More specifically, do you sponsor a child in one of these three child development centers in El Salvador?

• ES526, Bethel Student Center
• ES808, Cachorros de León Student Center
• ES782, Comisión de Amor Student Center

If you do sponsor a child in one of those three centers, let us know. These are the centers that the CompassionBloggers will visit next week, and we have someone going who is willing to TRY to get a photo of your child for you.

We can’t guarantee success, but we will do our best.

Please don’t leave your child’s name or number in your comment. Just let us know you have a child at one of the centers and someone will contact you via e-mail to get the information. Or you can send us your information via our contact form.

From Nov. 9 to 13, four bloggers will witness firsthand how we minister to the poor of El Salvador. Visit CompassionBloggers.com daily to travel with them through their stories, pictures and videos.

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My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

Dan Trumble, a managerial accountant in Finance Business Partner Support, tells a story of one man’s salvation brought about in a way that only God can orchestrate.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

We’d like to introduce you to Josh Durias and his photography.

Josh was born and raised in Seattle. He’s a father of two, and a husband to one.

We’re plagiarizing here … jes so ya know.

He’s a son of Philippine immigrants and grew up with his mother and father, sister, brother, grandmother, grandfather, two aunts, four uncles and five cousins (among other houseguests) in the 18 years he spent at home.

He enjoys people. And likes to laugh … even courtesy laughs … ha ha.

We met Josh through this blog. He sent us an e-mail with some photos he took on a Compassion trip. They are stunning. See for yourself.

We also asked him to share a little bit about the trip to help put the photos in context. We hope you enjoy Josh’s perspective on children in poverty.

Gearing up for my Compassion trip to Ecuador, I told my wife, “Ya know? In some ways I might have more in common with the Compassion kids than with the folks I’m traveling with.”

She needed a bit more convincing.

I reminded her that my cousin was a Compassion child in the Philippines, my mother grew up in a poor farming community in Zamboanga, and many of my family members are still living in situations like the ones I’ll see on the trip.

“Wow,” she replied. “I hope people can see that in your photos.”

With that, my challenge was set: Tell the stories of these kids as if they were my own family.

Back in June, I traveled with a group of donors to Quito, Ecuador. The first stop was Bernabe Student Center for a Child Survival Program (CSP) presentation. This was the same center where I met Edison and Paula.

Edison and his family opened up their home for us to see what typical living arrangements look like in this area of Quito.

After lunch with the family, the highlight of the day was Edison’s birthday cake. No, it wasn’t his birthday, but for Edison’s first five birthdays his family didn’t have the funds for a birthday cake. So on that day, Compassion sponsored Edison’s very first birthday cake!

We encouraged him to “go for it,” but Edison wanted us to slice the cake up for everyone to enjoy.

When we returned to the center, a little girl named Paula waited anxiously for one of the families on the trip – her sponsor family. She was shy, but excited about the meeting. Her sponsor family greeted her with open arms and grins from ear to ear, but what really broke the ice were the gifts.

The family unveiled (among other things) a “Dora the Explorer” blanket. Paula loved Dora.

From that point on hugs, smiles and tears of joy were shared by everyone in the room. To think, this is just the start of years of support.

The last center we visited (Jesus Rey de Reyes Student Center) was located in Otavalo. Here we met Jessica and her family and spent much of the afternoon doing typical tasks around their home.

A few of the members on the trip tried their hand at picking corn. Others worked the wool that the family used in weaving belts that were sold at the market. Some of the most brilliant colors and intricate weaving I’ve ever seen!

On the flight home, I realized how thankful I am. I am thankful for an organization like Compassion whose sole purpose is to release children from poverty.

I am thankful that kids like Edison, Paula, Jessica and my cousin can be given hope in places where there may be no hope. And I am thankful that I, the son of a poor farmer’s daughter, get to share the story of kids growing up in his own mother’s shoes and sharing them through photography.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

After passing by a hazy eastern tip of Cuba, our American Airlines flight banked steeply to the right and within minutes we were passing over the northern peninsula of Haiti, so recognizable due to the heavily rutted landscape.

The French had not been kind when they ravaged the once-lush western half of Hispaniola of all the mahogany trees and shipped the lumber back to Paris to make fine furniture.

More than 200 years later, the nation is still 90 percent barren, and what little good topsoil remains is eroding into the Caribbean.

We circled over the Canal du Sud strait approaching Port-au-Prince, a teeming city I had not been to in 19 years. As we touched down on the single runway “international” airport, memories began to take focus.

Child Survival – What Does Ti Chape Means?

I’ll never forget that trip. A wiry American with a unique accent was my guide. He had been living in Haiti for six years, assisting with various ministries, and eventually signing on full time with Compassion. His name was Wess Stafford.

