Dear Friends,
Visit to Romania 4th – 11th October 2018.
The lead up to our visit to Romania wasn’t the easiest with Kath having had a benign cyst removed from the front of her neck 2 weeks previously, and for some reason, we had some uncertainty about the trip, but despite the huge emotions, to say the trip was amazing is an understatement! We, David, Kath & Mandy Pateman arrived in Barlad early Friday afternoon and went to see Oana & Mum Maria first. Oana had some issues to share with us that had been concerning her but all was soon sorted and our time together was a good time. Their lives are still very difficult but it was good to see Oana had put some weight on and looks really well, as she has suffered from anorexia nervosa. We did manage to see her once more and she gave us a lovely hand made bracelet each in the Romanian colours, something to treasure! She is making more for us to sell at our coffee morning. We arrived at Claudiu & Ada’s to a warm welcome and we all started chatting about the 4 guys from Northern Ireland who were by now on the road to Romania and expected to arrive on Sunday morning. We weren’t long before we were sorting out beautiful hand made jumpers, gifts and sweets and off we went to visit our families. We went shopping first for food for the 3 families we would visit and the first family we visited was the Munteanu family who we had never met before. Mirela and her 5 children had recently moved into a ‘new to them’ home which a local priest had found which was very basic, but much better than the one roomed home they had just left. There was no running water so buckets of water were being carried from the neighbours house, hopefully the water situation will be sorted soon. Everyone was very excited to see us and loved their gifts, especially the sweets, a rare treat from them! We then went off to see the Rosca family, Tiberiu & Sebastian were very excited and again, the sweets were quickly scooped up and off they went into their room to tuck in! Mum & Dad had huge smiles, they looked better than they had done the last visit and this was mainly because they have stopped drinking, praise God! The whole family seemed happier but Dad explained to us that a drunken man had entered his land and beat him up a few weeks ago so there was a police enquiry going on, it’s never easy for them! Dad again dashed off into the house and brought out a photo of Kath & Oana that Kath had sent Oana when she was ill in hospital, he’s obviously very proud of it! We spent time chatting and realised that they weren’t looking forward to the winter months because they have no electricity in their home so when it gets dark, which is very early in winter, they have to go to bed. We discussed with Claudiu what we could do and we have decided to try and buy some solar panels for them which will at least give them lights and maybe we could buy a small TV for them, we can only imagine the excitement and joy this would bring! The cost of this would be around £500-£600, we will do our best and Claudiu would happily fit it. It was good to hear that Tiberiu was still attending school and we have committed to paying the £7 a week bus fare so he doesn’t need to walk the 4 miles to and from school over the winter months. Our next stop was the Micu family. We have never met this family before and the family consists of Grandma, Lidia, 74, Grandad 84 and 10 of their 45 grandchildren! The children are aged 2 – 15 years and to say life is hard, well, its ‘foarte greu’ which means very hard! There was huge excitement from the children and many tears from Lidia. David and I have 10 grandchildren, 6-26 years old but could not even think about looking after all of them even in our good living conditions. There were around 40 jars of pickled fruit and vegetables all ready for them to eat over the winter and Lidia was preparing more while we were there. Her kitchen is extremely basic and she said she felt ashamed showing us. What a wonderful inspirational lady she is! It was hard leaving them but all being well, we would bring the Irish guys for a visit. We also managed to see Milena, Stela’s aunt, uncle and baby Andrei, Madalina, Vlad, Stefania & Rebeca, Ruben, Alex P, Alex U, Stefan, Cristian, Mara & Bianca. We also visited Dana, Andreea & Beatrice and then Oana Rosca and her boyfriend Florin. Dana struggles but she was happy to receive our help. Oana looked really well and very happy, Florin seemed a nice young man and Kath took the opportunity to ask him to take good care of Oana or he would have her to answer to her, everyone laughed but they seemed genuinely happy together, Oana certainly deserves happiness and has recovered fully after having tuberculosis meningitis. Northern Ireland guys: Sunday morning arrived and around 11am, Geoff, Mark, Paul & Chris arrived safely, they were very tired but thrilled to be at the end of their 2,300 mile journey. We were sorry that Gary, the 5th member of the team couldn’t be with us but want to thank him for all his efforts with the fund raising. The guys travelled over in a Volkswagen Sharan because they couldn’t