The Color Purple Event - Thursday, October 11, 2012

For two weeks after the Color Purple Event, we were waited for our final results of donations and for the pictures.  About that time, our beloved dog and friend of 11 years became ill.  We were caring for him finally having to lay him to rest.  We are sorry for the delay in our reporting and thank you for your patience.
 

Our event did indeed, finally took place at Villa San Carlos - Thursday, October 11 beginning at 7:00 p.m.  This was the 2nd annual Color Purple to benefit the children with cancer at SOLCA here in Cuenca, Ecuador.
 

Our theme was and is the color purple.  Those who attended last year and this year have now understood the color purple is brilliant, beautiful, and bright representing what we all need:  Hope - Esperanza!

 

  The evening began with our "purple" friends trickling in one by one, two by two. As each one entered the door, each one was greeted by our American and Ecuadorian friends, Bobby & Terri Hager, and Dayana and Marcela Reyes.  The ladies were greeted with a lovely rose.

 

 

The first half hour was a time of saying "hellos," and striking up conversations with everyone.  As each one found their seat for the evening, we began the evening with door prizes!  Dinner then began to be served.  Villa San Carlos once again proved their culinary skills with a delightful meal which everyone said they enjoyed immensely.

 

 

When the room was finally filled, our emcees for the evening Alvaro Arnijos and Elisa Munoz graciously greeted everyone both in Spanish and English.  They gave the quick review of what was to take place for the evening, introducing our event's guest speaker, Dr. Raul Alvarado,
Director of SOLCA.
 

 

Sue shared her song, "You Have Friends," right before Dr. Alvarado's comments.  And afterwards, Gary shared about how his sister at age 16 contracted a rare stomach cancer.  Though Gary was only 11 years old, he was able to find comfort from God regarding his sister's untimely death and departure from this world.  He asked how many in the room had either been affected by cancer or knew of a friend and/or family member who had cancer.  Nearly every person raised their hand.
 

After Gary shared, a band of doctors from SOLCA hospital gave us a superb musical performance.  Everyone seemed to enjoy their presentation.  During their presentation, Sue & Elisa gave out the remainder of roses that had been donated for the evening to a number of ladies.  As you will see from the pictures, there were some great surprised faces!
 

 

 

 The finally tally of donation to SOLCA is $1507.25 plus $300 in food we were able to donate to the families of patients in SOLCA.  We were informed that the hospital was full and there a number of families in the Emaus home who needed to be fed.  Our total donation then was $1807.25.
 

We are so grateful to everyone who gave of their time, resources, gifts, and talents to this year's 2nd annual event.  Every penny given was given to SOLCA with the exception of a small printing charge of $48.29.  So many businesses were generous with their gifts of door prizes, flowers, and chocolates.

Thanks to everyone for the 2nd Annual Color Purple Event
.

Photos have been provided by Stephanie and Sebastian Carrion.
 

 

Sue & Gary
Elisa Munoz
and our friends

SOLCA Birthday Party

October 5, 2012 Elisa (our co-chairman) and I had the privilege of attending a "Quince Anos" birthday party held for those young ladies and young men who were turning 15.  Ecuador's "Quince Anos" is equivalent to the American "Sweet Sixteen."  These are young people who are currently in treatment or have been treated for cancer in the past. 

It was quite a party.  As you will see from the pictures below, first there was an empty room, then began filling up family by family, person by person until it was full!  Balloons, colors, festive atmostphere was everywhere.  The guests of honor were upstairs getting dressed into formal attire - almost like it was a prom!

Before they walked down the stairs with escorts to take their reserved seating, the lady voluteers of SOLCA all sang a song.  Elisa interpreted for me of what they singing.  It was a song giving praise to God, thanking for His love, and that He is the One who heals.

A prayer was offered by one of the volunteers and with that, the procession began.  Beautiful young people in their processional with smiles of joy as the crowd admired and cheered them on!

Then here they come...down the stairs with escorts and led to their honored seats.  A festive clown was the emcee of the birthday fare.

