JDC Provides Literal Lifeline to Dejected
and Destitute Young Family

Valentina and Victor built a two-room shack in Slobodziya, Moldova for themselves and their two children with their bare hands, using only a hoe and a pitch fork.

They fashioned the roof from layers of cardboard and pieces of scrap metal from abandoned factories, the walls from mud mixed with manure and soiled straw given to them by neighbors. The windows are constructed with bits of broken glass from an abandoned Soviet fur factory. Over time, the glass has shifted away from the mud, leaving large, drafty gaps. The front door is a side panel from a shipping container.

The hole in their outhouse is very shallow, because Victor couldn’t physically dig it any deeper. Even in normal weather, the sewage level often rises over the top of the wooden planks used to sit on.

Since the family can’t afford to refill the now empty gas balloon issued to them by the JDC-supported Hesed’s DSOS one-time emergency assistance program, Valentina cooks outside on an open fire. "When it’s snowing or raining it’s harder to keep the fire lit," she says. "The sticks I collect around the area don’t burn very long or hot."

The family of four shares two beds in one room. A shaft with a hole located in the middle of the shack is made into a wood heater, where in attempt to keep warm they burn straw and twigs for lack of firewood or coal. Smoke bellows into the inner room, and with no ventilation, levels of oxygen are low and the walls have become permanently black with soot.

Valentina coughs incessantly—one of the many residual effects of the extreme poverty in which the family lives. She relies on $2 worth of herbs from the market to treat her hereditary hepatitis. "I don’t have any medicine from the doctor, only herbal treatments my mom used to make, and I can’t even afford those," she says.

Fourteen-year-old Victor "Junior", named after his father, is devastated. "My mom is so sick. I have so many problems. I’m overwhelmed with sadness about how horrible my life is," says the devastated adolescent.

Food packages and food sets furnished by the IFCJ-JDC Partnership for Children in the FSU through the Beltsy Hesed afford the children their only source of nutrition. Young Victor also received clothes and shoes to endure the winter. Eager to escape their misery and engage in Jewish community life, the family also participates in Hesed-run educational and holiday activities.

"For now, we don’t have any future ourselves," says Valentina. " We can only think of today."

October 2008