Hot News

Read all about it! Our latest newsletter (spring 2010) is hot off the press. Read it here

Urgent Delivery Needed

Delivery room - Canitoan Village Health Centre

We are back in the Philippines to catch up with some of the projects that we are already involved in and to meet with new people to discuss whether we may be able to help them.

Today saw us visiting the village health centre in the Barangay of Canitoan - just a couple of miles outside of Cagayan De Oro City - which serves a growing local population, currently of about 15,000 people with bassic maternity care, dentistry, family planning advice and an immunization program. The local church pastor explained that many of the residents are subsistence farmers who struggle to make ends meet and for whom it is difficult to afford proper medical services.

The midwife proudly showed us two little rooms that she uses and where she has now started to do deliveries instead of sending expectant mothers to one of the large hospitals or private "birthing homes" in the city centre.

In the larger outer room stood a simple wooden slat bed with a foam mattress where women who are in labour can wait. In the tiny inner cubicle, measuring about 7 feet by 5 feet, is a single delivery bed (with it's cloths stained with dried blood) and a couple of old wooden tables with plastic table cloths and a small collection of instruments in a two bowls, plus a bucket on the floor and an angle poise lamp. On the wall a hand drawn chart gives a guide to cervix dilation sizes so that the midwife can gauge the progress of the delivery.

We asked the midwife what happened if two women were in labour at the same time? "We would make a space on the floor for the other one!", she said simply. I was unsure exactly where the space could be made, except in the outer room!

Outside in the office, on a table, lay the only sphygmomanometer (blood pressure meter) for use by 13 health workers. Unfortunately it was broken and they have no money to replace it.

We urgently need to get a couple of midwifery delivery kits into this centre and, in the longer term, we talked with the Barangay councillors and the midwife about the possibility of providing more medical equipment. The acting head of the council (now in his early seventies) explained that in 1998 they had a five year plan to establish a "mini-hospital" for the village but 12 years on they still had not been able to fulfill that dream.

Our desire for 2010, with help from Aid To Hospitals Worldwide, is to ship a 40 foot container of medical aid to this area, and it seems that this little clinic at Canitoan would be an ideal recipient for some of that aid. Who would like to help us make an old man's dream come true?

Radio Gaga Replay

I really enjoyed my time on Lesley Dolphin's show on BBC Radio Suffolk. I know that a number of our supporters were able to listen in but for those who missed it here is an edited version of the interview.

Radio Gaga

I have been invited to be a guest on the Lesley Dolphin show on BBC Radio Suffolk this coming Thursday at 3.00pm to talk about the work of the charity.

If you are not in the station's reception area you can listen to the program via the Internet here http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/suffolk/hi/ they also have a 'listen again' button if you miss the live broadcast.

What A Year That Was

What an incredible year 2009 turned out to be for us!

Finalising our annual accounts we see income up by 69% in the midst of the worst recession the UK has seen in almost 20 years . And grants made are up by a massive 91% - largely as a result of our response to teh fire in the Puntod Community back in July.

All we can say is a massive thank you to our very generous friends and supporters who have risen to the challenges we have faced in trying to show God's love to those in need.

However we still have a long way to go to realise our goal of completing the construction of the House of Joshua. At the present time we have just over £9000 against an estimated total cost of £65000. So we need an even more amazing year in 2010.
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Autumn Newsletter

Our Autumn Newsletter has just been published and is full of exciting news, photos and information.

You can read it here on Google Documents - Autumn 2009 Newsletter

You can also read our earlier newsletters here too:-

Spring 2009 Newsletter

Autumn 2008 Newsletter

Spring 2008 Newsletter

Christmas Is Coming

Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat,

Please put some pennies in the fund-raisers hat!

Yes it's that time of year again; when many of us go a bit mad rushing around spending money to celebrate the Saviour's birth by buying loads of food, presents and other stuff to share with those we love. It is also a time when many of us like to give a thought to those less fortunate than ourselves.

