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VAMOS! NEWSLETTER June 2014
VAMOS!Newsletter
June 2014
EVERY DOLLAR DONATED GOES TO THE MEXICAN POOR! WWW.VAMOS.ORG.MX
To me VAMOS! is a special organization. I know it well. I grew up with it. My parents helped to launch it in 1986 and volunteered with VAMOS! for 27 years. My mother will turn 88 years old this summer and she still opens our mail and records our donations. I am often in Mexico and have met many of the people who work for VAMOS! as well as the poor families that we serve and I cannot imagine growing up in that kind of poverty. Feeling hungry all the time. Fetching water in buckets. Dirt floors and dust everywhere. Schools that simply don’t care because the community is poor with few resources. It is a different type of poverty than you see here in the U.S. In Cuernavaca poverty means a lack of basic needs like water, electricity and safe homes and most importantly ‐ opportunities. I have also seen the difference that VAMOS! makes in many, many lives. I have seen so many smiles on the faces of our children and have heard the
thanks of hundreds of grateful mothers. Grateful for the healthy meal they received, the lesson their child is learning, the free doctor and dental exams and most of all grateful for the dignity, respect and love that they receive at our centers.
TODOS SOMOS VAMOS! Todos Somos VAMOS! means “We are all VAMOS!” And that is the culture that permeates all of our centers. And YOU are VAMOS! You are a part of this work, this spirit, this special organization. My part is to ask for your help. The need in Mexico is as great as it has ever been and VAMOS! needs your support. Our 10 community centers, free meals, education and medical services, computer and music programs all cost money to provide. Your donations have a huge impact! Because we purchase locally and prepare our meals at each center, our healthy meals cost about 87 cents each. A donation of $100 buys a meal
for 115 people! What a wonderful gift! And soon, with your help, people will be able to drink the water at our centers! You can read about our Aquabox program on the next page and you may choose to support VAMOS! in that way. However you choose to help, you should know how grateful the people are whose lives are being helped. You are joining an organization that was founded on the simple value of loving our sisters and brothers. An organization that is working hard to fulfill that value every day. Thank You! Muchas Gracias and please check out our web site www.vamos.org.mx.
Todos Somos VAMOS! means We Are All VAMOS! By Sean Dougherty, Executive Director VAMOS!
VAMOS! NEWSLETTER June 2014
Tell people that you are going to Mexico and one of the first things you’ll hear is, “DON’T DRINK THE WATER!” And of course that is true, you must not drink the water in Mexico ‐ the quality of water has consistently been ranked at the bottom of any list of world nations. Why? The water often contains unsafe levels of common bacteria, such as E. coli, cholera and salmonella, and illness can also be caused by protozoa viruses (like hepatitis A, polio and rotavirus) and chemical pollutants. Our doctor, Dr. Sofía Chávez Cabañas, says that one of the main causes of illness to the people we serve is infections and sicknesses caused by the water. Of course Mexicans know not to drink it, but the reality is that the cost of water to poor families quickly adds up. A recent study found that Mexicans used about 127 gallons of bottled water per person a year, more than four times the bottled‐water consumption in the United States. The poor also have to pay for non‐drinkable water, which is delivered by a truck to 55 gallon drums near their homes. The study goes on to say that families here spend as much as 10 percent of their incomes on water, double what the
world development bank estimates they should.
HOW VAMOS IS HELPING! VAMOS! is now able to do something about this major issue! Recently, the Ripon Rotary Club and the UK Friends of VAMOS! donated an AquaBox to our Cerro de la Corona community center. This specially designed, portable micro filter takes the water that VAMOS! gets delivered and with just a few quick pumps through the filter, turns it into perfectly clean drinking water! The pump was installed in February and since then we have been pumping thousands of gallons in our center, saving VAMOS! hundreds of dollars in bottled water costs. Also, families coming to our program are
able to fill bottles up for free to take home and use. It is a remarkable gift to this community. The AquaBox costs about $500 (plus shipping costs) and has the capacity to clean the drinking water here for at least three years!
HOW YOU CAN HELP! VAMOS! has started a campaign to raise funds to get these AquaBoxes is all of our centers! We need 10 more filters to supply clean drinking water to the more than 1000 families who visit our centers each week! For us in the US, we take for granted the fact that good clean drinking water comes out of our taps every day. Here it is the opposite. If VAMOS! can help to supply free drinkable water in these communities, we could reduce the number of illnesses our families suffer from and allow them to spend more of their meager income on food! Please consider donating to make this happen: Go to www.vamos.org.mx/donate OR https://www.crowdrise.com/DontDrinkTheWater OR send a donation to BOX 212 , Weston, VT 05161.
