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Update from Kenya

August 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment

We made it back into Nairobi yesterday and are scheduled to head back to the US tonight. It is honestly hard to put into words how this past week has been. I am just so thankful, honored and humbled to be here. Brian, Rustin and I continue to discuss how difficult it is to wrap our minds and hearts around what we have experienced and seen. I was sending a brief email to my church this morning telling them that the reality has hit me that this is really happening “right now” in the lives of people. It is not just something we see on the news, but it is something real. Real people who are mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, etc. This is their life for the time being, and the question for me is what can I do to make a difference? I keep thinking that it is all so complex and big (which it is), that my help will be so small. But I think that is ok. I have to believe every little bit helps. We cannot believe the lie that we cannot make a difference, I truly know with my heart we can. Your support and prayers have been amazing this week. I am blown away by the people and churches who have stepped up to send money for food or medicine. It WILL get to the people here who need it. In the coming week, I will be updating how we plan to start moving forward with all of this in the coming weeks. We can’t do it alone…your continued support and prayers are a blessing. Again, thank you!!

Best,

Brad

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Turkana, Kenya

August 23, 2011 By Leave a Comment

It is almost impossible to describe what we have seen today. To put it best, beautiful, strong and resilient people surviving at what seems like the edge of the world here in Turkana, Kenya.  The drought and famine is honestly hard to communicate…the magnitude of it is much more intense than I had anticipated. Before we started distributing the food at this village, the chief and many of the people spoke to us. One lady said “if you come back in a few days, we do not if we will even still be here (alive)”. It is real…what we saw on the news before we came here does not do it justice. But among all of this, more than anything, I was just in awe of the peoples spirit, their drive, their smiles, their ability to hold on to their faith during this time. We were greeted with such kindness and I am convinced that it is impossible for us to repay back even a fraction of what we received from them today. I will not forget them. The CRF crew is doing an amazing job of getting food to them. We will continue to support those efforts. Tomorrow we are up at 4am and off to Kakuma Refugee Camp. I look forward to updating as we are able. Thank you for your continued support and prayers. It means so much.

Best,

Brad

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Heading out Tomorrow!

August 19, 2011 By Leave a Comment

I cannot begin to tell you how thankful we are for the amazing amount of support, encouragement and prayers we have received from so many of you this past week. Getting prepared for this trip has been a little crazier than usual. We continue to find more information from our friend on the ground about what is going on there…it is just tragic. It doesn’t seem real. In between preparing for the trip, I tried to spend some time in the afternoon with my family doing “fun” stuff yesterday. I enjoyed it, but everything around me during that time took my thoughts back to Africa and what is happening there. I drove by a pool…I thought we have more water at our disposal than we know what to do with. What a blessing. Went out to lunch with my good friend…had more food than I can eat, and they will bring more if I ask. What a blessing. It was a good time just trying to rest my mind with people I love, but my every thought just kept wandering off to where I will be in 3 days, the drastic contrast of life and opportunity. I am really just talking out loud here as I try to reconcile all of it in my mind in getting ready to go. This I do know: God’s heart is with the poor. I have no idea why this is happening and I do wander at times where He is in all of this. I have to believe that He is waiting on us, nudging our hearts to get busy and get in the trenches with Him to be a voice and a tangible source of action and comfort to those who are suffering. That part excites me.

Again, thank you for all of your support in this. We still have a long way to go…this is a marathon and it will get worse before it gets better. Please consider going to our Africa Famine Relief DONATE button if you are able. Spread the word to your friends and family. The more we raise, the more people we feed.

Look forward to keeping you updated from the filed!