It was on that trip that I snapped one of my all-time favorite photos: a little child of about 3 with a distended belly, wearing a ragged striped T-shirt and nothing else, proudly hoisting his torn little handmade kite on a 10-foot string made of scraps of twine and wire he had found.

The breeze was only keeping the kite about 5 feet aloft, but the boy was as gleeful as any child I had ever seen.

Wess was seated next to me in our van, and noticed my fascination with the tiny urchin.

“Ah, yes … another little Ti Chape.”

“What is a Ti Chape?”

“It’s a Creole phrase that many parents in these poorest areas of Haiti use with their youngest kids. I’m sure you’ll hear it often over the next several days as we visit homes. It’s a term of endearment … but also a harsh reality that reminds everyone of how devastating each day can be for people living on the brink. Ti Chape means little survivor or one who has escaped death.”

As a very tenderhearted man, Wess could not conceal his passion, and tears began to well in his eyes. With a catch in his throat he continued:

“Sadly, for the majority of the poor here in Haiti, the infant mortality rate is as high as 50 percent for children under the age of 5.

“Often parents won’t refer to their littlest ones by their birth name until they celebrate their fifth birthday because they know all too well that many of them won’t make it that far.

“While they are still in this most vulnerable toddler stage, the children are affectionately called Ti Chape.

“I guess it is often too painful to consistently call them by their real names for fear of assigning too much hope to their prospects.

“This same phenomena happens, by different names of course, in other desperately poor cultures around the globe.”

I watched intently for a few more minutes as that toddler joyfully tried to keep his tattered toy buoyant on the air. Then we lurched forward in the traffic flow.

For the rest of our stay I pondered what that child’s chances of survival really were.

Even now, whenever I look at that tyke’s photo in my collection, it gives me great pause, and those feelings all came back to me as we drove through the packed streets of Port-au-Prince again.

On the trip’s final day, we drove out the N2 highway along the southern Massif de la Hotte peninsula, weaving past colorfully painted tap-taps (old pickups converted into buses often over-loaded down with upward of 20 people), soot-spewing diesel trucks, and U.N. troop patrol vehicles that help keep the peace in the politically unstable environment.

We were headed out to see one of our child development centers — one that had been in existence for 23 years, but had added a new program just a few years before, a program that is helping revolutionize our work: our Child Survival Program.

Child Survival – Rescuing, Nurturing and Discipling Little Ones

When we arrived in the rural town of Papette where our local church partner had become a real community center over the past two decades, it was obvious that the 1,000 residents had a deep respect for all that the church had helped them with.

My group and I were ushered into the sanctuary where 93 mothers and their infants had been patiently waiting. It was amazing how quiet and disciplined the 120 or so little ones were — we commented amongst ourselves that the same scene in America would’ve been utter pandemonium.

There was a look of gentle appreciation on the face of each young woman when we made eye contact.

A handful of the moms came forward to give testimony to what had revolutionized their lives.

Over Compassion’s 57 years of existence, we’ve always been laser-beam focused on child development for kindergarten-age kids through high school. But in the past five years we launched our Child Survival Program, which supports mothers and children all the way from their pregnancy on into infancy and through the toddler years.

One of the young mothers, Irmice, had her little 18-month-old boy draped on her shoulder, fast asleep, as she shared with the crowd.

“I serve a living, loving God. If not for Him or Compassion, I, and certainly not my baby, wouldn’t be alive today.”

She went on to explain the loving care and instruction she had received from the Child Survival Program staff, nurses and social workers who showed her how to improve prenatal health via exercise, nutrition and supplements. Then after her son was born, the encouraging practical lessons like proper breast-feeding, preventive vaccines, immunizations and other medicines continued.

On a subsequent tour through the child survival wing of the church we saw cribs, tiny chairs, baby swings, scooters, tricycles, a huge supply of learning toys and instruments, exercise mats, building blocks, and everything else you would see in a well-run education-based nursery. They even had weekly classes for social interaction/training and early literacy.

For these moms, who come from households where the average monthly income is perhaps $40 at best, this is a sanctuary for their babies in the truest sense of the word.

The Child Survival Program center Director, Rose, explained how the tots are regularly weighed, measured and examined to make sure they are within healthy parameters. There was a full pharmaceutical closet with everything a young mother could need for her child. Extensive files are kept on each mom and baby, and they’re regularly updated with information gathered from the weekly visits to the homes and the families visits to the center.

I was thoroughly impressed. And the results were obvious in the shiny eyes, gleeful giggles, and yes, even the healthy full-throat wails of some little nippers.

I saw the wall charts that are proudly displayed showing the progress of each and every infant that had come through the program … and not a single one had died.

