The first of these is the Children’s House in an extremely poor parish of Lima and the second a Medical Centre established in an outer area of the Huandoy parish, another very poor area. This title is simply translated to The Children’s Home. The place was established by an Irish Columban priest, Father Tony Coney who still oversees the management of this unbelievable complex.
In October 1996 a small house precariously perched on top of a hillside in the Cornhill area was purchased in order to establish a facility to cater for children outside school hours. In February 1997 it opened its doors to seventy children and ever since then it has continued to grow.
The basic concept is to offer the local children a safe space outside school hours with a caring atmosphere, a place where they can do their homework, play games or attend various craft workshops such as art, woodwork, sewing, dance, music and sewing. The house also has an extensive computer area for the children to enhance learning and develop their skills. You have to remember it is not a school.
The house now has a staff of approximately twenty five, it is opened from Monday to Saturday and more than four hundred children enter the building each day and over thirteen hundred each month! You can imagine the noise these young people make when they are inside the concrete building!
The normal weekday consists of secondary children in the morning and the primary children in the afternoon from 2.00 p.m. till 5.00 p.m.
As you can see it is a huge complex five storeys high, this includes the fully enclosed playing space on the actual roof. The younger children occupy the lower levels and as you go higher the ages increase. The afternoon we visited the ages would have ranged from three years of age to about twelve or thirteen.
The complex is totally funded by generous overseas benefactors while the government of Peru offers absolutely no financial support, yet everyone is more than happy to see this facility operating in their area!
The second project is a newly constructed medical centre – “Posta Médica Valle de Paraiso”, the medical clinic for paradise valley. The attached photos hardly support the claim of ‘paradise’!
The clinic is the result of the efforts of a Melbourne Diocesan priest, Father Joe Ruys, working as an associate of the Columban Fathers in Lima. It has only recently been completed in the last couple of years and it supports the people of this area, the outer fringe of the Huandoy parish. It is an extremely poor and underdeveloped area.
The clinic covers a wide range of medical and consultative services. It also provides an extensive pharmaceutical service to the people at reasonable costs.
The clinic also offers a very wide range of visiting medical practitioners throughout the week, another cost which Joe has to bear.
When you enter the front entrance you are immediately impressed by a meeting area which may also be used as a chapel on a number of weekends during the year.
During the construction of the clinic Joe continually stressed the need for a garden area in the centre of the complex. As you can see the stark contrast between the outside and the inside! The importance of lawn, flowers and the small fountain cannot be overstated when talking of the local people’s welfare; it acts like an oasis in the desert and must lift the spirits of the local people when they visit the clinic.
A brief reminder of the surrounding area.
Finally, it is worth noting that there is no water piped to this area, all water is purchased from the local water trucks.
Both these ‘projects’ serve valuable needs in their respective areas and the people involved in each do magnificent work and deserve all the support they can get.
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