Contacting other children’s homes and the neighbourhood We try to maintain the relationship to other children’s homes. It is very interesting because some children know each other from the IHNFA, and they can cultivate their friendship by keeping in touch. This time we visited the children's home Pro Niño in Progresso. The boys played a soccer game and our kids won 1:0. There we also met Darwin again. He lived with us during two years, but since last summer he stays with his brother in Pro Niño.
Although we live in a very dangerous neighbourhood, we don’t want to lock ourselves in. On Saturday mornings, our children usually have a soccer tournament on the big soccer field next to the children’s home. That way, our children get into contact with other kids from the neighbourhood.
Mother’s Day The school organized a special program for Mother’s Day, in which the students performed class by class. From the smallest to the oldest, everybody gave their best and we have many a talent…
Easter-weekend: When angels travel... In Honduras, people usually travel during the Semana Santa (Easter-week). We also happily packed our things and we were looking forward to spend this special week in the “Chalet” in Santa Rosa de Copan. We started our journey full of emotions and anticipation…
After a one-hour bus ride, the good atmosphere was heavily interrupted! The fuse of the steering wheel came loose and Edwing wasn’t able to control the bus anymore. Our bus got out of control, smashed against a tree and came to a stop in a sand dune. The impact was really heavy; some seats became loose, two windows shattered into a thousand pieces and the children were thrown around. We evacuated the children through the windows, and luckily, most of the children only escaped with small cuts, bruises, crushes and with a nasty shock. Everybody was aided on the scene and three people had to go to the hospital; Carlitos broke his hand, Carlos broke his collar bone and Jhonson had a big wound…
Annex to Sala Cuna Edwing and Darling were hardworking roofers. The annex already has a roof, on which a second floor could be added. Now, our two talented Hondurans are working as bricklayers besides concreting our floor. In the next weeks, the paving tiles can be placed and the walls will be painted. Finally, the enhanced Sala Cuna can be opened.
Meeting of the foundation council The foundation council "yo quiero ser..." gathered in order to discuss the near future. The main topic was the expansion of the project concerning the older children. That means that we want to offer the best fitted education for every individual kid. This is not very easy in Honduras, because there are no apprenticeships of the likes we know in Switzerland. Either you get a degree at the university, or you follow the principle: „Learning by doing“.
Official events for the coming summer consist in the benefit lunch on August 5, 2012, organised by ORIGEN in Riom, and a market stand at “Scuntrada” in…
School Start Before our 27 primary students and one secondary student started school on February 6, we accommodated a new girl. Her name is Anahy, she will soon be five years old, and she grew up in a poor and unstable family, mainly living in the streets. In addition, her mother suffers from a mental handicap and is fatally ill.
School start is always accompanied by a huge amount of organizational matters. All the school uniforms and the shoes have to fit and everybody’s school bag has to be filled with all the necessary things. For the children it also means that they go back to having a daily routine: Getting up at 5.00 a.m., followed by showering and getting dressed, then everybody has to fulfil their little chores (cleaning the bathroom and bedroom, wiping, etc.). 6.00 a.m. is breakfast time, then the children wash the dishes and clean the dining room, and at 6.30 a.m. they leave for school. At noon, they are picked up by bus, they change their clothes, and after lunch they have…
Extension of the Sala Cuna The annex of the Sala Cuna is in full swing. Our Swiss volunteer Walter Pegorari, who stays with us from December to the end of February, was responsible for the fast building of the wall, so that the new children can move in until the end of February.
Visit of the "grandparents" Our "grandparents" Luisa and Pauli Scarpatetti visited us at the beginning of January. They quickly got used to the Honduran lifestyle and were integrated immediately. Pauli was a big idol mainly for the older boys, and everybody was highly impressed by his work, will to work, strength, precision and endurance. For every children’s room, he built a big wardrobe and a shoe rack, so that every child can now keep their clothes in their room. Luisa helped everywhere; she changed about 30 school clothes' zippers, wrote the children's names on all the school books, looked after the smallest of ou children and played for hours. All the children and the staff were really sad that they had…
Soccer field Our 3-year old soccer field was in a dismal state due to poor construction. Not only sneakers and crocs, but also kids’ toes were affected by this. The kids accomplished an amazing task and took away the old surfacing and filled the holes with cement in manual labor. The new surfacing also saves us some soccer balls.
Inauguration drive of the new bus to Santa Rosa Our longtime-loyal bus has become too small by now. We’ve used it daily to drive the kids to school for 4 years. Unfortunately, it only consisted of 14 seats, which resulted in two kids having to share a seat and being short of space. Thanks to Mr. Odermatt’s generous donation, we could now purchase a bus with 29 seats. The inauguration drive led us to Santa Rosa de Copan during Christmas vacation. We spent 5 wonderful days there and one day we went on a trip to Gracias Lempira, Juan Carlos’ native city.
