20th/50th Anniversary Peace Corps
Romania Celebration Build
From May 30th – June 5th, 2011, the Volunteers of Peace Corps Romania have decided to celebrate the invaluable development work that Peace Corps has been doing for 20 years in Romania, and 50 years world wide, by blitz building a home for the Petrus Family.
Pictures from the event here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/pcbuild11a
http://picasaweb.google.com/pcbuild11b
http://picasaweb.google.com/pcbuild11c
Alongside the build, volunteers will also plan and participate in local community development projects that demonstrate the work that volunteers do day-to-day.
We kindly ask that you help us celebrate our service by supporting our Anniversary project. You, your family and friends, and your local HFH affiliate can ensure that Marcel, Alina, Alin and Claudiu Pertus won’t spend another freezing winter fighting rats and mold, and will help show the power of friendship and partnership that Peace Corps stives to encourage throughout the world.
For more information about the event or how you can support Peace Corps Volunteers in celebrating their service, please contact Chris Fontanesi at chris.fontanesi[at]habitat.ro
If you want to join Peace Corps Volunteers in changing a family’s life while enjoying the renowned Romanian hospitality, sign-up with Habitat for Humanity’s International volunteer program, Global Village.
Everybody is welcomed!
Petrus family story
A father’s poor health keeps a family mired poverty
Without warning, one day Marcel Petrus had a brain aneurism that left him partially paralyzed on the right side of his body. While this would be a challenge for any family, Marcel’s family was about to hit dire times. He found himself out of work and unable to even seek employment, as he was forced by the hospital to take permanent medical leave. That left his wife, Alina, to support their two young boys, Alin and Claudiu, who are just 13 and 7 years old.
Unfortunately for them all, Beius is a small town without many job opportunities for young, unskilled workers, so she’s had to make do with seasonal work.
To make matters worse, they were permanently stuck in the horrible conditions that Marcel’s condition found them in. Living in an old, communist bloc of apartments originally intended for single people without families, their home is a meager 240 ft 2(1/10th the size of the average home in the US), consisting of a small room where the entire family sleeps, studies and lives their lives. Flanked by a decrepit bathroom and a tiny kitchen, their home is falling apart around them.
“When we first moved in, everything was broken. When we’d light a fire for heat, smoke would fill up the room. Mold is everywhere. Every time it rains the walls become damp. Because we live on the ground floor, when it freezes outside and the floor gets cold, the walls condense from the moisture. I have to replace them constantly, but it’s no use. What the mold doesn’t get, the rats do. Until I moved in here, I had never heard of rats gnawing through concrete.”
They can’t even rely on their neighbors for a bit of decency, as they will steal the wood they use to keep warm in winter. Everything must be crammed inside their tiny home. It’s amazing that their family has held togetherthrough such trying times
Alin, who is in middle school, is looking forward to having a room that he and his friends can play in. There’s simply no space for more people in their home, especially if Claudiu needs to study.
“It’s for them we want the home so bad. If it was just ourselves here, we wouldn’t ask for anyone’s help. But they can’t keep living in conditions like this. I want them to be someone someday, to become something important.”
“When I first heard of Habitat, I knew that they were good people from the beginning. They had helped out the families from Mizies, so we applied too. They only thing we didn’t lose was hope. God has helped us to manage, to stay together, and to keep hoping for a better life.”
More details you can find on the event blog at: celebratepcro.wordpress.com
Visit our Facebook page to find pictures, quotes and meet the other people that support the event.
