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Last Meeting: Ross & Anna Barber
Despite the disconcerting title Anna Barber and her father, Ross, gave a fascinating and appealing address on their work in Africa. Anna and her husband Felito run a Centre of Hope for the Africa on Fire Mission. Anna is currently residing in New Zealand following the birth of her son but normally she and her husband run a Mission for 250 orphaned children in Southern Mozambique. Felito is now running it by himself but Anna hopes to be able to return there soon. The Mission includes a Bible College, school, and agricultural trading centre, and also provides a feeding programme three times a week for 300 children.
Ross explained the background to the Mission's work with some alarming facts. After gaining independence from their Portuguese colonial master the country had its "obligatory" civil war but is now an independent liberal Islamic country. It has some cities, but the rural areas can be very undeveloped and poor, where the people live by subsistence farming and suffer from famines every three or four years. There are about 280,000 aids orphans in their part of Mozambique, and a shortage of young fit men as most go off to work in the mines in South Africa. The people have a hard life: there is real poverty and hunger and little surplus to survive the famines. With little money for food there is often none left for clothing and children often have to wear hand me downs through several cycles.
One unpleasant side effect is that young girls have no underclothes and are vulnerable to casual rape, which is almost condoned. Anna hopes that by providing underclothes for the girls they will be less readily" accessible". She is therefore trying to send over as many underclothes as she can. (She is also collecting wedding dresses to be re-cut and adjusted as the local girls value a formal outfit for their wedding.
The Mission has 6,000 acres of land and is developing 5 hectares for arable and vegetable farming, training and using local people to do so. Anna and her husband also have plans to plant cashew nut trees on 2,000 of their acres.
We were fascinated by Ross and Anna's accounts and impressed by what they are attempting and achieving. The Board has made a donation of $850 and Errol pledged to provide 100 pairs of underclothes from his factory. View other images HERE.
The Power of Positivity
Parting Thought:
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." ~ George Bernard Shaw
(If you have any comments or questions, please contact the editor)
General Notices:
* Women's Refuge Collection: Don't forget this is on Friday and Saturday this week. Thanks to you all for giving your time!
* Funds Raised: Sergeant $102.60
Learning Sessions 9 & 10:
1) Sometimes the Bulletin goes into your Spam box for some strange reason. So, if you haven't got it by the weekend, go to our Website and view it from THERE.
2) When you have been appointed a Rostered Duty and want to check what this is, again go to our Website first, and open up the last Bulletin. Scan down to "Rostered Duties & Responsibilities"and you will see that 'Rostered Duties' is in a blue colour. This is a Link that will take you to a page that explains all the duties and responsibilities.
Please study and plan ahead, especially if you are on duty to write a Bulletin Contribution. A reminder that it's also your responsibility to find a replacement if you are unable to fulfill your duty.
Eastern Hutt Rotary e-Bulletin
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