Mimose Dazouloute-Geffrard’s with Anna Pierre, her 97-year-old mother, at the St. Francois de Sales Hospital. Photo by Robyn Fieser/CRS

Mimose Dazouloute-Geffrard dropped bills into special collection trays for Catholic Relief Services during mass at her Clarksville, Maryland church over the years. She wrote a check after cities in her native Haiti were damaged by storms and flooding. She figured the money would be used to help CRS “do good work.”

She never imagined she would one day be the recipient of that work.

Then the ground shook in Haiti for about 35 seconds on January 12. Mimose, a nurse for the state of Maryland, pledged $20 a month for Haiti and checked in on her 97-year-old mother, Anna Pierre, in Haiti. Everything was fine, friends said, “your mother just has a blister between her toes,” Mimose remembers being told. A few days later, the blister was described as a little cut. But in the Haitian tradition of not giving bad news, the friends and neighbors caring for Mimose’s diabetic mother weren’t telling her the whole story.

“Then I got a call on Sunday night, we were about to sit down to dinner,” said Mimose. “A friend of the family, a woman who had been caring for my mother, told me the situation was complicated, that her foot was all black. And if someone in Haiti tells you the situation is complicated, it is complicated. I knew I had to go.”

It took four days to get to Haiti. On February 25 before dawn, Mimose arrived in Petit-Goave, a town two hours and 30 minutes south of the capital by road. She found her mother asleep in a wheelchair in the trash-laden yard of a local school.
She couldn’t unwrap the dirty bandage to see the foot. It was stuck to the skin. But the smell left no doubt.

“I knew we could not save the foot,” said Mimose.

That night, she made a bed by laying a piece of cardboard over bricks. She slept next to her mother. As the odor of her mother’s foot rose up, Mimose figured it was the first time in days that anyone had gotten that close to the woman.

Mimose stood in line the next morning at the U.S. Embassy. Bringing her mother home to Maryland was not an option, she was told. She went looking for the Navy hospital ship Comfort. But it was gone. She walked a few miles to a hospital run by the United Nations. Doctors there said her mother was too old and her medical condition too fragile to operate. She tried another hospital near the airport but it was not accepting new patients. By day’s end, Mimose was desperate.

“And then my husband Joseph called to say he had seen on television that the University of Maryland doctors were at the St. Francois de Sales Hospital,” she said. “It was a Godsend.”

The hospital, the oldest in Haiti, was almost entirely destroyed by the earthquake. CRS helped buy fuel for the hospital, recruited volunteers, procured an ambulance, and brought in truckloads of medicine. In the days and weeks after the earthquake, a steady rotation of doctors and nurses from the University of Maryland conducted up to 20 operations a day.
I met Mimose and her husband Joseph at the hospital two weeks after doctors from the University of Maryland removed Anna Pierre’s leg.

Through the bustle of an early morning registration, during which dozens of Haitians come looking for treatment of everyday ailments, it was easy to tell who had been there a while. People in wheelchairs lounged in the sun. Children played in a courtyard. A tall woman in a strapless dress wandered around. She carried her broken arm, sprouting pins and needles, on a red, velvet pillow. Through a hallway to the right, I saw the remains of collapsed wards, baby cribs and IV kits still visible through gaps in the rubble.

Anna Pierre, 97-year-old mother of CRS donor Mimose Dazouloute-Geffrard, clutches her rosary while recuperating at the St. Francois de Sales Hospital. Photo by Robyn Fieser/CRS

Amid it all, I found Mimose and Joseph at their mother’s bedside in one of the hospital’s medical tents. The two spend their days there alongside at least a dozen other Haitian families who are nursing their injured loved ones back to life.

Mimose bathes her mother, cooks for her and tends to her fevers. She sleeps at night on a slab of concrete next to a block of latrines. She carts a suitcase full of paperwork she’ll need for the visa, if she can get it, to take her mother home.

Two weeks after the surgery, Anna Pierre is doing well. She clings to her rosary beads and talks of seeing her granddaughter again.

