By Chrissy, child sponsor
I have sponsored Asya for over 13 years. It’s been amazing to see her grow, not only physically, but also in regards to her schooling and learning.
When I first started to organise this visit to finally meet Asya, my son Kai and I were very excited. The planning was intense because of the remoteness of Asya’s community and the location of the World Vision office.
When we arrived, both of us were overwhelmed. We knew we were in for an adventure of a lifetime, but also an experience that we will both remember for the rest of our lives. You can’t put a price on sitting in a World Vision car getting taken to a hotel that we couldn’t even find on the internet. We were seriously in the middle of nowhere but felt like celebrities as everyone knew why we were there. Induction happened that afternoon with all the World Vision staff, who were nothing short of amazing, welcoming and beautiful people.
The evening before the visit was exciting and emotional and reality definitely set in that tomorrow I would be doing something I’d been wanting to do for many years.
We were picked up by World Vision the next day and went to Asya’s school where we were met with lots of smiling, happy children and adults. Two lines of children sang to us a welcoming song and Asya stood in the middle. Tears rolled down my face as this precious girl walked towards us. It was so surreal and the impact of this still brings tears to my eyes today as I write this. We have always maintained communication with Asya – but this was something special. My son and Asya walked hand in hand back to the car after the ceremony finished.
Next we were taken into her school, and we were told about the work that World Vision has done and will continue to do. The community now have water they can access straight away – before World Vision started working in this area, some people had to walk two to five kilometres just to get drinking water. Toilets were also built in the school, and the children were learning English.