God Bless,

Brad

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Famine in Africa 2

August 17, 2011 By Leave a Comment

In between Ghana and Rwanda last month, I was in Washington, DC meeting with the Elizabeth Glaser Foundation about our pediatric HIV/AIDS work in Africa. They are good people and are doing good work across Africa to help children affected by HIV/AIDS. We have been corresponding back and forth discussing possibilities to collaborate in some of their clinics where HIV/AIDS has taken its heaviest toll. May happen, may not, we will see. On one of the managers emails, below her name is the quote “People say they care, but actions are what save lives.” This is a quote by Elizabeth Glaser, who is a pioneer for AIDS care around the world even now, many years after passing away from the disease. When I read that quote, I thought, “what a bold statement, what a true statement. It may be so true that it will probably offend some people.” On so many occasions I will sit in a meeting with someone, meet for dinner with someone, fly to a conference to speak to a group of people, often to discuss issues like stopping children from dying from HIV/AIDS, the needless death of a child dying from malaria, or in this past week talking with people about the destruction of life the famine and drought in Kenya/Somalia is causing right now. In several meetings I am greeted with a hug/handshake accompanied with a sincere commitment to do something tangible to make a difference. Or like what happened today at lunch when I was talking with a dear friend of mine. After we finish eating, he says, “follow me to my bank and let me give you money for medicines right now to take to Kenya/Somalia.” More often in those meetings or discussions I am looked at like I have three heads and I can see the person squirming trying to decide how all of this could possibly relate to them. It does relate to them. It relates to me, you, everyone. I received a forwarded email from a colleague/friend in Kenya today where he is in the trenches there providing aide for the famine. We plan to meet up with him on Monday. He said that it is hard seeing mothers walking the 4 day trip from Somalia with no food or water to the refugee camp, leaving their babies in the middle of the road among thousands of people walking, in hopes that someone will pick them up and care for them before they die. He said it is hard seeing women arrive from the 4 day walk only to take the child off of their back to realize they have died from starvation. This is hard to hear. It actually is brutal to hear. It makes me uncomfortable. It makes my heart ache, and of course I thank God that it is not my wife having to make that decision with my children. Why isn’t that my wife or child? I don’t know, only God knows. But what I do know, is that because I believe God’s heart is with the poor, my heart is with the poor. What do I do with that? I believe it has to be love in action…I would want that for my wife and child. I would probably do almost anything to get them fed if starving or get them medicine if they were dying from a treatable illness. We have an amazing opportunity to facilitate that in Kenya with our partners on the ground. Many of you have responded in the past two days with funds and prayers for this endeavor. This has been such a HUGE blessing and we are so thankful. Still, if I am honest, more is desperately needed. The more funding we can gather, the more children we can feed. Go to DONATE if you can help. Tell others with kindred hearts about it. The more awareness we raise, the more people we help. Thank you for caring and acting!!!!!!!

Best,

Brad

Photos from Francis Bi in Dadaab

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Famine in Africa

August 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment

I am writing to you today to bring awareness to a tragedy that is currently happening in the Horn of Africa, more specifically Somalia and Kenya. The region has been struck by a deadly drought and famine and as I write this, over 30,000 children have already died from starvation and disease in the past three months, with 600,000 more children projected to die by year’s end. Yes, you read right, 600,000 children dying from not having enough food or simple medical care.

This coming week, Brian Wallace and I will be traveling to this region to meet up with partners on the ground to assess how we can best assist the people being most affected. In that trip, we will be visiting the Dadaab Refugee Camp, a home to nearly 500,000 Somali refugees. We will also be visiting other camps and villages where the most vulnerable, children, struggle to live on a daily basis. In addition to assessing how we can best help in the long-run, we will also hopefully assist in delivering needed food and I hope to provide any medical care that I am able to do.

Please prayerfully consider supporting us during this time for us to be able to provide life-sustaining food and medical care, in the name of the Lord, to those who desperately need it in Kenya and Somalia right now.

As always, thank you!

Best,

Brad

Photo Credit: International Business Times

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Home from Rwanda

August 8, 2011 By 2 Comments

RWANDA: As I reflect on the past week and a half in Rwanda, there is nothing that can free me from the thought of what happened to innocent people, mostly children in this case, during the genocide in 1994-1995. No matter the age of the almost 600 children we medically assessed at the Noel Orphanage in Gesiny, my first thought was, “How did the genocide affect this child sitting in front of me? Did he/she lose their parents, his grandparents, his brothers/sisters, friends or other close family members?” In the younger children, there was not so much “direct” influence from the genocide that caused them to be orphaned.  But as we started seeing the older children, the scars, both mental and physical, became so evident, palpable and real, many times just  pouring out as raw emotion when explaining what happened to their parents…how they themselves had been hurt or had lost a hand/arm at the age of 2, 3 or 5 years of age.

