Refugees

 Wednesday January 21. 

This morning first thing we had a breakfast meeting with the area president and all of the senior missionaries. We are the only non doctors or non lawyers working here in the area. Sometimes it’s like being surrounded by those in competition to see who is more knowledgeable or important. But we deal with it. Some of the food was amazing. There was a Carmel pie that I could eat every day. Next grandma and I went in a car with one of the project managers out to a place in the country to visit the refugees from Afghanistan. The drive took an hour. We drove through 2 tunnels and trough woods and countryside.

We arrived and met with the attorneys who are in charge of helping the refugees and toured the place. They are doing okay about like being in a run down hotel, which I guess it is as they still have guests. This is where the people stay for about 3 weeks until they are sent to cities where they have sponsors. We ate a nice lunch and visited in the rooms of 2 of the families. In both cases the fathers had been killed and the teenage girls were going to be forced to marry older men at 14 so they fled to Pakistan or Iran. The one family was 2 women who had been married to the same man and their 4 kids each. Ages from 23 to 9. The people speak English barely and Persian. 

Cool old tractor notice how small the engine.

Soon it was time to start back. We passed through a town called Jordanesia or Jordan Town. 

These next pictures are of Favellas.. They are basically slums or ghettos. Old patched together buildings vacant looking and ugly. The poor people move here and just move in stealing power water the building itself and raise families. The kids go to public school and they survive. Minimum wage here in Brazil is $350 per month. Tough to pay the rent and utilities on that so they survive.  I am experiencing difficulty in loading pictures. I will come back in later and try to add more.

We came home and left in time to walk home as it started to sprinkle but we were fine. Our washing machine was repaired. Interesting day. Things to think about. We called Tanner to wish him happy birthday. He was at our place and walked outside fun to see the snow and look around. Love to all.

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