In June 2008, I (Lois Jacobs) went with a group from my church to the Dominican Republic for a week to volunteer with Samaritan's Foundation in building homes for the very poor.
I was very saddened by the lack of opportunities for people to find work to support their families. One of the few opportunities we saw for people was to go to the dump and salvage through what the garbage trucks were dumping. The only other opportunity available for some is prostitution. In the city of Sosua where we were staying, prostitution is legal. It is a tourist town and unfortunatley some tourists come mainly to hire prostitutes.
When we returned to the US, I was talking one day about trying to find something we could teach the people to do so that they could be able to buy food. A friend suggested that we teach them how to make paper beads out of magazines. My sister later suggested trying to use product packaging such as cereal boxes. Co-workers also chimed in ideas and H.O.P.E. (Helping Other People Eat) was born.
We returned in October 2008 and taught a six ladies in the Ascension Village how to make paper bead jewelry. We sold this jewelry at Christmas 2008 in the US. In 2009, we decided to focus on another village due to the fact that there were already two wonderful organizations working with ladies in the Ascension Village. One organization is called The Fair Trade Coop. More information about this program can be found at: http://latienda.moonfruit.com/
The other organization is called Crossroads. Crossroads has taught the ladies in the Ascension Village how to make the wonderful bracelets made out of cans that are shown in the embedded picture. More information about Crossroads can be found at:
http://www.dominicancrossroads.com/
We returned to the Dominican Republic in March 2009 and focused on working in Los Algodones. This is a village that is 100% Haitian. People came to the Dominican Republic from Haiti searching for a better life and work in the cane fields. Unfortunately, most of the sugar cane factories have closed and now it is very hard to find work. This is also a village that has a significant presence of HIV/AIDS. Approximately 30% of the adults in the village are HIV positive.
Two years ago when Samaritan's Foundation found out about this village, they didn't even have running water. People had to walk quite a distance to some creeks to get water. The first priority was building a water line to the village. Next, Samaritan's Founadtion build a medical clinic in land adjacent to Los Algodones which they had purchased. This was the start of a new village Samaritan's Foundation is building for the people of Los Algodones. The new village also has a new name -- Villa Esperanza. Esperanza means hope in Spanish and that is exactly what this new village is for the people that live here. The next priority was to build a school. In September 2008, 120 children who had never attended school before started attending the new school in Villa Esperanza. Next, a church was built in Villa Esperanza and in early 2009, homes are starting to be built.
Samaritan's Foundation is taking a section of the old Los Algodones at a time and building new homes in Villa Esperanza for the people. The people are given the new homes to live in. As soon as the people move out of the old homes, the old homes are torn down and the land is used to build vegetable gardens.
Even though things are looking up for the people of Los Algodones, they still need opportunities and jobs. Many of the men are being hired by Samaritan's Foundation to build the new homes. However, there is almost no work for the ladies of the village. So, when I returned in March 2009, I taught four ladies and one man (a translator) how to make beads out of product packaging and circular advertisements that come in the mail. The group caught on very quickly and is making very beautiful jewelry. More blog posts will be written introducing you to the group making the beads.
This picture is of Mama Bois. Mama Bois lives in Los Algodones in the Dominican Republic in the same village where the jewelry of HOPE is made. The four ladies and one man who make the jewelry have been setting aside 10% of all they make from the jewelry and they used this money recently to buy food for the elderly people in the village who have no way to earn money like Mama Bois. I am so impressed with the team making the jewelry for doing this!
