On my mission trip this year I got to meet Micaela and her daughter Anita who live up above town. When I say up I mean way up. Sigchos Ecuador is around 9000 feet elevation. I didn’t see a level spot anywhere. It seem that everywhere you go you have to walk up hill. Where I live in Tennessee the elevation is 500 feet so I breathed hard just walking there.
One of our mission team members told me of a family that could use some food. So I got my translator and started shopping. We got a huge sack full and start that way. The food weighed 50 pounds so I got a truck to carry us up there.
When we arrived Anita comes out to meet us. She has multiple sclerosis and struggles to walk. It broke my heart to watch her walk with a stick she must have found just laying around. I carried the food inside their home and her mother Micaela starts hugging me and crying. We talk a few minutes and start to leave. On the trail back to the truck with Anita following close behind I see a flower. I picked it and showed it to Anita and told her it was beautiful just like her. Needless to say I made her day.
At church that afternoon our team showed the movie The Hope. It is a very good movie by the way. We got the truck again and went and picked up Anita and her mother. They sat on the front row and I could tell that they enjoyed the movie. I had to pick Anita up in my arms to put her in the truck and prayed that my back would not go out on me. Same thing when we got her home. As I watch her walking back down the path in the dim light with her stick my heart broke again and I cried all the way back to town.
I must have a soft spot in my heart for girls and especially for the ones that suffer. I told my wife about her and she said I needed to get her a nice walker. So I am and will sent it with the next team going this summer. I’m hoping it will make life in Ecuador a little easier for her.
alight
