinds of minerals and vitamins and body cream.
By helping them with these articles they can use their money to pay other bills like the electricity which is very high due to the machines they have to use all day.

Andres. Always smiling. Joana is playing with him. She is a young lady from La Carpio who has adopted me as her mom. Andres is 6 years old and has cerebral palsy.

Morena. She and Veronica are the only ones that can talk. Morena could probably be doing much better physically and mentally but the counselors say she is very lazy. She doesn't even want to try to stand up and she talks a lot but when she wants to. Her favorite thing to say is "De verdad" which means "really". She is 10 years old and has Cerebral Palsy.

This is Andrea. She is 13 years old. She was abused as a little girl by her dad and although the mom knew, she didn't do anything. The mom is currently in jail. Andrea also has Cerebral Palsy. If you have food or anything in your hands, she wants it even though she just finished eating. A way to get your attention is by hitting herself. She did this while I was there and it gave me such an awful feeling because she hits her face and head really hard. If you hold her hands, she will use her feet. You have to leave the room and then she calms down.

Jennifer is 12 years old and has cerebral palsy.

Here is Guillermo. He is 5 years old and when he was little, his parents shook him causing his spine to snap. He is now blind, dependent on oxygen and has to be fed through a tube.

This is Josesito. He is 6 years old. He was born fine but got an infection that affected his brain. He is now blind and has cerebral palsy. He hears you talking to him and smiles a lot.

This is Yendri. She is 19 years old. She is blind and has cerebral palsy. She is now taking a nap.

When I first met Maria Cristina last year around July, she was very weak. I praise God because she is now able to sit up and seems much more alert. It was fun seeing her play with the water.

Maria Cristina is helping Sor Caridad by giving her water. She would wet her fingers and hand them to Sor Caridad. If she didn't come and get the water right away she would make all kinds of noise to get her attention so she could get the water from her fingers.

Sor Caridad is cleaning a very greasy stove. Behind her, where the red bars are, they would like to enclose it and build a place where the children can receive physical therapy. For this, they will also have to build a cement ramp to take the children up with the wheel chairs.

Maria Cristina, 1 year and 10 months. She has a disease called syndrome de Stein. It's a disease that affects the muscles. She inherited it from her mom who also has it. The mom cannot take care of her and the dad is not in the picture; therefore, the nuns are taking care of her. She has to be fed through a tube. She is also very smart and will be starting school soon. She understands everything you tell her. She doesn't talk but waves good bye and throws the best kisses ever.

Veronica and Morena. Veronica is 18 years old, she has to use the walker and she also has problems with one of her hands. She is very intelligent and helps the nuns feed some of the children. She told me that she already finished school.

In the living room the children either watch or listen to the television while the nuns take care of things in the house or are taking care of the other children.

Wheel chair parking lot. It would be nice to have a cement ramp rather than some boards.

The wash room. The walls are peeling and need a paint job bad.

Although they have a washer and dryer, they still do wash by hand. This is the biggest pila (basin) I've ever seen.

One side of the kitchen.

The other side of the kitchen. There isn't very much storage space to keep all the supplies and food to cook for at least 11 people.

In this room there are four beds. There's really not much room between them when you think that you have to literally pick the children out of bed since they can't move any part of their body.