By our third day, we had assessed close to 350 children, mostly too young to have been alive during that time period. However, my last two days consisted almost entirely of older children, now young adults, trying to cope with what has happened to them. Why them? Why so suddenly and by people they even knew/trusted? A tragedy so sudden that they still can’t understand why their parents are dead. I work with children that have been orphaned, abandoned, vulnerable victims of devastating earthquakes and hurricanes, as well as beautiful children rescued from the horrors of child trafficking and slavery. Each time I am with these children, a part of my heart dies and is replaced with a part of theirs. I can’t explain it. Often I can protect my heart “in the moment”  to allow just enough in so not to fully face the tragedy in front of me. These past four weeks in Liberia, Ghana and Rwanda have been different. There was no protecting my heart, it was raw, it was in the moment, it had to be more than anything out of pure respect to the child sitting across me opening his/her heart.

As many of the children over 16 started coming in to be assessed, there was a cautious and guarded silence. They undoubtedly had heard from the other children what questions we were asking about how they came to live at Noel. For pure survival purposes, they had long hidden these memories in their hearts. But now, with one question posed, many of those emotions uncontrollably erupted to the surface, reminding both of us of the pain they endured as a child. My hope and belief is that God’s love heals. I pray that these children know they are not forgotten by anyone, especially God. My hope is that we won’t forget them, that we don’t get so comfortable in our own lives that we carry on in our safe world here in the US acting as this never happened. I hope, and plan, to see these children again soon to witness God’s continued healing and love in action in their lives.

Thank you for your continued support of our work at GHI.

Best,

Brad

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Rwanda

July 27, 2011 By Leave a Comment

These past few days in Rwanda have just been amazing. I am here with His Chase Foundation, an organization dedicated to helping transform the lives of children that have been abandoned, orphaned and sold into child slavery. In addition to being an organization, they are also just some of our dear friends that have amazing hearts for the poor and vulnerable children. I am so amazed at how blessed I am to get to work with people like this. Here in Rwanda, we are doing medical assessments  for over 600 children living in the Noel Orphanage in Gisenyi, right on the border of the DRC (Congo). The landscape is beautiful here…the children in the orphanage are even more beautiful. With a medical team of 14 people, we have been so fortunate to have assessed 170+ kids the past 2.0 days. Just like in Ghana, the medical team is just amazing. Nurses, nursing students, Docs, PA’s and NP’s all coming together with only one goal in common-to love on these children while providing the best medical care possible for them while we are here. It has honestly been a blast working together. Some kids look great, some of the younger ones have been terribly sick, but hopefully we have been able to help in some small way. The non-medical team has also been such a blessing, jumping right in making things happen so we can see the children that are sick. Proverbs 31 8-9 has just come alive for me this past week as I have spent time with these children. As always, their stories are just breathtaking and even seem unreal, but they are. Looking forward to the rest of the week with them. Thank you for your prayers, thoughts and support!! Truly thankful!

Best,

Brad

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Update on Ghana

July 19, 2011 By 4 Comments

Ghana: Our second week in W. Africa was spent with our amazing friends and family at Touch A Life Foundation (TAL). We were part of a larger team, including an 8-person medical team, that headed south-west of Accra to a children’s home where 68 of TAL’s children are living, and where the team would come together to put on a large health fair for close to 600 kids….yes, 600 kids! It was incredible. The TAL kids are beautiful and are a testament to the hearts and hard work of the TAL team. Garret and Kelly Nichols are the TAL team leaders on the ground in Ghana, and then Rachel Johnson in the US, and they are the ones that laid all of the groundwork over many months for this health fair to happen. I always enjoy my time with all of the TAL team, but this trip was even more special. They are good people all the way around and I am convinced that their work is some of the most important work that I am involved in. They rescue, and then care for, children that have been sold into child slavery. It is so hard to believe that this still happens today, but it does. Once the children are rescued and are under the care of TAL, you can literally see lives transformed. It is beautiful. On the medical side, we were able to assess over 500 children in a week. Overall, the children looked great and the medical team made the assessments a lot of fun for the kids. I can’t speak enough about the medical team I was able to work alongside with, just incredible people with huge hearts. I have always said that this kind of work starts with relationships, and this trip proved this to be true over and over.  I am honored to be able to provide health care for the children under the care of TAL in Ghana. Obviously, this is a team effort on every level and we are already looking forward to our next trip!!

