Nightmare in Nepal [Jeff’s 1st Blog from Nepal]

11May

Nightmare in Nepal [Jeff’s 1st Blog from Nepal]

Entire villages destroyed, my contact said in an email to me just days after the April 25th earthquake in Nepal. I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. Two days later I slipped "unseen" into the capital city of Kathmandu—larger organizations, I learned, found themselves mired in bureaucratic red tape at the airport as they tried to get their teams and supplies into the country

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30Apr

Bound for Nepal

Tomorrow I'm flying to Nepal, the mountainous nation devastated by the 7.9 magnitude earthquake last weekend. I'll be leading a team of trained first responders to meet with our partners in Kathmandu and travel to outlying villages where large aid organizations are not presently working---villages that one of our partners told me have been "fully destroyed," forcing everyone to sleep outside.

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26Apr

Kathmandu Quake

You have no doubt heard of the massive 7.8 magnitude earthquake centered near Kathmandu, Nepal, earlier this weekend. The images are heartbreaking. The death toll has exceeded 2,500 as of this writing, and will no doubt increase substantially as many who are now missing are later found buried under rubble.

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01Mar

Disaster Relief Fund

Unlike other recent years, 2014 brought no headline-dominating natural disasters in which thousands of people perished. But that is no consolation to a woman in China who lost her child in last year's earthquake, or to a father in Pakistan whose wife disappeared when flood waters washed away their home, or to orphans in India as they huddled together in the dark while a cyclone ripped off the roof of their orphanage. Heaven's Family was there to help those disaster victims, and others.

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19Feb

African Disaster

These children were orphaned by flooding in Malawi, but a precious saint cares for them in what remains of this house. Africa is plagued with problems, but damaging storms is not usually one of them. So I was surprised when my friend and Heaven's Family coworker Dick Samuels told me that a cyclone struck Malawi this month, causing widespread flooding and damage to homes and crops. Almost 200 are confirmed dead, thousands are still missing, and hundreds of thousands have been displaced.

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16Feb

An Unexpected Disaster [Jeff’s 3rd and Final Blog from Cambodia/Philippines]

Where's my mommy? This cry, whether spoken through the tears of a small child, or unmistakably etched on his or her face, is all too common in the chaotic wake of a natural disaster. Families are separated or displaced—sometimes permanently—and such perilous circumstances are, for opportunistic human traffickers, like fishing in a stocked pond.

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07Feb

Bed Bus to Poipet [Jeff’s 2nd Blog from Cambodia/Philippines]

I had never heard of a "bed bus" until I boarded one bound for Poipet, a small city on Cambodia's border with Thailand. After squeezing down an aisle that thin people have to walk sideways to fit through—two tiers of beds down each side—I soon discovered that the bunks were double-occupancy, meaning I had to share the last remaining 3.5-foot-wide by 5-foot-long bunk, all the way in the back of the bus, with another person for the 9-hour ride through the dark, bumpy night.

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04Feb

Sidewalks in the Sky [Jeff’s 1st Blog from Cambodia/Philippines]

A sign should be posted, I thought, that warns those fearful of heights not to enter. I was walking into a riverfront slum, one in which every home was built on stilts—some very high stilts. Even the sidewalks that weaved through this collision of cobbled-together buildings were built on interconnected stilts that tied everything together in what seemed an uneasy truce with gravity. I didn't want to look down, as it was impossible to avoid seeing the ground far below through the gaping gaps between boards—but if I didn't, a slight misstep might seriously ruin my day!

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10Dec

Philippines Disaster… Again

It’s likely that you’ve heard about the destructive path of Typhoon Hagupit (locally called Ruby) as it raked across the Philippines just a few days ago—just over one year from when Superstorm Haiyan ravaged the island nation. Late last winter I told you about Mahalit, a small fishing community that had been devastated by Typhoon Haiyan. Through our friend Pastor Lot, we helped rebuild the decimated fishing boat fleet in addition to helping rebuild damaged homes.

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19Nov

A Home for Jopai

Jopai slept along a street in the slums of Cebu City, the Philippines, each night. Her home consisted of an old tarp draped over a discarded metal frame. She shared that space with her mother and siblings—Joy, her sister, and 2 younger brothers. Her mother did all she could to provide for the 5 of them, but although she worked hard all day cleaning fish, she earned only about a dollar a day—barely enough to buy the rice and soup they needed to survive each day. All else was a luxury they couldn’t afford, including the children’s education.

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