John's Journey.

Recently our friend, Monica, visited Columbia. She came back with an amazing story and a worthwhile cause. Here is her story, in her words...

When I arrived in Colombia I did many of the things you would imagine doing on any type of similar trip...site seeing, enjoying the culture and its food and most of all...attempt to wrap my brain around the beautiful language of Espanol. Along my journey I met a young boy named John. John is a 16 year old young man who lives in the small town of Pradera, Colombia. At a first glance John looks like any other boy living in the town, however there is one thing that sets John apart from everyone else. John was born deaf. He does much of his communicating by giving a thumbs up and reading lips. The unfortunate reality is that due to the nature of a third world country, John has never received a formal education. He has a younger siblings who attend school but there are no educational programs, that his parents can afford, for him to attend. His Dad does manual labor in a sugar cane field just to support his family with the bare necessities.

A few days into my journey I met John and I could instantly tell that this boy had something extraordinary about him. His spirit alone could be felt in the silence of a room. No spoken words were necessary for me to understand the heart that this young man has to share with the world. So without any thought or reason I asked my Dad to take me to the next town over of Palmira and visit the "Instituto de Rehabilitacion para el nino sorado". This is a private school for Deaf Children. After my first visit to the school something inside of me knew that John had to go to this school. Without any more explanation that is what I decided, John will get an education with all the other kids just like him and I want to be the one to help him get the education he deserves. It all moved very quickly from there and on my last day in Colombia we took John and his mom for a visit to the school for a hearing evaluation. John had never been evaluated so his complete hearing abilities are unknown. After walking on to the campus Johns face was all I needed to see to know that this was part of Gods plan for his life. His excitement literally brought me to tears as I sat listening in two completely different languages (spanish and sign language). I did not understand the words of the conversation taking place but I just knew that I was doing the right thing.

I was hesitant in sharing this story because it was such a humbling experience for me and I did not want to share this for the wrong reasons. The reason I decided to share the story is that in order to start off Johns education correctly he will need hearing aids which are going to be around $1,000.00. I have committed to Johns monthly educational expenses as well as the initial cost of his hearing aids. I don't like to do this but I am going to ask for donations just this one time to help with the cost of Johns hearing aids. So if anyone would like to help John out please contact me. I am going to be wiring my donations to the institution directly and if you would feel more comfortable doing that rather than giving the donation directly to me please let me know. Any help will be forever appreciated.

If you can contribute to John's journey, please contact us at silly.sisters@yahoo.com and we will point you in the right direction.