Once into the hall filled with people, balloons and the smell of popcorn, they were given a welcome and birthday cheer.  A ceremony proceeded, almost like a wedding!  They toasted their 15th birthday with juice in a goblet and asked to dance the birthday waltz. 

The most touching part of their ceremony was when they asked each young person by name, to come forward with their partner or family member.  At that time they announced whom they had chosen as one who has especially been helpful or special to them during their treatment.  Sometimes it was a family member and sometimes it was a nurse or volunteer.  A garter was placed on their leg (just like in a wedding) to represent that special bond.

As you will see from the pictures below, it was a festive day for not only those turning 15, but for everyone who attended.  All were invited - even the younger children in SOLCA currently receiving chemo treatment.  They were brought into the hall were the IVs and a nurse to see that all was going well for them. 

It was a special day for them and for all of us who attended. 

And last night, October 11th, we held our 2nd annual Color Purple Event.  We will be writing about this sometime next week with pictures!  Professional photographers graciously gave their time and film for the event so we are looking forward to seeing what all they captured.  We will give a full report of all that took place and the gift we were able to give SOLCA!

Enjoy the pictures from the birthday party!  Please check in next week for the post on The Color Purple Event!

Blessings,

Sue Gaither

 

 

Lo que está pasando

Lo que esta' pasando - what is going on?

Here's the latest going on with the 2nd annual Color Purple Event.  The committee:  Elisa Munoz, Gary and Sue Gaither, Lina Vintimilla, Lawrence Burdge, Alvaro Armijos, Efrain Perez, Gina Ugalde and Maria Fernanda have been working together to bring about the event to happen on October 11, 2012.

Since our last post, the following has taken place to form and shape this event:

1)  Gary, Sue and Elisa had a radio interview with Radio Familia here in Cuenca.  Lina Vintimilla is the host for this program.  She interviewed us concerning how the Color Purple came about last year and our decision to have it again in 2012.

2)  Elisa and Sue had an interview with El Tiempo newspaper.  Along with the correspondents, Liseth and Margarita Toral (Elisa's mother), was the Vice President of El Tiempo, Maria Alicia Salinas, who has taken an interest in supporting the event this year.

3)  The sponsors for this years event are:  Unsion Television, El Tiempo, Radio Familia, and ARCO
Language Institute.  These businesses are giving free promotion to the event.  El Tiempo is a ticket
location.

4)   Elisa and Sue visisted the board meeting of the ladies who volunteer for the Emaus Home.  This is a home for the families of the children who are being treated for cancer.  In this meeting we were able
to understand more fully, the needs of not only the children and their treatment, but the families as well.
Many are not able to come because of lack of funds.  And when they are able to come, they must be
provided with food and shelter.

5)  To date we have received door prizes for the event of about 12 businesses so far.  Also, it has been confirmed that Miss Cuenca will be attending the dinner, Dr. Raul Alvarado, Director of SOLCA will
be attending and sharing with us, a few remarks on SOLCA.

6)  Sue was able to write a song about suffering children in honor of the children of SOLCA.               
Luz De Luna Producciones (Moonlight Productions), a recording studio here in Cuenca, recorded Sue's song for her, "You Have Friends."  You can listen to it after the pictures.

Lastly, we've been honored to have responses to the request for financial donations from the USA.  All these donations go solely to SOLCA - no fees, no expenses, etc.  Also, please know that when giving online, the donation is processed in the USA - not Ecuador.   It is very secure.  Unsion's CEO is Bill McDonald, an American who has now served in Ecuador for 25 years.

Stay tuned for more happenings.

Here's the song, "You Have Friends" - Sue Stover Gaither, ©2012, BMI

      

What is The Color Purple Event?

In 2011, after living in Cuenca for 8 months, a wonderful idea came to put together a ladies luncheon at the beautiful Villa San Carlos located on Remigio Tamariz.  In order to have lunch provided, we needed to sell tickets, and we made the proceeds go to the children's cancer department of SOLCA hospital.  SOLCA provides incredible treatment for families, especially the poor, who cannot afford to have the disease treated.

