Ana Beiba has featured quite regularly in blogs, stories, fund-raising, over the last couple of years. When I was there in April, with Lee & Katie Collier, Chris Spark, and Benjamin Osorio, Lee was equipped to shoot some good video, and an interview with Ana, unlike the last one I posted, which was really Ana Beiba shrieking with delight and amazement, and me going more and more purple as she hugged me, suffocated me, and then broke my neck…. 🙂

You’ll never be WITHOUT background noise in Cali, least of all in Alfonso Aragon Bonilla, the barrio where Ana lives, so bear with the video, it IS easy to listen to. My long-time and very dear friend, Benny Osorio, from Mexico City, translated.

With your help, in the last year, she has been able to buy a second house, though you’ll hear in the video that soon after the purchase, an earthquake (very common in Cali – well, it IS in the Andes and on a fault line…) brought down the roof: also you can see the transformation of the kitchen, with refrigerators, also (not seen) a washing machine, and a newly fitted out kitchen (Lee shows the comparison with last year).

It was amazing to be there a day after one of her ‘babies’ (she won’t call them old people) died: the first thing she did when I arrived was show me his death certificate – on a day when, impromptu as usual, an ambulance arrived, honked loudly, and ‘offloaded’ a replacement ‘new’ baby, much to Ana’s utter delight and joy. The police and hospitals just deliver people to her, unannounced, and the second house is now almost full…. You’ll hear that she has no help from the state, her only help is a handful of poor churches, and yours truly….it is SUCH a privilege to be able to serve her.

There are still countless needs, a few of which I hope to be able to meet when I go back to Cali – and her barrio in Agua Blanca (‘White Water’ – I don’t think there IS any white water in Agua Blanca!! – plenty of highly polluted, probably toxic brown water though (that would be ‘Agua Marron’, which doesn’t sound QUITE so appealing: very little about the barrio IS appealing: and it IS very dangerous). I am hoping to buy for the house a much larger stove (she does have one now, but it is small), and more refrigeration, as well as a much larger washing machine. Waiting on the Lord for some of that, though….

If you are in a position to help, then please let me know, and I’ll tell you how!

Here’s the video….

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QP-zaWbZUxI