Dear Family and Friends,
As you can see, our newsletter has a new
look. We have made it even easier
contribute to our ministry. To make a onetime
donation or set up a monthly contribution, simply click on the “donate” button to the right and follow the
instructions. It can’t get much easier! We also want thank all of our long-time
prayer partners and contributors. We
would not be in Bolivia working in these ministries without your partnership
and support. Thanks! Equally, if your are tired of hearing from
us, just click on the link at the bottom of the email to opt out of our monthly
newsletter. If you would like further
information or would like to see pictures and videos of our work, there are
also buttons linking you to our blogs and websites.
Several weeks ago we hosted a mission team
from our home church, Crossroads Christian Church, in Lexington, Kentucky. Six men and three women came to help out with
our ministries here in Santa Cruz. As is
always the case, we had a great week working hard and laughing together. We love to share our lives and work with
folks from back home. Let us know if you
would like to put a volunteer team together.
We will make space for you on the
calendar and put you to work.
Ruth
and Noemi Transition House for Girls
The three ladies from Crossroads worked
with Vanessa, teaching the girls in residence how to make jewellery. Three of the four girls now living in the
house are either pregnant or have babies and they need skills they can use to
earn money while they stay at home taking care of their babies. The jewellery the girls learned to make is
absolutely beautiful and should sell really well both in Bolivia and in the
North America. The Crossroads team took
some samples back with them and we hope to begin selling them soon. Let us know if you would like to sell some in
your church or community group. Part of
the profits will go toward paying for the on-going costs of the Ruth
and Noemi Transition House and part will go directly to the girls. We will also begin selling the jewellery
locally in artisan markets here in Santa Cruz.
Vanessa and her team are making good progress with the girls. Continue to remember the girls and their
babies in prayer: Juanita, Estrella (baby David), Licaria (baby Josue), and
Andreina (expecting).
Agua
Yaku – A Water Well Drilling Project
I took the men from the Crossroads team
with me out to Isosog, a new area where we are just beginning to work. Isosog is still in the department of Santa
Cruz, but in the province of Charagua near the border with Paraguay—a seven
hour drive through rough scrub brush country where there are dozens of Guarani
Indian communities along the Parapeti river.
The Parapeti is actually a dry sandy beach most of the year, but near
the river bed we are able to drill water wells relatively easily.
People living in these communities have
traditionally gotten drinking water from shallow hand dug wells, called norias in Spanish. Norias
are almost always contaminated from human and animal waste seeping into the
shallow water table. Most communities now
have at least one deep well that was drilled by the government. Some communities even have water towers and
water distribution networks. However, in
community after community people say they receive water sporadically if at all
from the distribution system because the local water coop does not have the
money to buy diesel to operate the pumps.
The majority of people walk long distances from their houses to the few
wells with hand-operated manual pumps.
Every morning and evening you can see columns of women and children
waiting in line at wells, filling their containers, and lugging the heavy
buckets and jugs back home so they can cook, wash clothes, bathe, and give
water to their animals.
Agua
Yaku uses a simple inexpensive drilling technique which
now makes it possible for each family to have their own well. With the Crossroads team we drilled two wells
in Yapiroa, a Guarani community of about 1500 people. While we were there church leaders compiled a
list of the several dozen most urgently needed wells in the community:
including schools, health posts, churches, wells centered around groups of
houses, and isolated farms. We promised
to come back as soon as we finish up a few other ongoing projects in other
areas. Before we left Yapiroa word of
our project reached the ears of other community leaders. Several leaders
visited our project site to see how we were working. We promised to expand our project and to come
drill wells in their communities as soon as possible. After a quick survey on Google Earth, we
found dozens of communities in this area that also need clean easily accessible
water. This week, we sent an Agua Yaku team back to Yapiroa and we
will—with any luck—be drilling several wells a week, but (insert plea for
financial support), we cannot continue too much longer as a project unless we receive
more donations soon. If you like the
work we are doing and have been thinking about supporting Agua Yaku, NOW IS THE
TIME! Your
donation will make a huge impact on the daily lives of these people living in
this harsh dry environment. It costs
about $500 to drill a well and install the casing, a filter, and a hand pump.
Perhaps your family, church, or small group would like to sponsor one, or
perhaps a dozen, wells in Bolivia.
Danny and Vanessa Beams