The judge and the social worker couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw our little sunshine boy. Juan…
Soccer team Real España The national soccer team Real España from San Pedro Sula and the company Foam Honduras provide a social project with a bed or with mattresses with every goal scored. Our children’s home, too, is a project supported by them, which is why we were able to participate in a press conference, in which the kids could meet the national stars, talk to them, and urge me to take lots of pictures. For the kids, it was a special experience to see the soccer players and to become aware of the fact that those “men” are normal people, too.
Graduation Deyvin Meza, the oldest of our kids, is the first to complete elementary school. It is common here to celebrate this with a graduation party. During his last school years, Deyvin stood out due to his helpfulness and loyalty rather than his good marks. Everyone liked him very much and the nuns didn’t want to let him go. Here in Honduras, few children get the opportunity to go to high school. Many of them can hardly afford…
Visit from Gerard van Kesteren Our foundation council’s member Gerard van Kesteren visited us for the second time in October. We all were really excited about his visit and our kids prepared a surprise for him. 8 kids sang typical Honduran songs, Enrique sang a solo and a group performed a play.
After the performances, we were ready to dance. Gerard even had the courage to dance punta with Maria. He got everyone of us a „yo quiero ser…“ tee and treated the kids to ice cream in the afternoon. We enjoyed our time with him and hope that he will come back soon.
Children’s home gathering CEPUDO is an organization that provides us with food, polish, toiletries, and gifts on a regular basis. Once a year, they organize a reunion of several children’s homes from Honduras. On that day, more than 600 girls and boys met here in San Pedro Sula. In the morning, various games were on the agenda and in the afternoon we had a Miss and Mister CEPUDO beauty contest, with a disco to round off. We sent…
Pavilion Our area includes a total of 15.000 square meters. We have 5 buildings as well as 3 mango trees, 3 Avocado trees and 5 coconut trees. However, since we lacked a shady place outdoors, Edwing built a pavilion for us. It now also functions as a gathering place for visitors, or as a place for study as well as a common venue.
Corn Crop As I mentioned in the last couple of newsletters, we are owners of a cornfield. In August, we were ready to harvest the corn. Our cooks performed a feat for us to savor various corn dishes such as Tamales (corn pastries with peas), Mantuca (corn pastries with pork and chicken), Elotes locos (corn mash), Tamalitos (corn mash similar to polenta), Riguas (corn tortillas) and Fritas (deep-fried corn).
IHNFA Our children come from the state home (IHNFA). This home repeatedly had problems during the last couple of months, with the staff going on strike in August. Imagine a children’s home with 150 kids and no staff! Our kids participated in a children’s…
Behavior & Sanctions Since many of our children are pubescent and prepubescent, we had to introduce a method to be able to control them. Thus, we now complete a feedback for every child, every day. A total of 25 aspects is being evaluated. Those include:
1. Body Hygiene 2. School achievement and diligence 3. Behavior at the dining room 4. Obedience 5. Attention with things 6. Bedroom tidiness and cleanness 7. Fighting 8. Performance of little chores 9. Vocabulary 10. Punctuality 11. Not walking around shoeless etc....
All the educators evaluate every child and the feedbacks are filled in together. For items not accomplished, crosses are assigned. Evidently, the goal of the month consists in receiving as few crosses as possible. In order to eliminate the crosses, the kids have to perform tasks such as wiping, cleaning, collecting wood, etc.
Vacation at Santa Rosa de Copan On June 29, the saint of the city, San Pedro, is commemorated. Due to this fact, the children were on a holiday…
From this month on, we have a new family of employees at our home. Victor, 39 years of age, is employed as educator and responsible for agriculture, while his wife, Blanca (22 years old) looks after the little ones of Sala Cuna in the mornings and does homework with the older ones in the afternoons. They have a one-year old son, Daniel, who also lives with us.
Our students go to a private nuns’ school called Laura Vicuña. Since May is the “Month of the Mother of God”, they had a special religious program during the whole month. One morning, they had to be at school at 5.00 a.m. to say a rosary, with subsequent procession. They also had to go to school at evenings to pray for an hour. The month of May also is the merry month of May. We adopted the literal meaning and converted our home into an agricultural home. Since our home is full of little, green spots, Victor planted a variety of vegetables with the kids: Tomatoes, Capsicum, as well as cornfields. If everything grows nicely,…
The first week of April meant a lot of studying for our 27 students, because the first midterms were on the agenda. Our educators and the teacher spent every afternoon preparing them for their exams so that we could joyfully collect their grades. Together, they have an average of 5,3, the best reached a 5,7 and nobody went below 4,5. We’re very pleased by these results, which represent the fruits of our daily work and reassure us of the fact that every child is on the right track to fulfill their dreams.
Furthermore, Easter week was just around the corner. In Honduras, this is an intense religious week on the one hand, as well as a tradition of going to the seaside and celebrating on the other. Many people lose control, which makes the situation here in Honduras even more dangerous and unpredictable than it already is. In order for our children to avoid those circumstances, we were granted a week of relaxing holidays at a Finca in Santa Rosa de Copan. Although the house is very small,…
