This year we celebrated our 4th anniversary in COVID-19- inflicted relative quietness. Alas, we were not able to invite people and increase our visibility in the community we are part of. But nonetheless, we are fortunate with a circle of well-wishers around us. In this blog we put the spotlight on them.
- Wensely is a young hairdresser, who already for years now has been visiting our community home if we call upon him to cut our residents’ hair.
- Dr Baez our dentist, together with colleagues if necessary, looks after the dental care of our residents.
- Dr Saturdino, a holistic physician, whom we regularly visit with Jonathan or Loyda, never charges the regular fees for his work and herbal medication.
- Jose Antonio runs a restaurant and gifts us a free meal once a month.
- Three stationary and book shops sell piñatas for us. These are produced by the participants of our activities centre.
- And of course there is the Juigalpa bookshop. The owners Ana Julia and Ana Patricia regularly invite a number of the participants of our activities centre to work in their shop to increase the visibility of our work. They also contribute to our fund-raising campaigns and are often with us when we have got something to celebrate. We asked the two Anas whether we could use the raised money for an outing to the beach with all residents and staff, and they thought that was a great idea. The outing is planned for the 17th of December.
- Harold also deserves a mention. He’s a creative Dutch carpenter/handy man. He normally appears promptly after we call him, and only charges a nominal fee.
- Every Wednesday doña Anielka is waiting for us with her van to take our residents to a swimming pool 5km outside Juigalpa. And doña Guadaloupe does not charge us for the use of her swimming pool on the premises of a popular restaurant which she manages.
- There is also goodwill from doña Guadaloupe’s neighbours who own a hotel with another swimming pool. We asked them if we could use their swimming pool instead during the busy December month for doing the therapeutic exercises with our residents in their pool. And they agreed!
- Last but not least: Aristide and Javier, who helped me to design the website of the Ruach Fundación in Spanish and are in charge of maintaining it….
Where would we have been without these pillars of strength? It gives us energy to be able to share tasks. Of course we try to extend our circle of involved people, but obviously we are on the right track!
