Completing the Window Project

The Bread of Life Orphanage has always been a place with a lot of energy, just as any home is and the same is true today. The little children make their presence known day in and day out. Some have softer voices while others are much stronger ones. There is a game I play with myself when I am in my office at the Orphanage, to see if I can recognize the children by their voice. Sometimes I’ll say that is Marius because he has a very young but still louder voice, or Darius, or some of the other little ones, but other times I have to go out of the office to see if I was right or wrong. During one of those days recently I could not determine a sound that I kept hearing. It sounded like someone was whistling in the hallway. I could not put a child’s face with the sound because it was not a song nor was it melodic. When I went into the hall to see who was making the sound, I was saddened. The sound was not coming from any of the children. The sound was the cold wind blowing through the old outside doors and windows.

You see when we renovated the orphanage in 2003, we had to settle for the cheapest doors and single pane windows on the market. In later years we realized how poorly made these doors and windows were and started a project to replace them with better ones. Yes, we are Romanians and accustomed to the cold winters, but these old doors and windows have deteriorated to the point of not being functional anymore, explaining why I heard the sound of the whistling wind and felt the cold breeze.

During our initial window renovation project, we raised enough funds to install insulating windows in most of the children’s rooms, and that does help. But not enough to finish hallways and other areas of the building. Our children spend a lot of time in the hallways, going from one room to the other or to the cafeteria to eat and this temperature difference from room to room is difficult on their fragile bodies, so many of them end up wearing their coats, even inside the building.

We desire to finish this project of replacing the remaining doors and windows that have been in the building from our original renovation in 2003. We have 26 more windows and doors to finish the job, and the average cost per window/door will be $300. If you desire to help the children have a warmer winter this year, please get involved. Maybe your church group or friends would like to help with one door or window. With the installation of each door or window, we help the children stay warmer and healthier.

Alin P.