ROMANIA UPDATE
The newsletter of Romania Care, registered charity no. 1012759

January 2002

British Ambassador agrees to become a patron of Romania Care

In our last newsletter we reported that His Excellency Richard Ralph, British Ambassador to Romania, spent a day in Suceava County visiting our projects.

Following that visit we had an invitation to go to one of the regular meetings he holds for British business men working in Romania. There he reported on his visit in July and the way he saw our project, especially from the point of UK/Romania cooperation. Laurence Biggs, Sally Shaw, Paul Clark and Peter Halden attended that meeting on Wednesday 16th January.

We are delighted to announce that Richard Ralph has accepted our invitation to become a Patron of Romania Care.

Nursing and Respite Care project Update

Work on the Nursing and Respite care home stopped for the winter in the middle of November. There are now 50cm+ of snow around the building and temperatures rarely go above freezing. The ground floor shell is complete except for rendering which will be done in the spring.

Looking to this year, we need to raise just over £50,000 to complete the shell of the building. Please join with us in praying for this finance.

To help with fund raising we have produced a new brochure - copies with tailored inserts are available from the office.

News from Paul Clark in Fintinele including the 2001 Family Shoebox Appeal.

In Fintinele it is extremely cold and I have been suffering in temperatures that fall well below -20C!! In my house I have closed off all the rooms apart from the bedroom so as to conserve what little heat I have. Even with a wood fire going, I am still able to see my own breath as I watch TV. The snow outside is deep and in some places up to my waist, the roads are blocked leaving many people stranded between villages having had to abandon their car.

Since I have been back, these last three weeks, work has been little and the festive season was spent mostly huddled next to my fire rubbing anti rheumatism cream into my toes.

I was, however, privileged to be given the role of "Father Christmas" this year and was entrusted with over 700 shoeboxes to deliver to a small village called Stupca where employment is non-existent and poverty is overwhelming.

I put on my "Father Christmas" hat and drove 50 or so kilometres to the village. The trip took ages and at one time I had to get 10 Romanians to lift my car out of a ditch where the snow was high. The village mayor had gathered together a small team of trusted men and with myself, Lenuta and my brother we went down the small roads knocking on doors and surprising the occupant with a present from England. Many times there were tears in the recipient's eyes and looks of disbelief - and occasionally the more intelligent person wanted to know what the catch was as in Romania nothing is free!

Further down in the village live the gypsies who are, without doubt, even poorer than the Romanians. Whether by laziness or discrimination is debatable, but the fact is that the gypsies in Stupca have nothing! The mayor asked me whether or not I wanted to give to these people and my reply was that the people in England want to bring a bit of happiness to all the poor in this village.

Due to the snow we were unable to visit the homes of all the gypsies so we called them to us and delivered the shoeboxes from the car.

My over-all feeling was one of success and many hearts were touched by the kindness shown by all who packed a shoebox. All the Romanians were extremely grateful and overwhelmed by your gifts.

It's been an interesting month and now that the holiday is over it's back to work and I would like to wish all of you a very happy 2002

Take Care and God bless Paul and Lenuta

Snippets of information from our January 2002 visit.

Temperatures during our week's visit ranged from -7C to -27C.

Suceava county hospital (1500 beds) had no local anaesthetic or painkillers - operations were being carried out without them!

Plans were progressed to complete the shell of the Nursing home in Ilisesti - all that is needed now is the money - please pray for this as it would be good to get the roof on before next winter.

A number of good contacts were made during our time in Bucharest, these initial contacts now need to be built on.

It was encouraging to see the Suceava branch of the Red Cross thinking similarly to ourselves.

Would you like to help out in Romania in the summer?

We are planning to have summer teams in Romania & Moldova from 20th July until 17th August this year.

Our plan is to run Holiday Clubs in 4 locations, Valea Marie & Ricipeni in Moldova; and Fintinele & Ilisesti in Romania. At the same time we expect to carry out some practical work during the Romania weeks.

We are looking for people to join our teams - would you consider coming for 1 or 2 weeks? You need have no special skills, just a deep desire to help others not so fortunate as yourself. You will be expected to pay your own costs, which will be in the region of £450 for one week and £50 for each additional week.

Further information can be obtained by phoning or writing to our office - details of which are shown below

News on giving

It is possible to give by cash, cheque, CAF voucher, CharityCard and Give As You Earn.

More details of all these ways of giving can be obtained from the office.

Romania Care
Registered Charity No 1012759
Office: 4 Bury Lane, Codicote, Herts, SG4 8XT
Phone/Fax: 01438 - 822007.
Email: info@RomaniaCare.com