“She is always saying that the Lord is going to take care of us. That our lives are in God’s hands,” said Joseph of Anna Pierre. “And I am beginning to believe it.”

Robyn Fieser is CRS communications officer for Latina America

On the 22nd, we’ll publish a World Water Day page with stories, video, and other features about the state of water needs. Until then, each day this week, we’re posting one fact about water that you might not be aware of.

Today’s fact: Nearly 50% of people in developing countries currently suffer from a water and sanitation-related disease (dysentery, typhoid fever, cholera, intestinal worms, etc).

You can learn more about World Water Day here.

“What am I doing here?” I thought, driving out of the city of Mekelle, Ethiopia. My thoughts were as random as the people we passed on the street. Some were lying on the dirt sidewalk covered in plastic and rags. One woman was holding a baby no more than 6 months old. Most looked as if they hadn’t eaten a hearty meal their entire lives.

The questions I was asking myself—the questions people will ask when I get home—silently haunted me as we drove to Axum. The journey was tiresome as I tried to wrap my mind around everything I was taking in. “Don’t they know how to make gravel around here?” I wondered as we bounced along. All my thoughts about Toyota engineering went out the window as our Land Cruiser stoutly drove over the baseball-sized rocks.

Africa has always been another world to most, and for me, Ethiopia was my crash course. The extreme gaps between the rich and the poor were startling and impossible to ignore. One question kept returning. It just wouldn’t go away: “What can I do?”

Children at the Adi-Daero Integrated Watershed Development Project in Ethiopia. Photo by Debbie DeVoe/CRS

Back in the States, I imagine myself standing in front of a small crowd during a Sunday liturgy, folks staring at me with their blinking faces, wondering what amazing things I experienced in Africa. I feel my heart weighing heavy as I try to muster the courage to tell them the truth. I imagine saying, “There is great suffering in the world, and Ethiopia is at the front lines.” I probably won’t say that though, or much of anything other than the hopeful stuff. Just a few lines of what they can do for underdeveloped countries. I’ll probably tell them, “Money is great, if you have a lot, and awareness is better if one doesn’t forget, but more importantly, prayer is the absolute means to help. Pray for those who don’t eat today, pray for those who are ill and impoverished, pray for those who have nothing.”

But is that enough? I still ask myself, “What can I do? Will I use my voice? Will I tell their story—the one that I’ve seen, the one they’ve told?” The suffering and hardships of many Ethiopians are great, and it’s important that I bear witness to the extreme poverty I saw. But after experiencing so much, I’ve realized that there is something greater still, and that is hope. There is hope in this land, and my voice can share that.

Hope in Ethiopia and across Africa starts with the people who bring it by means of Catholic Relief Services. Through the many programs and opportunities CRS provides to the world, you can’t help but see hope. I know, because I’ve witnessed it in Ethiopia. Wherever we visited CRS projects, we found smiling children, thankful families, and growing villages. CRS was the hope seen in places often without other support.

Becoming a Global Fellow has become part of my life now. It has changed me in ways I have yet to understand. The people of Ethiopia taught me what it means to have something, and yet have nothing. As impoverished as many are, the people of Ethiopia are the most spiritually rich I’ve ever met. Ironically my home is the polar opposite.

Ethiopia has helped me find my voice, a voice I’ll use as a bridge between two countries. Ethiopia has shown me how to bring more people into solidarity with those who suffer.

Disembarking from our plane at Chicago’s O’Hare International, I knew what to do: I will become an ambassador to the people of Ethiopia and use the power of my voice to make a difference. My words will show everyone just how rich they can be.

A single mother and her daughter receive a cow at a livestock fair in rural Bangladesh. Photo by Laura Sheahen/CRS

I don’t know a lot about cows, or any livestock for that matter. Working for Catholic Relief Services and visiting the rural people we serve has been an ongoing education for me.

A few weeks ago in Bangladesh, cyclone survivors who have been working to rebuild their lives lined up, vouchers in hand, for a cow fair. The small female cows (would that be heifers?) patiently chewed straw while the beneficiaries talked excitedly about their plans.

“Today I am looking for a red cow. During Cyclone Sidr, my red cow died,” said Parul Begum, a 58-year-old grandmother in a black burqa. “The wind and waves took everything. My house was completely gone. I’ve never seen such a thing in my life.”

During the storm, Parul struggled through chin-high water to get to a police station that was on high ground. “I thought I was going to die.”

Like everyone in her village of Mahipur, Parul and her family had to start over with nothing. In this poor coastal area, villagers already lacked food, health care, and education. Now many of them were homeless and had lost their livelihoods. Livestock, rickshaws, fishing boats, and tools were swept away by powerful tidal surges.

With funding from USAID and support from CRS, Caritas Bangladesh is giving people the things they need to earn a living. Project Somriddhi (“self-sufficiency”) gives villagers choices about which items to pick, from cows to sewing machines. Almost 6,000 have chosen and received cows so far; over a thousand have picked things like barber shop materials, bicycle carts, or fishing nets. The program has also taught people how to save these items during future floods and cyclones.

At the livestock fair, I talked with Caritas staff about cow care. You have to wash a cow frequently, it turns out, or it can get disease. Why I thought cows were self-cleaning I will never know. And there are certain types of locally-available fodder that Caritas recommends to beneficiaries; contrary to my vague ideas, just eating the dry rice stubble in the fields isn’t enough.

I learned that the cow’s height matters; Caritas staff measured each one carefully and checked its teeth. As a cosmetic issue, color matters too. “My favorite colors are red and black,” said Parul. “And white cows get dirty.”

The cows are a dream come true for many villagers, an asset that will lead to a steady source of food or income in years to come. “The cow will have a baby in the future, so we can drink the milk,” said Parul happily.

OK, that I knew.

On the 22nd, we’ll publish a World Water Day page with stories, video, and other features about the state of water needs. Until then, each day this week, we’re posting one fact about water that you might not be aware of.

Today’s fact: In the U.S., nearly 100% of people have multiple taps and flush toilets inside their homes. In Sub-Saharan Africa, less than 30% have running water and sanitation available.

You can learn more about World Water Day here.

On the 22nd, we’ll publish a World Water Day page with stories, video, and other features about the state of water needs. Until then, each day this week, we’re posting one fact about water that you might not be aware of.

Today’s fact: Water has both a physical and spiritual dimension. It is essential for life and all major religions have a spiritual link between faith and water.

You can learn more about World Water Day here.

The graduates clap and ululate as each participant receives her certificate. Photo by Melita Sawyer/CRS

Melita Sawyer, Microfinance Technical Advisor at CRS headquarters in Baltimore, recently attended a graduation ceremony in Sudan.

Graduations are a big deal in Sudan. Not that they go unnoticed in the United States, but here in Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, graduations mean singing, dancing, showering graduates with congratulations (and sometimes fake snow too) and lots of food—all during the ceremony.

I was really looking forward to attending the graduation ceremony for 150 women who received vocational training through CRS’ Khartoum State Poverty Reduction program, and it far exceeded my expectations. The minute we arrived and heard the all-women’s marching band playing a lively tune, surrounded by graduates happily dancing, I knew that this graduation would be different.

Before the ceremony began, we were able to see wonderful displays of the skills the women had learned during their three-month vocational training courses. There was embroidery, crocheting, examples of health and beauty skills like henna painting, jams, baked goods, dried dates … the list goes on. Before the training topics were decided, CRS’ partner Khartoum University conducted a market study to ensure all of the skills would be in demand in the local market. As a result, the women have already been able to start selling their goods and services and increase their incomes. For someone who is a bit of a microfinance and livelihoods geek, this was incredibly great to see.

A professor from Khartoum University dances to the tunes of the all-women’s marching band. Photo by Melita Sawyer/CRS

I was also happy to see and speak with many women I’d met earlier during a visit to a Savings and Internal Lending Community (SILC) group. SILC is a microfinance method that emphasizes savings and makes savings, loans and insurance available to people that aren’t being served by formal financial institutions. All of the vocational training graduates are also involved in SILC groups. The combination of these activities has been really important, as participants are able to take loans out from their SILC groups to launch small businesses using their new skills.

