Dear Friends,
As most of you know well, I have been living and working in Honduras, Central America, for nearly four years. I work for Foundation Proniño, Honduras, a rehabilitation and rescue center for the many homeless children of Honduras. I just want to borrow a moment of your time to tell you about this small yet amazing foundation doing such great work.
I found myself in Proniño quite by accident. Looking for a place to volunteer for a 6 month stint before going backpacking until my money ran out. That was nearly 4 years ago this September. What happened? This foundation, the children it cares for, and the Proniño family as a whole, took a hold of me. My life has forever changed, and I have never once looked back.
As a volunteer with Proniño I received a quick educational crash course in working in a third-world country for grass-roots foundation. The days were long, hot, and sometimes unbearable. At least 3 times I stormed out of the center refusing to come back. Well, obviously, I came back. I even went as far as to apply at other foundations in hopes of finding an easier "ride" until my 6 months were up. Nothing noble kept me in the foundation, more than anything I just couldn't face the embarrassment of telling my friends and family that I was going to cut and run. So I stayed, telling myself "just make it 6 months, and you can bail." Six months is now 46 and counting. Still loving every minute of it.
Why Proniño? While obviously a bit biased towards a foundation I have worked with for so long, I promise you this foundation is magic. It truly does what it says, it literally takes discarded children off the streets and puts them in a better life. I have seen it. I have done it. I have witnessed the transformation. There is nothing like it, nothing I can even compare it to. To take a child left to fend for themselves at the age of ten on the streets, and then recuperate that same child, rehabilitate that child, and then see that same child you saw filthy, skinny, alone and scared on the street with a smile on their face in a school uniform, is just magic. I feel blessed just to witness the transformation, let alone take part.
The first time you see homeless children, it really knocks you. It just doesn't compute, make sense, seem like it should be allowed, doesn't fit into your reality at least when you grow up in a developed nation. Its like a punch in the stomach to witness. You can read about it but you just can't imagine how devastating it is in real life. To be part of something, Proniño, that is correcting this problem one child at a time is encouraging. I am not sure if I could stomach living here and see that sort of human devastation without knowing there was some way to help, some way to stop it, some way to make it make sense. Proniño makes it make sense to me, and for the nearly 90 children living in our custody, I can attest it makes sense to them now too.
Can I make it make sense to you too? Proniño is the best shot, really the only shot, these children have. Proniño has to exist now, there is no going back. One simply cannot take on this type of work and not follow it through. This foundation, I know. This foundation I believe in. This foundation, I promise you, works about 90 little miracles every day. We desperately need you to join our family and let us keep on making miracles. Keep on saving lives. Keep on righting the wrongs for these innocent victims of a society that just doesn’t make much sense here all that often. Now more than ever the children of Proniño need your help. There are 90 smiling faces that have no idea how much we must work each month just to keep them fed, clothes, educated, and moving forward to a just and dignified life.
Help us keep Proniño moving forward and remain that sole beacon of light, a tried and true hope for so many children who so desperately need it... To ten more years and beyond for Proniño!
A Sincere Thank You,
Kevin Cestra