get insurance for a minibus, we felt disappointed, but we were to find out why this didn’t happen, you will read about it later in this newsletter! The Sharan was donated to GNfR but there is an issue in that the Romanian government are in the process of passing a law that right hand drive vehicles will not be able to be registered in Romania so its been decided that the best option is for the Sharan to be broken for spares to raise funds for GNfR. This will help towards running our minibus. They also presented us with a wonderful donation which will help the families hugely. Their time was short as they were catching the 4pm train to Bucharest, flying back to Northern Ireland on the Monday and back to work on the Tuesday – amazing!! So, after a short rest, off we went to visit Lidia and the children. The children we delighted to receive goodies from Barlad the guys and cuddled the toys they were given. Patric, 3 years old loved the Tigger soft toy and wouldn’t put it down, very moving for everyone to see. Again, there were lots of tears from Lidia, she was truly humbled by everyone’s love towards her and said she didn’t feel worthy of the help. All the guys were so moved by their experience in Barlad, that they are hoping to continue to help Lidia which is wonderful! We also managed to spend time with Andrei Dinca in Bucharest. Andrei is studying to be a Dr and needed some financial help last year, he is doing extremely well in his studies and has now found out that he has funding for the rest of this academic year because of his high grades, well done Andrei, a really lovely young man. New contacts: About 6 weeks before going to Barlad, Kath was contacted by Laura from Arizona USA who had found Kath on the internet. Laura had been doing charity work in Barlad for around 20 years and we soon realised that we both knew Oana Zanet. She quickly put us in touch with David Conway who lives in Southend and is involved in the same charity and the connection was a positive one and definitely ‘meant to be.’ We were all surprised to realise that we had all been going to Barlad for so long and yet we had never met. We have only ever been to Romania once in October and that was in 1990 and yet this year, we were going in October, the dates dictated by the Irish group and guess what? David C and the team were there at exactly the same time! We were able to visit the apartment where David, his daughter Alina, Laura & Lauren were busy working to make it into a day centre for disabled children to attend for teaching, physiotherapy etc and were delighted to hear about all the great things they are involved in. We spent time together at Claudiu’s house chatting, exchanging stories and then we found out that it may be possible for Claudiu & Ada to use the apartment for Church/Sunday school for the children…how good is that! We did hire an apartment for a while for Church but it was too costly, Now everyone meets in C & A’s home which is rather a squash, so being able to use this apartment will be such a blessing! We then had what we have called another ‘God coincidence.’ We said our goodbyes to David C and the team, not knowing when we would see each other again. Our time in Barlad came to an end and as we wanted to meet Andrei, we were having a few days in Bucharest before flying home. We knew David & Alina were flying home on the Tuesday so Kath messaged to wish them a good flight home and said we were just going for a walk. David C replied saying that they were just discussing having a walk before the flight so, as the park was close to the airport, we were able to meet again. This again was meant to be as the 2 David’s spent time chatting. David C started asking David about the minibus, why did it not come, why did they need another etc so David explained. David C then said that the charities he was involved with in Barlad had TWO MINIBUSES so he could see no reason why Claudiu couldn’t borrow them for camp….THIS IS WHY THE MINIBUS DIDN’T COME FROM NORTHERN IRELAND! Our ‘God coincidences’ as we call them are what we don’t know. We make plans, they don’t happen and then we realise that God has already planned something much better. Its very difficult to put into few words how good everything was on the visit, yes, there were many challenges, high emotions of seeing such great poverty and depravation but being able to bring such joy to those we met was wonderful. The encouragement that the NI guys gave us was fabulous and will never be forgotten. Thank you all so much for your love, support and encouragement, it means so much to us. We know we have said this before but we really couldn’t do any of this without you, you do make a difference! THANK YOU!
For anyone in the Newport Pagnell area, your contact is Mandy Pateman. [email protected] Tel: 01908218679 Mandy & Sue will be having a stall at the NP light switch on which is November 24th, 10-6. She needs cuddly toys, children’s toys & books and small items. Please do get in touch with her if you can help with any of the above but do go along!
Much love and sincere thanks to you all.
David, Kath & Mandy xxxx