Not only do these women now have skills that are demanded by the market, but they have the means to start and expand their businesses. They can also use their SILC group to save their profits and then invest those savings back into their businesses or families. For example, many women use their savings to pay their children’s school fees.

Another highlight of the afternoon was meeting the professors from CRS’ partner, the Khartoum University Home Sciences Department. Many of these professors had donated their time to teach the women the skills they are now so proud of.

This project has done a wonderful job of bringing together a mix of partners—community-based organizations, academics, NGOs and the private sector—to help women and youth improve their incomes. Khartoum University hadn’t previously been involved with a project that works directly with people in poor communities, but the experience was a very positive one for them. The Dean of the University said they plan to increase their work in this area.

Overall, this project has helped 3,000 women and youth living in Khartoum’s poorest neighborhoods and camps for internally displaced people to change their lives for the better. It was evident in speaking with project participants that the benefits gained went far beyond improved skills and access to financial services. People also made some important new friendships and are incredibly supportive of one another. In communities with diverse populations, this is exciting to see. As Fatima, one of the women who I had met at the Wahda “Unity” SILC group, told me, “Before this project, we didn’t really know people from other tribes. Now we truly love each other.”

Our visit to Ethiopia is coming to a conclusion. We have visited the Missionaries of Charity one last time at their Sidist Kilo home for the destitute and dying in Addis, and now we are packing to return to the USA later tonight.

These few days in Ethiopia have left an indelible mark on all of us. This mark will travel with us back to the States and be our motivation for sharing our story with our families and communities.

We have seen what poverty, global warming, injustice and underdevelopment can do to a human being, to a child of God. All these adverse factors can truly make a child of God believe that he or she is not. But despite the different faces and situations with which suffering makes known its overpowering presence in Ethiopia, there are still signs of hope.

Ethiopia’s children reflect the country’s hope and beauty. Photo by Debbie DeVoe/CRS

It is hard not to see glimpses of hope and of a future of justice and equality after witnessing what solidarity, love, development projects and justice can do for a human being, for a child of God, through the work CRS and its partners carry out in this beautiful land of Ethiopia. How can it not be a sign of hope to see dusty, rocky, dry grounds turning into green, beautiful and healthful oases where crops are growing and holding future promise for villagers near Mekelle and Adigrat? How can we not believe in justice and peace when we see Muslims, Ethiopian Orthodox and Catholics working together for the wellbeing of their communities, bridging their differences by treasuring and strengthening that which unifies us?

How can we not see glimpses of hope after meeting Lane, Carlos and Debbie, CRS staff and USA citizens who selflessly spend their lives to make the world and this country of Ethiopia more humane? How can we not see glimpses of hope after meeting Ato Kifle—a CRS Ethiopia staff member—and many others Ethiopians helping to improve the life conditions of their own people? How can we not see glimpses of hope after seeing the Missionaries of Charity Sisters and volunteers working day and night caring for 900 patients with HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis in just one of 18 homes? How can we not see glimpses of hope after seeing the work of God in all of them?

This is the message we, seminarians and priests, are bringing back to the States. It is through the contribution of many people here in the U.S. that this transformation is happening now in Ethiopia. We are bearers of great news but also bearers of a great challenge: Ethiopia still needs our help. CRS, its partners and the Catholic Community in the United States are committed to continue bringing hope to our brothers and sisters in Ethiopia. 

CRS staff members reading an opening prayer before a Lenten meal of soup, bread and water at the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. Photo by David Snyder for CRS

Operation Rice Bowl is not just about putting money in a Rice Bowl during Lent. It combines four equally important components: praying, fasting, learning and giving. The alms are collected in the home or in the parish during Lent as one part of the program. Alms are a part of our Lenten sacrifice that includes praying and fasting. With the help of materials such as the Lenten Calendar, Operation Rice Bowl participants have a daily guide for prayer and fasting in solidarity with the poor. In addition to giving alms, participants also have the opportunity to learn more about the developing world and to deepen their Lenten experience with spiritual reflection.