In fact, once the 3-year-olds “graduate” from the Child Survival Program, they then become eligible for our Child Sponsorship Program, and all of them from four to five years ago were enrolled there!

Outside the center, I saw some healthy-looking kindergartners sailing their tattered kites. They were in their school uniforms, with good shoes on their feet.

I always like asking these little Haitian dynamos their names. It swells my heart every time to hear them proudly blurt out their moniker: Pierre! Camille! Sebastien! Monique! Alain! Simone! Yves!

And when I asked these mothers on to introduce their littlest ones, there wasn’t a single Ti Chape in the bunch.

Support a Child Survival Program

Editor’s note: Mark wrote this post about a trip he took to Haiti in March 2008. He originally published it on his MySpace page and allowed us to share it with you here, in its entirety. The photos are not from his trip, although they are from child survival programs in Haiti.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

Yesterday, I promised you some insights into Steph’s Compassion Traveller experience, so here you go. - Irene

Steph in 30 seconds:

• Age: 14 and a half



• Siblings: I’m the eldest. I have a 13-year-old brother named James.
• School: Year nine (third year in junior high school)
• Pets: We have two cats: Maddison, a white tortoise-shell cross Persian, and Soots, a grey Persian cross something. Both are girls. They have completely different personalities and hate each other. We also have budgies, which we’re getting rid of.
• Hobby: Netball. This is my seventh year playing in the district competition. I also take art lessons.

Favourites:

• Quote: “A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can repeat it back to you when you’ve forgotten the words.”
• Book: The Tomorrow series by John Marsden
• Film: The Notebook
• Board game: Scrabble
• Song: “Pray for Me” by Plumb

Steph’s Compassion Traveller experience:

Describe the trip in one sentence:

An amazing experience … I need to go back!

And at the moment I’m looking for a way to do it. No luck yet, but I’m sure my Lord will provide for me and something will come up. I can’t do it by myself.

Most memorable moment:

I met my family’s sponsored child in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Her name is Kini.

Kini was born without pulmonary arteries, the arteries that go between her heart and her lungs.

My Dad sponsored her after his last visit in 2006, so we had been sponsoring her for 18 months when I met her.

The doctors thought Kini would die within months when my Dad first met her, but because of her sponsorship she receives regular treatment and still lives!

What did Kini say to you when you met her?

Because of you I’m now alive.

How was your relationship with your Dad during the trip?

Our relationship was stretched … He was very protective of me and I wanted to have my independence.

Dads with teenage daughters know that teenage girls are emotional. Add to that I was away from friends and family.

But despite everything, I was happy I got to spend that time with him and make those lasting memories.

Tell me about your most impacting day …

It was Sunday, 1 February, at the Kali Temple in Kolkata, on my fourth day in India. It was a crowded place. I think thousands of people were coming to worship their gods. They had sacrificed 130 goats that morning, and there were remnants of the sacrifice lying everywhere. It freaked me out a bit.

As we were walking in the alley after leaving the temple, I had one of the shopkeepers come and grab my arm and try to lead me away from the group. Being tense already, I freaked out.

The man then looked over my shoulder and saw one of the guys in the team standing right behind me. My friend then stepped forward and put his arm around my waist. Seeing him, the man then let go of my arm and slunk back into his shop. What scared me the most was that no one else in our group had noticed the man.

How has your trip influenced your school life?

I just started my first week at a new school. So far I’ve shared my travelling experience with friends as well as with my year nine class in my self-introduction.

My class mates were really responsive, and my friends have been positive, too -– they’ve asked questions about the trip.

How has this trip influenced your relationship with God?

I grew up in a Christian home and have believed in God since I was seven. But before the trip I was wondering “Who is God and what is He doing?”

In India, I saw a stark contrast between kids who were sponsored and kids who weren’t. Those who were sponsored weren’t as thin and were happier.

I also took lots of pictures of kids praying before their meals … These kids would’ve only known God for a short time, but they have changed.

It fascinates me what God can do in these children’s lives in such a short time. Seeing this has motivated me to walk closer with God.

Have you changed?

I look at the world differently. I’m more appreciative of … well … everything, really.

I compare things. Now I’m sitting in a nice cosy office with a shiny white board, but over in India and Bangladesh there are kids in the street picking up rubbish.

Seeing the state of these two countries broke my heart. Walking the streets, using the toilets, eating the food and most importantly, seeing the expressions and emotions on all the faces broke my heart.

I now find myself thinking of other people’s life stories, problems, daily battles and life-changing moments. I think of all the people that I pass driving to school … their stories and problems.

Then I think of all the ones that go unheard, unanswered and the new challenges they face every day just to survive.

Would you recommend a trip to others?

Yes. The country staff were very good. It’s a life-changing experience. So it’s not to be missed!

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates