Incubating a wish

Candida has bright eyes and a shy smile. She raises by herself three children and she thanks God for the beans that she and her family have every day as a meal. Beans are the only thing she can hardly afford by working as a street vendor. I don´t think I could ever forget that hopeless smile she once gave us before saying: ¨Sometimes when I am blessed enough, my family and i can have chicken as a meal twice a month.¨   

Today, I want to bring you a story about chickens.

La linea, or ¨the line¨ community  in El salvador where the Baptist Church ¨Disciples of Christ¨ (IBDC) is located, inherited its name from the abandoned railway line that was built on that place and stopped being used after the bridges surrounding the area were destroyed during the civil war in the 80´s. In addition to the war, In 1986 El salvador faced also an earthquake disaster that left many people homeless and without many options but to resettle in La linea, an extremely vulnerable area.

In November of 2009, La linea was heavily affected by the Ida hurricane creating landslides and destroying or burying many houses including the IBDC church building. Nowadays this community not only faces poverty, but also a high rate of violence and the lack of legal rights to stay on the land.

You may be wondering at this point:  where do the chickens fit in this story? 

Families in La linea have very rough living situations. For some of them having chicken or any other meat in their meals is an indulgency that can´t be had more often than once every two months.

Under that context, IBDC is strongly committed with their community and above all of the struggles that La linea goes through, it has been actively working with MCC to bring hope. Part of their projects has been the purchase of a land to resettle 200 families from la linea and grant them the legal rights to possess it and support small business initiaves to transform it into a sustainable community.  But that is not the only project that the church is working at.

The IBDC youth also started a project supported by MCC called ¨Capacity Building for Sustainable Development and Peace¨ where they learned about the breeding boilers business.  ¨With the experience that the youth gained raising chickens, we wanted to help the families to build their own chicken farms too and support them with the knowledge that we now have¨ - said Vladimir Ramos, one of the youth leaders of IBDC - ¨This whole idea was an initiative of the youth where the leaders provide complementary support to boost the project. We are all deeply engaged with our community¨.

Last april, The Rosthern Junior Collegiate (RJC) group from Saskatchewan, Canada visited the community, the new purchased land, their current chicken project and spent a wonderful time sharing with the IBDC youth. RJC also supported the IBDC youth to get started with their project of building chicken farms for the families, and were invited to the families´ houses to spend time together and listen to their stories, being Candida´s story one of them.

This story is not over yet. Let´s take a part in its ending.

Find out more about what IBDC is doing at:

   

  http://ibdc-iglesia.blogspot.com/

RJC and IBDC youth sharing together

William and Valdimir (IBDC youth members) explaining how to breed broilers to Theodora´s family.  

IBDC youth distributing chickens.

Isaac and Ramon helping out to build Candida´s chicken farm

Alfredo and Vladimir helping out to build Concepción´s family chicken farm.

IBDC Youth leaders accompanying Candida and her children ( From left to right: Vladimir Ramos, Tania, Silvia Yaneth, Edwin Alexander and Candida Martinez.)

Dolores Funez Escobar and her family.

IBDC chicken project.

vaccinating chickens.

Silvia and Yesenia distributing the chickens with the local families.