Fortunately, we had about 150 people show up (mostly ladies - a few men!) and we had a beautiful day of lunch, door prizes, an informative talk regarding SOLCA, and a message on hope and God's love.

We sold the tickets for $10, the lunch cost $5 per person, and with a printing cost of a little over $100, we were able to deliver about $1,400 in donation to Dr. Alvarado and some of his staff at SOLCA.  So many people donated door prizes, time, talents, flowers, chocolates. Unsion Television provided continuous advertisement of the event.  El Tiempo provided a wonderful cover story as well.

This year we are so privileged to hold the 2nd Annual Color Purple Event.  We have already visited the Director of SOLCA, sharing with him our ideas, plans and hopes for this year's event.  It will be held Thursday, October 11, 2012, 7:00 p.m. and again, with our friends, Branden Lenz and Sandra Flores, who own and operate the beautiful Villa San Carlos.  All people are invited - couples, singles!

Maria Elisa Munoz has volunteered to be the Co-Chairman of the event.  Elisa is a university student, studying International Business.  She has served as a volunteer at SOLCA.  She speaks excellent English, is an artist, loves music and creativity, and is also a professor at ARCO Language Institute teaching English.

It truly is an honor to have Elisa as she brings so much to the planning of this event.  She will also serve as our Emcee this year - so be looking for her beautiful smile and glowing personality and heart!

The rest of our committee is Gary Gaither, Lawrence Burdge (who is a retired OBGYN doctor), Gina Ugalde, Director of ARCO, and a few others we hope to announce before too long and all their pictures!

Unsion Television has offered their support again this year with advertisement and interviews as well as our friends from El Tiempo.  Unsion is also providing a way for folks back home, in the USA, to donate to SOLCA.  It is explained later in this blog.  All of the donation indeed, will go to SOLCA, yet providing a tax deductible receipt from Unsion.  Thank you, Unsion for being such a wonderful friend!

Last week four of us visited the children's department of SOLCA - there were some children in the isolation unit - so we did not get to visit them.  But we were able to see a few other children who are being treated.

The story of Carlos, deeply touched our hearts. 

Carlos, who is ten years old, lives in the jungles of the Oriente.  There are no roads leading to where he lives.  So when he fell ill, he had to be airlifted out of the jungles to a regional hospital, then eventually came to SOLCA.  It was a difficult process for the family to find out what was wrong with their son.  And when he did finally get to SOLCA, it took a week for communications to reach the family back in the jungles. There is no internet or mail service in their remore area.  That alone would be a trial - to wait for news of your son.

The only one who could come with Carlos is his father.  And what a challenge to hear the news that their son has leukemia.

Somehow, Carlos has touched the hearts at SOLCA.  And it's all part of what they do from day to day.  Dr. Alvarado told us the greatest need they have at SOLCA right now is to have the funds to provide for families to be able to come and be with their child during treatment.  I can't imagine how difficult it would be for a child to be having treatment, without their family being present. 

Yet imagine how much greater the healing process could be, if children can indeed have their family there during this traumatic and scary process.  The nurses and doctors provide great love for these children - great care - but we all know it's not quite the same as mother and father.

Tickets will go on sale the 4th of September at $20.00 per ticket.  Also, advertising will begin at this time.  We are SO looking forward to many friends coming and sharing in this wonderful time together on October 11th.  We honestly believe it will be a great celebration of God's wonderful love for everyone and His faithfulness to provide all that is needed.

So...why The Color Purple Event?  Yes, there are other avenues of charity that people can and have (in Cuenca) shared their resources for SOLCA.  We consider Color Purple Event one of those avenues and a great opportunity for all to share in helping SOLCA.

Thank you for being friends of the Color Purple.  Purple is a beautiful color, isn't it?  And to us, it says "HOPE,"  -  in Spanish it's "ESPERANZA!"

With gratitude,

Sue & Gary Gaither  
Elisa Munoz

thecolorpurpleevent@gmail.com