Well why not make it a bit easier for yourself this year and do as much of the Christmas shopping as you can from the comfort of your own computer - on-line!

And, what's more you can put some money in the hat for your favourite charity whilst doing so. Easy Fundraising is a shopping portal that gives 50% of it's revenue to the charities that you choose - including this one of course!

They now have over 2000 top name retailers available ranging from Marks & Spencer to Thorntons, Fat Face, LA Fitness, Argos and many, many more, as well as banks, insurance companies, internet services and so on. The list just goes on and on. And every single one of these companies pays a commission on you on-line purchases. It costs you nothing but makes a huge difference to us.

Just this Saturday I received this quarters cheque from Easy Fundraising for £67.72. That may not seem much to you but to our House of Joshua appeal that means around 700 bricks for the building.

So what are you waiting for? Just get a-clicking! Click right here (or on the advert banner at the top of this page) and you'll be right there!

Of course you don't have to stop at just buying presents on-line to raise money for us. Maybe the people you love already have everything they need and beyond? So, instead of cluttering their home up with even more stuff why not give them an 'alternative' Christmas gift? Make a direct donation to our House of Joshua fund on their behalf. There is a donate button on our website (as well as on this blog)

And if you can't find the perfect gift that you are looking for through Easy Fundraising then why not look for it through the Easy Search search engine - at least that way we'll pick up a few pennies for the searches that you do.

Do You E-Bay?

Now you can support us when you sell things on E-Bay.

When you are listing an item for sale on E-Bay you have the option of donating all or part of the proceeds to a charity of your choice. Now that we have registered with E-Bay's charity partner, Missionfish, you can choose to support the Conroy Rendon Charitable Trust.

Click here to find out more.

P.S. A big thank you to "Tita Dolly" who put us on to this and has already chosen to support us in this way with her E-Bay listings.

Another Shipment On Its Way

Just some of the tools shipped today

It's been several months in the preparing, the collecting, the boxing and labelling but at last we've done it. We have emptied our garage and dispatched another shipment of tools (mechanics, plumbers, electricians and carpenters tools) gardening implements, sewing machines and computers, plus a few sets of children's clothing for good measure (as well as padding around the computers).

The bulk of these (22 boxes weighing in at over half a ton) are bound for the 'Open Eyes Mission' in Cagayan De Oro City where they will be used to set up a workers co-operative in a poor community. Two other boxes are bound for other organisations that we partner with in the same area.

Once again a huge vote of thanks to Tools With A Mission and Aid to Hospitals Worldwide, plus several individual contributors, for supplying the goods and to Gary and Evelyn at Tagalog Balikbayan Services for arranging the shipping on our behalf. We simply couldn't do this without your help.

All being well the consignment should arrive at its destination in early December. In the meantime we have more orders to process so, in a week or two, we will start all over again. Oh well, it was nice having a bit of space in the garage for a day or two!

Manila Typhoon Aid

Over the past week I've had one or two people asking if they can route donations to help the victims of Typhoon Ketsana in Manila through our charity.

Our focus is on long term sustainable projects, primarily around the city of Cagayan De Oro in Mindanao (which is in the south of the country) and we only work through local mission partners to ensure that all the aid we provide makes it through to the intended beneficiaries.

We don't have any suitable contacts in the Manila area however one of our friends, who is a church pastor in Cagayan De Oro, has recommended Operation Blessing Philippines a Philippines based charity distributing aid to disaster victims. You can make a donation by credit card on their website http://www.obphil.com/

Alternatively, if you prefer to make a donation through a UK based charity, you can do so via the Disasters Emergency Committee, an umbrella organisation for 13 major UK disaster relief charities,who have launched a special appeal for the victims of the typhoons in the Philippines and Vietnam as well as the earthquake in Sumatra and the Tsunami in Samoa. However any donations you make through this route will go to all these regions rather than just the Philippines.

Update Sunday 11th october :- since writing the above there have been more tropical storms causing floods and landslides in numerous places including Dagupan City in Pangasinan (Northern Luzon) and Bagguio.