Our First Full Day

Today we met with staff at main World Vision office in Bamako.  Truly an amazing people and very welcoming:  Noticed some pictures we had sent to them previouly hanging on bulletin board.  We were shown the mail room where packages and letters arrive for sponsor children.  It is truly understandable now as to why they prefer letters and  small flat envelopes - they, must pay extra to pick up larger packeges from post office and that can be very expensive.  From there, we traveled to the Beledougo ADP (area development project).  This ADP is made up of the villages where our sponsored children live. Here we met the director of the ADP and his staff:  We then visited the ADP Health Center.  There are over 60,000 people in the ADP and one MD staffs the health center.  Sara and Bonnie vowed to be more thankful for the excellent health care systems and working conditions in US.  The clinic lacked basic supplies, medicines, running water, sanitation, etc.  World Vision continues to work with the clinic to help with nutrition education, vaccinations, and malaria prevention (the number 1 killer of children there).We had opportunity to visit with clinic staff thru intepreter.  When they see a patient who is unable to pay; they often pool their own money to help with costs - doing this all with a smile! 

We are led by a wonderful World Vision employee, Jean Calvin, who has worked with World Vision for over 25 years.  He is very patient with us and answers all our questions (and there are many) with a smile.

Having some technical difficulties today so will try to post more pictures as soon as possible.