Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Welfare

So, another week has passed us by... Sadly, our internet was down the whole entire weekend, so I haven’t been able to update anything! Silly providers. At first we were concerned that the ‘plug’ had been ‘pulled’, so to speak. But, we are still connected to the world for the moment.

So, I’ve been thinking. Last week, someone Devin home teaches (we’ll call him George) called Devin up and said that he needed to talk because he was having some problems. Uh oh. Lots of warning bells went off on this one, because quite frankly, usually the only reason people come to us if they have trouble is when they need a whole lot of money. It’s the old “You’re not from around here so you must be rich” ploy. So, we waited around for him to come and see what he needed and we were all ready to give him the “We can’t just give you money. We pay fast offerings so that the branch president can take care of the needs, because we can’t support the whole branch monetarily!!” So, in he came. The poor guy looked so downtrodden. I didn’t get a chance to talk to him, as I was trying to get the kids ready for bed as he and Devin chatted. Well, he didn’t necessarily ask for money. The guy has a fairly decent job (as decent as most people get here...) but his boss has been refusing to pay him! He hasn’t been paid since June, he has 3 boys, and they hadn’t eaten in 4 days! And, to make matters worse, the weekend before, he was in the market and was robbed. The person who robbed him took the food that he had bought, the money he had on him, and his ID card, which was the worst part! Here in Cameroon, if you don’t have your ID card on you, and you get stopped by the police, they will take you to jail until someone bails you out. If you are anywhere near a fight, the police round everyone up who was even nearby and check for ID’s. If you don’t have one, they automatically think that you’re here illegally, and they cart you off to jail. This poor guy, ‘George’, took a taxi home, but didn’t have money to pay for it, so they called the police and he got carted off to jail because he didn’t have his ID card! ‘George’ had already talked to the Elder’s Quorum president (who also happens to be Devin’s home teaching partner), and the EQP told him to go and be more firm with his boss so that she would pay him. When he did, she just told him that she didn’t have any money to give him, and to just leave her alone. Nice. So, Devin called the branch president for him (because, of course, he didn’t have any minutes on his cell phone to call anyone, let alone money for taxi fare to go drop by and see them...) and the president set up to visit with him and help him out the next day. I’m hoping this happened. Sometimes the branch president is a bit flaky and doesn’t show up for interviews and meetings... Anyway, Devin set the guy up with a few pineapples and some cereal and stuff to eat for the evening at least, and drove him to a taxi rendezvous (with taxi fare, of course...) and a few words of advice (like to keep paying your tithing and obey the commandments because God is always watching out for us and will help us). All through this event, though, I kept thinking of when I was the Relief Society president in Pennsylvania. I had known a little about the church’s welfare system, just because I had done some welfare work on my mission, but let me tell you that the welfare system that is set up in the US is super fantastic! Those people really don’t know what they have there! I know that the people who are the recipients of the welfare program are very grateful for it...but I can tell you right now, that they honestly don’t need it as much as the people here do. They ‘homes’ they live in, the foods they eat, the lives they lead...it’s heartbreaking!! Most countries outside the US could really use the vastness of the welfare that is set up and readily available within the continental US (I don’t know if it’s as easy to get to in Alaska and Hawaii, having never lived there). When I was in Guatemala, I know we could have used it. However, as bad and backward and sad as life was there, it’s worse here. These people have nothing. I know there’s really not much I can personally do about it except pay a generous fast offering and hope and pray that it’s used wisely, but I must admit it is frustrating. I know that Heavenly Father knows what He is doing. He cares for all of His children all over the world in the way that is best for them. I’m sure that if it’s this hard for me to watch, it must be a million times worse for Him.

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