Sponsor's update from Bogotá
11/03/2008
Dear friends:
It is a pleasure for us to write to you some of our experiences during this semester in the SOS Children’s Village Bogotá and the Family Strengthening programmes in the same city.
It has been a nice year for many girls and boys in the SOS Children’s Village; 35 children have been welcome since the beginning of the year in this way, there are 175 girls, boys and young people. Most of them have arrived to the Village thanks for partnerships with the ICBF (Colombian Family Wellbeing Institute), responsible in the country to watch for the Children’s rights respect. Some of those children protected by the ICBF are in a group of “adoption”; it means that they are waiting for a family to be adopted, although it is not easy to find a family because of their age. For that reason, the SOS Children’s Village becomes a better alternative for them to have a family till they become mature and become autonomous and independent in society.
It is the case of María and Martha, two sisters 13 and 10 years old respectively were abandoned by their mother and they don’t have relatives; after six months in a foster family the ICBF decided to ask SOS Children’s Village Bogotá to shelter them So, they live in the Ruth’s family since one month ago where seven children more live. The kids were a little fearful but day by day they feel better and are adapted to this new environment.
María is a shy and sensible girl who keeps a good relationship with children and SOS mother. In contrast with her, Martha shows to be open-minded and amusing girl who makes friends easily, not only siblings at home but also everybody who is contact with her. Both of them express to feel very happy to find a new family. Currently, they are retaking all subjects for their age in order to be on level to start the new school year in 2008. Fortunately, they have showed to learn easily.
Just as new children are sheltered within SOS families, young people are finishing new stages in their lives average 27 kids have been in the youth home during this year; they are studying professional careers, technical ones or they are working. Five of them after 3 years in the youth home will pass to live independent and two of them will keep support from SOS Children’s Village to pay the rent till they finish university. Olga, a 21 years old young adult girl, who was protected by a SOS family since she was just a baby -40 days of born, has concluded her process and she studied computers and her results were good! She wrote a thank you-letter addressed to SOS Children’s Village telling us “Thank you for your support, for your care and love, I am a young lady with values and a profession that helped me to get a stable employment and money gifts have help me to buy a computer and what I need to be completely independent from January 2008.”; at the beginning Olga will go to live together her brother José and she plans to study a specialization in order to get a better position at work.
We would like that everything were good and positive, however there are situations in life that make us to be sad and it is difficult to tell you We are talking about the death of one of our boys: “Oscar”, this boy, 10 years old, was a playful and happy boy who quickly was close to everybody, grown up and children with whom he was sharing. Just a couple of months ago he had been welcome to the Village together with his sister due to their parents’ abandonment and bad economical and social conditions of their grandmother. One of his favourite games was to dress up as Super-hero and to jump onto beds, chairs, etc One night of July, as every night at 9:00 p.m. Oscar went to sleep Later, his SOS mother went into all bedrooms, as usual, to tucked them up in bed; as soon as she open the Oscar’s bedroom she felt astonished to see the unconscious boy, but alive still, laid on the floor; immediately, the director and mother carried the boy to the hospital but all efforts done were in vain, they could not save the life of the boy. It seems and investigations told us that maybe he began to play his favourite game because of clothes he wore when he was found when he fell down from his bunk bed and her sister -who slept in the same bedroom did not noticed about that because she was deep slept.
It has been a very hard tragedy for our SOS family. Death of a boy is painful for all human being because there are many dreams shuttered and it is more painful when the circumstances are so tragic, sudden, absurd and unbelievable. Besides of that, this fact remembers us how huge is responsibility with all girls, boys and young people who live under our care and how new measurements we must take into account. Nevertheless, there are many children who motivate us to continue our work backed by a lot of people around the world like you. In spite of these pains, the Village must continue
On a Saturday night after this event, a ceremony of reconciliation and spiritual transformation was carried out together with all the families of the Village. Girls, boys and young people were walking into the room with candles on their hands
like a symbol of life
meanwhile background music from the guitar was sounding. They were asking to everybody and to the director what happened with Oscar and the director with tears on his face told that although this happen, our projects must be realised
they read verses from the Bible and also mothers expressed themselves and asked for more support from the education team. So, we have programmed reflection workshop with them weekly, especially with the Oscar’s family.
One of the deep songs they sang was: “Children are the authentic owner of our small time” written by a Colombian singer Jaime Valencia.
On the other hand, on Saturday November the 3rd, an emergency happened in Bogotá, a huge hailstorm fell down over the city! The great quantity of ice stones began to full the roofs of many apartments and houses, among them the houses of the SOS Children’s Village Bogotá what caused the breaking of the 10 houses’ ceilings, the director house and the administration building and the old rooms of the Village used for workshops or meetings; fortunately, the other family buildings did not suffered the impact of this natural phenomenon. Meanwhile the hail was fallen the director and nine mothers were enjoying of an integration trip to Bucaramanga (7 hours from Bogotá)
After this news they stopped the travel and returned to the Village immediately. They found wet blankets, mattresses, furnitures and electrical appliances and children from the families were moved to the apartments at the same Village. Fortunately, a friend of SOS donated mattresses for the first night and the repairs began the following days. Nowadays, children are again in their own houses.
We have been working together with the family and community strengthening programmes Social Center New Life and Social Center Cazucá in frequent meetings to carry out joint efforts to help mothers, children, families and community. Fortunately, the new law project about Infancy and Adolescence passed and it was sanctioned by the President of Colombia -Law 1098 2006. In this Code, human equality and dignity stand out without discrimination, protecting cultural identity, social rooting, and working with families in prevention. For that reason, the participation in public politics of SOS Children’s Village has been a purpose during 2007 and will be a strategic goal in 2008: One of the meetings was a presentation of our SOS Children’s Village programmes to the authorities of children’s rights protection whose purpose was to get partnerships to help strengthening the programmes, for instance to open four community Centres in neighbourhood attended by New Life and two more in Cazucá. It has been a great help to attend more people: New Life Programme attends 221 families and 348 children; and Cazucá attends 167 families and 292 children.
We would like to finish by thanking you for your generous and important help that enable us to give new opportunities guaranteeing a different present and future of many children and families.
¡ wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2008!
Kind regards,
Fabio Curtidor Argüello
Village Director
Relevant Countries: Colombia.