Project Name: Casa Hogar Manos Unidas
Site Visit: Oct 8 and 9, 2009
Project Director: Eric Alexander Lappe Diaz
Number of Children now: 28, max 40
Location: Suburb of Cuidad Obregon called Esperanza
I arrived at the Obregon Airport the evening of Oct 7th, one day after my wife's birthday. Eric and Daniel arrived to pick me up about 7:00 PM and drove me to the Yori Hotel. The next day a missionary named Terry Lingel (International Gospel Ministries) came from Hermosillo with Pastor Daryl Butler to spend the next 2 days talking with Eric about a new partnership. I finally arrived at the Casa Hogar Manos Unid
as (United Hands Home) at 11:45 AM on Oct 8th.
Terry, Daryl and I were greeted by Eric and Adriana (Eric's wife). They gave us a tour of the facility. The orphanage is a series of typical one story Mexican housing structures made from bricks, cement and concrete. The houses have been purchased over time - walls have since been removed or erected to make for a better place for the children. The primary living areas include a large common area for dining or entertaining; a large kitchen with professional style stove, oven, two refrigerators, washing area and large prep area. Currently all of the girls sleep in one room and all of the boys sleep in another room. Just recently, Eric made two new separate rooms for his biological boys and girls to protect them. Eric and Adriana also live in the house and have a separate bedroom and bathroom.
Site Visit: Oct 8 and 9, 2009
Project Director: Eric Alexander Lappe Diaz
Number of Children now: 28, max 40
Location: Suburb of Cuidad Obregon called Esperanza
I arrived at the Obregon Airport the evening of Oct 7th, one day after my wife's birthday. Eric and Daniel arrived to pick me up about 7:00 PM and drove me to the Yori Hotel. The next day a missionary named Terry Lingel (International Gospel Ministries) came from Hermosillo with Pastor Daryl Butler to spend the next 2 days talking with Eric about a new partnership. I finally arrived at the Casa Hogar Manos Unid
as (United Hands Home) at 11:45 AM on Oct 8th.Terry, Daryl and I were greeted by Eric and Adriana (Eric's wife). They gave us a tour of the facility. The orphanage is a series of typical one story Mexican housing structures made from bricks, cement and concrete. The houses have been purchased over time - walls have since been removed or erected to make for a better place for the children. The primary living areas include a large common area for dining or entertaining; a large kitchen with professional style stove, oven, two refrigerators, washing area and large prep area. Currently all of the girls sleep in one room and all of the boys sleep in another room. Just recently, Eric made two new separate rooms for his biological boys and girls to protect them. Eric and Adriana also live in the house and have a separate bedroom and bathroom.
The property also has 3 large school rooms to teaches three groups of children: Pre-kindergarten in one room; 1 and 2 in another room; and 3, 4, 5 and 6 in another room. The property also has an office, bakery (under construction), computer room with 4 computers and printer, and large food/clothes storage area. In addition to these spaces, Eric has recently acquired a small broken down house built into the side of their orphanage. Along with this space, he has purchased more adjacent property that is currently used for storage, workshop and a "grocery" store that is no longer operational. To my understanding, the orphanage owns all of these properties. He still owes 80,000 peso ($6,153) for the "grocery" store property. All of the other spaces are free and clear. (Special note: The orphanage has several acres of land in the region. These are available for farming, etc)
Currently they are caring for 28 children, 10 boys and 18 girls. The youngest is 3 years old and oldest is 16 years old. All of the children attend school at the orphanage up to 6th grade and then go to the public school (I am assuming). They have a regular daily schedule of chores, eating, going to school and playing. All of the children go to church on the weekend and they receive some Bible training using Spanish study guides. I didn't have time to drill into the educational materials or visit the public schools. We also did not have time to explore alternative concepts to the K-6 schooling vs public school.
Eric employs 9 people including himself. He and Adriana do not take a salary, they just live in the orphanage and have their primary needs met that way.
I was told that the children in the orphanage and in the greater community are healthy with no major diseases like TB, AIDS, etc. For immediate care, the children are taken to the local hospital about 5 kilometers away.
Through our conversations, Eric shared many ideas about small businesses to make money to help support the orphanage. Some ideas include a bakery, grocery and farm project.
On Friday, Terry, Daryl, Eric, Adriana and myself spent a few hours reviewing the sponsorship concept and what kind of expectations we all might have together. We poured through the example VisionTrust Partnership Agreement. This was a very good discussion that allowed all of us to talk about spiritual mentoring, education, health, long-term goals for the children, finances, budgets, etc.
Overall, my impression was that we have a good possibility of working together. I have a few concerns that still need to be resolved. I left Eric with a request to pray with his wife and then tell us later if they want a sponsorship program and if they want to work with us. I also told Eric that I would be reporting back to Calvary Church and that we all would be praying too. Then in a 3-4 weeks, we should all make a decision on what to do next.
SEPARATE IDEA:
I did explore other ideas with Terry about partnering with Pastor Pedro in Hermosillo - using the church there as a VisionTrust Learning Center that provides spiritual mentoring, educational support and health care to some of the poorest children in the area, along with having the children in the orphanage attend. All of these children could be in a sponsorship program for example. The Christian community could be expanded as well by starting a Learning Center near the dump area instead of a proposed feeding program. This center would run like the one just proposed, but instead of the location first being a church, this location starts as a "center" and over time could become a church.
I did explore other ideas with Terry about partnering with Pastor Pedro in Hermosillo - using the church there as a VisionTrust Learning Center that provides spiritual mentoring, educational support and health care to some of the poorest children in the area, along with having the children in the orphanage attend. All of these children could be in a sponsorship program for example. The Christian community could be expanded as well by starting a Learning Center near the dump area instead of a proposed feeding program. This center would run like the one just proposed, but instead of the location first being a church, this location starts as a "center" and over time could become a church.
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