Category Archives: Stories

What makes an advocate?

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What makes an "advocate"? | World Vision Blog
What does it mean to be an advocate? Dictionary.com defines advocate as “a person who speaks or writes in support or defense of a person, cause, etc.” For me, that definition feels impersonal. The 120 young people in Washington, D.C., this week for World Vision’s Youth Empowerment Program (YEP) summit bring personalization and breathe life into advocacy. Friday was Capitol Hill day for the fifth annual YEP Summit. Teenagers came from urban centers or rural hamlets across the United States. Many live in poverty or in areas plagued by violence and drug or alcohol abuse. Despite their troubles, they refuse to give up. They refuse to be beaten down. They stand up for their communities. They advocate....
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Four days old: Many hopes, many challenges in new South Sudan

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4 days old: South Sudan | World Vision Blog
Chants of “Republic of South Sudan Oyee” will forever be etched in the minds of many South Sudanese as they reminisce over their independence — today, only four days old. An overflowing crowd of people, both young and old, showed up at the John Garang Memorial to mark the historic event on July 9. Tens of thousands of South Sudanese endured the blistering sun, all along energized, as they erupted into song and dance when the country became the world’s 193rd country and Africa’s 54th. I saw men and women faint as the declaration was made. Others openly broke into tears as the new flag was hoisted....
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Always enough love for one more

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A note of the sweetest kind | World Vision
This note was simply too sweet not to share. A little background: I first started talking to Debbie on our Facebook page, where she leaves us daily comments of encouragement. On Facebook, we’ve shared in Debbie’s passion and deep love for all seven of her sponsored children. When she receives a letter from one of her “littles” from Thailand, Sierra Leone, Ethiopia, Brazil, Zambia, or Mexico, it makes our day, too. So when she heard about our bloggers trip to Bolivia, you can guess what she did next…...
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Following Coach Richt to Honduras — a trip that changes lives

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"Welcome Mark and Katharyn Richt" sign at a World Vision community in Honduras. ©2011 Erin Aspegren/World Vision
World Vision? What’s that? An optician with delusions of grandeur? A new psychic helpline? A few months ago, I had no idea. Then there came a curious off-season story from the most watched sports beat here at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: University of Georgia football. Bulldogs fans were all atwitter over a report that head coach Mark Richt had put his vacation lake home up for sale. That prompted wide speculation that after two disappointing seasons he was selling off as a hedge against the possibility of being fired this year........
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Where kids’ books meet the real story: Building a healthy village

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Emily, the successful beneficiary of a World Vision microloan, with her children and niece in Zambia. ©2011 Collins Kaumba/World vision
In the afternoon of our first day with World Vision in Sinazongwe, Zambia, Emily Syabubila, a widow and mother of three, gives us a tour of her compound. It consists of a one-room house with two beds for her and her daughters; another one-room home for her son; three raised chicken coops; an outdoor cook hut; and a raised drying rack for her corn. In my last post, I shared how microloans (similar to those described in my book “One Hen“) had enabled her to restore her family to economic and food security after malaria claimed the life of her husband. She now invites us to share in rituals of harvest and shuck dried maize with her. Hard. Then she...
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