THANK YOU !
Thanks to the Ripon Rotary Club for donating our first AquaBox and to UK Friends of VAMOS! for making all the arrangements, and covering the shipping costs! Muchas gracias!
GO AHEAD and
DRINK THE WATER!
VAMOS! NEWSLETTER June 2014
“They know they are loved here!” Meet Gael and Jimena, brother and sister who come to our downtown center, Casa Tatic. Jimena is a 13 year old girl who is always smiling and helping others with their school work. Gael, her 11 year old brother has some learning disabilities and has been adopted by the children and staff here. Gael is committed to learning and is one of the hardest workers in his class. Like almost all of the children who come to VAMOS!, their life is hard. They are poor and their day‐to‐day life can be a struggle. After school they help their father Alfonzo at work in the market. Their mother left the family when they were very young. As a single parent family, with teenagers ‐ one with special needs‐ life can often seem confusing. Things never seem to go right and there is always an obstacle in your path. Yet these children want more than to simply survive another day. They want to thrive, to grow and to have
successful futures. That is part of what VAMOS! is helping them to experience. They get a healthy meal here every day and lessons and, just as important, they also feel the love and respect that is at the heart of all of the VAMOS! programs. Each takes advantage of our Mental Health Program, meeting once a week with our Psychologist, Reyna Gonzalez. “I meet with lots of boys and girls to talk about their own situations, as teenagers, family issues and their living conditions,” says Reyna. “Poverty adds its own stress to their lives on top of everything else. It is so good that their father comes too. Participating in VAMOS! programs helps them with a sense of safety and security about their futures. We talk about where they are headed and encourage them to keep working hard. VAMOS! is a place where they know that they are loved and cared for.”
SISTERS OF PROVIDENCE
Thanks to a grant from the Sisters of Providence ‐Mother Joseph Province, all of our Medical, Dental and Mental Health Services are available free of
charge to everyone at our centers. This is such a gift to our VAMOS! families! No other organization in Cuernavaca (and perhaps all of Mexico!) is able to provide this. We have found that it is just as important to care for the minds and mental outlook of our poor as it is to feed and educate them. By providing all three – Mental, Dental and Medical we can begin to heal the whole person and only then can they move ahead to a successful future. Just ask Gael and Jimena when they greet you at the door exclaiming, “Beinvenidos a Casa Tatic! Welcome to Casa Tatic!”
Poly Pa VAMOS! is short for “Baltimore Polytechnic Institute For VAMOS!” It is the fundraising slogan of the Hispanic Culture Club at the school. This spring, led by their advisor, Regina O’Neal and their energetic vice‐president, Michael Lovo, they took on the cause of helping VAMOS! They sold wrist bands, asked classmates, showed our video, and had information tables set up at a variety of events. Together they raised over $500! Mrs. O’Neal is a Fullbright Scholar and traveled to Cuernavaca in 2010. While there she
volunteered with VAMOS! helping to paint one of our centers. “I made some beautiful friends there and the experience made a lifelong impression on me. I suggested VAMOS! to my students as an ideal organization that we could raise funds for!” THANK YOU to all the members of this wonderful club and
to all who supported them! Thanks also to the following schools who had movie nights, dinners and who simply asked people to support VAMOS! including: the Spanish Honor Society at Edwardsville, IL High School; St. Michael’s School in Independence, OH and The Quaker Valley School in Sewickley, PA!
REMEMBER!
TODOS SOMOS VAMOS!
“We are all VAMOS! “
EVERY DOLLAR DONATED GOES TO THE MEXICAN POOR!
Poly Pa VAMOS!
VAMOS! NEWSLETTER June 2014
LOOK WHAT YOUR DONATIONS HAVE ACCOMPLISHED! More than 165,000 meals served in the past year!
1,800+ free doctor and dentist visits! Over 3,500 hours of academic instruction!
Clean water filters! Music and Computer programs!
Love and respect to thousands of poor in Mexico!
There is so much more to be done. Please join us!
Thank you for being so generous! To donate please go to www.vamos.org.mx/donate
VAMOS! June 2014
Box 212
Weston, VT 05161
856‐625‐4400
www.vamos.org.mx
facebook.com/vamosinmexico