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Children in poverty … through the eyes of Eric Chapman, one of our friends in Flickr.
If you have difficulty viewing the slide show here, you can also check it out in Eric’s photostream.
Upload your photos to our Flickr group. Show us how you see children in poverty.
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Right before Thanksgiving, I was rootin’ around in our digital asset management library and saw some child photos I absolutely had to share. Photos of children reading letters from their sponsors.
The photos helped me picture my sponsored child, Lerionga, reading letters I’ve sent him. They drew me closer to him.
Some of these photos are old – five or six years. Others were taken just last year.
Some of these children have left our program, and some have sponsors from countries other than the U.S.
The exciting thing is that we were able to contact several sponsors and let them know about this post, so they could download the photo.
Any time I can do that for you, I will.
Here is what I speak of – the sponsor letter photos.
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Hey! Remember way back in mid-August when we asked you to join our Flickr group and to upload photos.
Do you remember that we also said, “It’s time to change our banner. And we want the next photo up there to be yours.”?
Well…we did. And you did.
)
I took this picture last summer in Tena, Ecuador. It’s a small village that is actually about 20 miles away from the place where Jim Elliot and Nate Saint where killed in 1956. I was there doing a Bible camp for kids living along the river.
The little boy in the picture is named Christian, and he stole my heart from the very first day. At the time of the photo he was five years old, but I’m not sure of his exact birthday. A natural model, he would often pose so I would take his picture, then run over to me to view the tiny screen on the back of my camera. – Alyssa
Our next blog banner could be yours. We’ll be doing this again in a few months, so keep uploading.
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Last week, I was in Mexico. On a sponsor tour. And I saw the deepest, darkest poverty of my life.
But I didn’t have to travel to ME, the abbreviation we use when referring to Mexico, to see it. I only had to look at me.
I was in Mexico for the wrong reason. I didn’t go for the children, to become a stronger, more passionate voice for them. To serve them better. To serve you better. I went because I like to travel. I went for me.
There certainly are solid business reasons for me to have gone on the trip, but I didn’t get out of my own way long enough to realize them. I hate that.
How do I redeem the opportunity God gave me and that I squandered? (more…)
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I’m going to Mexico! And I want you to come with me.
I was left behind once, and I’m grateful it wasn’t in the “missed the Rapture” sense. Because of that experience I will do my best to make you feel like you’re in Mexico with me.
I’m going to Mexico as a co-leader on a sponsor tour, not as a Compassion Blogger.
My first responsibility on the trip is to support the sponsors who are traveling with us to meet their sponsored children. However, you will always be in my thoughts.
I intend to:
I don’t sponsor a child in Mexico but if you do, and they’re at one of these child development centers, let me know. I will TRY to get a photo of your child for you. I cannot promise anything other than I’ll try.
The child development centers are:
Please don’t leave your child’s name or number in your comment. Just let me know you have a child at one of the centers and someone will contact you via email to get the information.
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We have an account at Flickr, a photostream they call it, where we upload our photos … but we don’t get out of the office that often ’cause we be Webbies, so we don’t get a lot of photos to upload.
We’re working on that.
We also have this suh-WEET! Flickr group where anyone can upload photos – even YOU!
Especially you.
Right now, we only have 23 members in the group 
and 121 photos. But what we do have is … well, why don’t you tell us what you think? And while you’re at it, add something to the stream.
drewfrancis1 took this photo. Click on it and you can see his whole photostream.
And our own Brandy Campbell took this photo when she was in Ethiopia earlier this year.
You remember Eric (aka chappyphoto), right? It’s his photo in the blog’s banner.
All of that is to say this, which if we were following sound web writing pwinciples we would’ve said at the beginning of this bwog post …
It’s time to change our banner. And we want the next photo up there to be yours.
So upload your photos to our Flickr group now ’cause we wanna see what u got.
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See the photo? The one at the top of the page. It was done by one of you.
Eric Chapman (aka chappyphoto) took it. He’s a friend we met by way of our Flickr group.
We liked his photos so much we asked if we could use one in our blog header. Then we asked if he wanted to write a post for us. We do that sometimes.
But enough of that. It’s time to focus your attention on what Eric says when he’s not behind a camera.
I’ll start by saying this: It’s very hard to explain impact a Compassion trip can have on a person.
For most of my life, the only thing I knew about poverty was the Sally Struthers commercials. You know, those spots from the ’80s with all the slow-motion shots of children crying. I have been given the opportunity to go with a video production crew to various countries to film the work of Compassion. In some way, I expected to see this Sally Struthers image. I was totally wrong.
I’m a sound engineer for Student Life. We produce large camps, conferences and a variety of additional resources for churches. About the time I started working there, Student Life had just partnered with Compassion. Since then we’ve always had a Compassion presentation at our events, and work to educate our attendees about what sponsoring a child means.
Last year we were sent to Uganda to interview students from Compassion’s Leadership Development Program (LDP). Our hope was that some of the students would travel with our camp teams throughout the summer and lead the Compassion presentation from stage. What better way to show the work of Compassion than to put living proof of that work on stage?
Before this trip I had already been on one Compassion video shoot, but it was a 48-hour whirlwind trip to Guatemala. It was a fast turnaround, and we were only able to see a few children. Our video focused on one child’s experience meeting her sponsor. I could see the impact Compassion was having on a single child, but what would the finished product look like? All I knew going into the Uganda trip was that LDP students had grown up through the Compassion child sponsorship program, graduated, and were then sponsored through college. These students were the cream of the crop.
We arrived in Kampala and tried to get some rest. The next morning we had our first LDP student interview. His name was James.
This was initially a typical setup for our team. We had done hundreds of interviews. What I did not know was that my life and perspective of Compassion would be changed forever by the testimony of this man.
James was more educated, well spoken and passionate about his relationship with God than I could say I have ever been. He described his childhood –- one that was riddled with loss of parents and siblings, leaving him alone to live with an aunt. He spoke of being malnourished and without hope. Then he said all that changed when he joined Compassion.
I could have probably predicted most of his interview to this point. We had asked most of the questions, and it was the picture of so many nonprofit companies and others who serve those less fortunate than most Americans. He was a child in poverty who was given a chance. It was his answer to our last question that stopped us all cold. (more…)
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