Dedicated to Helping Underprivileged Children
While vacationing in Mexico one day in 1987, a tiny child approached me on the beach, dragging a bag of trinkets. I searched in vain for her parents, thinking she was lost, but I soon realized she had been left all by herself to peddle her trinkets to tourists.
I gleaned that her name was Sara and she was only four years old. Her hair was matted, her clothes were tattered, and her little feet were burned by the hot sand. I stuffed some money into her bag, but I felt utterly helpless as I watched her walk away and disappear into the landscape. That day, I made a silent promise to someday help the “Saras” of the world.
Years later, my husband and I traveled to Bolivia to adopt our first child. Although I was blessed to have a beautiful new daughter, I was shocked by the living conditions of many of the children.
Everywhere I turned, I saw children who reminded me of Sara, but this time I refused to feel helpless. I learned about a back-alley orphanage from a group of Canadian college students I ran into one day. They told me that about 35 severely neglected children are living in deplorable conditions.
Calling friends and family in the US to ask for donations, and soliciting the help of the Canadians and our taxi driver, we managed to fix up that particularly horrific orphanage—installed toilets and made other repairs to the buildings, found doctors to examine and treat the sick children, set up a kitchen and purchased healthy food.
We even convinced the Bolivian Symphony Orchestra and others from the community to perform for the children and were instrumental in getting the orphanage director put in jail for his abuses. Casa de Sara was born in my heart with that project.
When I returned home to the United States, I formally started the organization that is named in honor of the little girl from the beach, so that I could work fulltime to help impoverished children.
Dedicated to Helping Underprivileged Children
While vacationing in Mexico one day in 1987, a tiny child approached me on the beach, dragging a bag of trinkets. I searched in vain for her parents, thinking she was lost, but I soon realized she had been left all by herself to peddle her trinkets to tourists.
I gleaned that her name was Sara and she was only four years old. Her hair was matted, her clothes were tattered, and her little feet were burned by the hot sand. I stuffed some money into her bag, but I felt utterly helpless as I watched her walk away and disappear into the landscape. That day, I made a silent promise to someday help the “Saras” of the world.
Years later, my husband and I traveled to Bolivia to adopt our first child. Although I was blessed to have a beautiful new daughter, I was shocked by the living conditions of many of the children.
Everywhere I turned, I saw children who reminded me of Sara, but this time I refused to feel helpless. I learned about a back-alley orphanage from a group of Canadian college students I ran into one day. They told me that about 35 severely neglected children are living in deplorable conditions.
Calling friends and family in the US to ask for donations, and soliciting the help of the Canadians and our taxi driver, we managed to fix up that particularly horrific orphanage—installed toilets and made other repairs to the buildings, found doctors to examine and treat the sick children, set up a kitchen and purchased healthy food.
We even convinced the Bolivian Symphony Orchestra and others from the community to perform for the children and were instrumental in getting the orphanage director put in jail for his abuses. Casa de Sara was born in my heart with that project.
When I returned home to the United States, I formally started the organization that is named in honor of the little girl from the beach, so that I could work fulltime to help impoverished children.
