Newly Weds Give Hope & Health to Total Strangers

 Newly Weds Give Hope & Health to Total Strangers

Why helping across the globe DOES make a difference.

By Sunyata Choyce

 

 

Every year my small NGO Project COLORS chooses a few families to assist when they are in desperate need of relief due to unpredictable circumstances.

Meet Sulochana’s family in Betticaola, Sri Lanka. 

The head of the house hold, Sulochana, has been slowly going blind and needed corrective surgery. Her teenage son was diagnosed with Leukemia and needed special care and transport to go Colombo once a month, over a 12 hour drive! Five other family members including an almost blind 90 year old grandmother live in a tin roof home made of mud and sticks over a floor of sand.

 

When I saw the grandmother, I was saddend at her state.  She was sitting in a dark room in the corner on loose old boards which were meant to be a bed.  She was shocked at first at my presence in her home, but soon gave me a big toothless grin excited to have a new visitor.

My local contact Marilyn, became aware of this family through colleagues involved in social welfare. Suloncha, showed me around their property.   Their sleeping arrangements were all on the sand floor (filled with sand fleas…I know from my flea bitten ankles).  Suloncha stressed the need for fencing so they could get livestock and also keep animals out of their garden so they can grow food.

 

We all spoke about the many needs and struggles and future planning!  It was both sad and exciting as there was so much potential to help make things better despite their recent bad luck.

Marilyn and I wrote to prospective donors and a plan was created.

GOOD NEWS SPECIAL REPORT:

A caring couple in Ontario Canada chose to donate funds just hours after their wedding to help this family.

Another amazing family in Nova Scotia donated to help COLORS pursue our ongoing work at two nearby children’s homes. Without this core help, none of these projects would be possible.

Supplies on the way!

I am now happy to announce the fencing has been not only bought but installed around the Suloncha’s family home so they can now have livestock. Beds, matts, sheets, pillows and chairs have been delivered so the family is  now  comfortably up from the bugs crawling all over the sand floor.

Funds were used to help with the son's transport for his leukaemia treatment, and he is now in remission. Marilyn and her husband are investigating training for the sons,  so he can become a community driver or work in a hotel. (However , he might need a training sponsor at some stage.) The mom has had her eye cataract surgery and has recovered well. And last but not least the older son is now employed and earning money to help partly support the family!

Personally when I received final news on this story last week, I had a huge smile on my face knowing that the old grandmother was now lying in a new bed and no longer perched on the old wood.

 

Grandmother on her new bed, sheets and pillow
 

Why do we love this story?

This is a story about not only a family overcoming hard times, but about a community and international community pulling together to help when its needed most. It was one action, of two families in Canada who cared, who wanted to make a big difference in this family's lives. It’s about seeing the progress and now the strength in the families and children we help, so they can survive and carry on stronger, happier and heathier then before.

Without the fast action of the individuals involved, COLORS work at the children’s homes and this family assistance would not exist, period.

Note from Marilyn in the field :
“Sulochana and her family wish to thank those who so generously gifted them their “wedding gift”.  She was very touched at the idea of someone doing this and said she will value the items all the more.  The items which were agreed upon and purchased have made a great improvement in their day to day living conditions.  
 A big thank you to COLORS for linking this generous donor to us here in post-war Batticaloa, Sri Lanka!!”

 

A major thank you goes out the Whalen Family and Sean and Dawn Holmes for believing in our vision and helping us see our projects through because of your caring contributions.

Thank you To Marilyn in Sri Lanka for following up with the completion of this project!!!!!