Jim-thanks for taking time away from your family to travel and work with me for 2 weeks, that time hanging out together was one of the best parts of the trip!

Also, go to http://www.touchalifekids.org/ to learn more about the life-changing work Touch A Life is doing.

Thanks for your prayers, thoughts and support for this trip, as I honestly do not know if it could have gone any better!

Best-Brad

**All photos taken by my dear friend, Nancy Borowick

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Update from Liberia

July 18, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Liberia: We spent our first week in Flehla, Liberia with my good friend John Travis and the children he cares for at Safe Home Children’s Village. He is doing an amazing job there. We were able to medically assess around 70 children as well as many adults from the community. The truth is that he is taking very good care of the children. They are well-nourished, healthy and full of life and love. There are a couple children that may need minor surgery and we are in hopes to facilitate that soon. During our time there, I was able to read through many of the children’s bios. It is hard to believe the tragedy that many of them come from. I honestly don’t feel you could come up with some of these stories if you tried because they are just so tragic. But at the end of the day, they are now safe, are healing and being loved by the team there. After knowing their history, you just continue to thank God over and over for their smiles and joy. I am just so honored to be part of the work here. On a side note: the kids LOVE soccer there and they enjoyed showing their dominance over us just like last trip. Keep John and these kids in your prayers. He is working in a tough place, but his dedication is so evident in how the kids are cared for.  The US team, Treasure In Heaven, is making a tremendous impact on a community-wide level with John. Go to www.treasureinheaven.org to learn more about what they are doing. I can’t thank you enough for your support of Global Health Innovations this summer to allow this medical work to be done!

Best-Brad

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From the Field: Kenya & Malawi

April 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The past two weeks in Kenya and Malawi were amazing for us at Global Health Innovations. Our time in Kenya working on our children’s HIV/AIDS program went better than expected thankfully. However, being that World Malaria Day was this past Monday I want to really take this time to share about our time with Pothawira (the Peter Maseko family) in Malawi.

On the last several trips we have taken there, we have concentrated heavily on malaria prevention and this trip was no different. When we arrived, Peter had already gathered information from over 10 different villages near Tonge to distribute mosquito nets while there. Before we even left the US for our trip to Malawi, I was talking with my friend Dr. Anne Alaniz, Peter’s daughter, and she was telling me how bad malaria was right now in that region. One of the hospitals had even brought on another missionary physician just to handle the children that were coming in with malaria.

The reality of this is so evident every time we visit. A disease that is preventable and 100% treatable when caught early unfortunately and needlessly kills way too many children there every day…and to be honest and as I frank as I can be, we are just not ok with this. Anne, Peter, Emma and their family have provided an amazing avenue to change all of this and we are so blessed to be able to partner with them on the ground. By our last day there, we had visited Tonge village together and were able to distribute hundreds of nets. Not only did we get to distribute nets to new villages there, but were also able to visit people in their homes where we had distributed nets a couple of months ago. The exciting part of it was that all of the people we visited had mosquito nets up in their homes that GHI and the Maseko family had distributed on previous trips. This is so encouraging to witness and you all have been a huge part of this! I want to thank you so much!

We are thankful for your partnership with us. This allows us to partner with people like the Maseko family, who are on the ground every day making a difference in the lives of people in their community. A difference that is transforming and saving lives. I am truly honored to partner with both them and you! Please keep this work in your thoughts and prayers this week as the world focuses on how to end malaria!

Best,

Brad

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