Co Watah!

“Co Watah, Co Minah, Co Watah”, the 9 year-old girl intones in a futile effort to rise above the din of the busy marketplace. She looks around expectantly to see if she has any customers. If she can sell six or seven of the small plastic bags filled with cold mineral water for 5 LD (about 8¢) each, she will eat that night. If she can’t sell them, she will not eat and she will have to hope to be more successful tomorrow. Almost everywhere you turn, you see others like her.

Of all the scenes that I see in this economically-ravaged country, this is the one that haunts me the most as I lie in bed. It’s almost as if I am in a surreal world where the boundaries of fairness and justice have been utterly destroyed leaving only the most basic of sense of survival left in their place. No joy, no hope, no expectancy. The normal explanations accompanied by blame and passivity don’t seem to bring a real sense of relief to my questions about this situation.
I can’t change the world and I can’t even change a tiny part of this country, but I can view it with compassion and a desire to help in even a very small way. And yes, I can even look at it with anger knowing that a 9-year old girl will go to bed hungry because she couldn’t sell enough small plastic bags filled with cold mineral water for 8¢ each. And even worse, she faces tomorrow and a long future with much the same fate.
~written by Tod Whitwer

This post was written by a great friend of ours, Tod Whitwer. Tod is partnering with Spirit Liberia in a big way and we are so thankful that God brought us together. Tod will be traveling to Liberia with Greg in January. He does a lot of research and planning of the agricultural projects in Liberia. He will aslo be running with Greg in the Marathon. Actually, Greg decided to tag along with Tod on this Marathon and to do it all in support of Spirit Liberia. Tod has done numerous Marathons. Tod has 2 adopted daughters from Liberia and has a God-given burden of compassion for the Liberian people. Thanks Tod! You are loved and appreciated :)