Thursday, September 20, 2012

Humanitarian Center Tour, the 111 on Charity - Part Two


 I wrote yesterday about how we toured the warehouse at the Humanitarian center. That is on the main level. In the upstairs level, there is a huge room for people to work and put together projects and in display cases are the different ways they help and send aid to areas where there is a disaster or to impoverished areas of the world.

They have "modules" which have a variety of things in them but specific items. They have medical modules that are larger and Children modules that have clothes, shoes, toys, blankets and wall hangings. They would go to places like orphanages. 

As you can see, they have smaller items that they send such as bedding, colorful quilts etc. They tell a story of a woman who visited an orphanage in and Eastern block country and there were white walls and no color. She wrote and asked friends to make colorful wall hanging to hand so the children would have something to look at. They use bright colored fabrics with run prints for these. 


Other things they have put together are layette sets for babies. They include diapers, pins, a few outfits, hat, soap, and cloths. This came about when a volunteer missionary witnessed babies going home from the "hospital" in newspapers because the families were too poor for blankets. Groups put the kits together and then each mother gets to take one home after they are sent to the needy country.

They have lots of homemade toys, clothes and other items that are all made and donated with love. They make school kits. Chalk board, chalk, paper, pencil, colored pencils all in a draw string bag.  

Humanitarian kits that go to disaster zones include toothpaste, soap, cloth, comb, toothbrush etc. My sister went to hear about a woman that came to the area as a refuge and tells of how she received one of these kits when they had to leave their home or be killed. She ended up in a refuge camp and got a kit. She said that she and her family and friends all share that one kit and what a blessing it was in their lives. 

They also do training in farming, newborn resuscitation, water purification and provide specific medical items such as wheel chairs and other items as needed. The trainers are all volunteers as missionaries helping locals increase their knowledge for their betterment. At the end of the tour, there is a video. 

When I walked in, I joked about all the tissue boxes sitting on the chairs and said, "This must be a tear jerker movie with all these tissue boxes." Well, I used some. The stories that were shared by the actual people that were helped were so touching.  

Touring the facility renewed my resolve to continue doing service and making items to donate to help these unfortunate people and pray that I am never in need of the items myself! 

I couldn't help but smile when at the end of the tour they have a world map and some pictures with numbers of people helped last year. In 2011, there were 111 disasters! Kinda weird I thought! There are 111 black dots on this world map for all the places the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints sent relief in the year 2011. Let's hear it for the Mormons! That is a lot of relief in 49 countries!

If you want to know more, here is a link to their page explaining "Why we help." If you want to learn even more or find a way that you can help or donate, google, Humanitarian Center, and lots of sites will come up. Follow a few and you will have plenty of information! If you want to see some of the projects we have done, click here for dolls and here for hats.  

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