The Summer Report for December 2

The "Sommer Report" for December 2004

This morning I again visited the Gypsy part of the city of Mangalia. I have been there quite a few times since our family arrived in Romania in the end of August. This is the part of town where we have a joint venture project with the city government to provide social housing to the poorest inhabitants of the city.

The streets were relatively quiet this morning, and I was able to leave the car to take some pictures. I was recognized by a man from the Pentecostal Church, and invited to see his house and meet his family (photo above). I did not recognize him, but I went with him and entered his house. It had two rooms; a small outer room and the main inner room about 10 feet by 12 feet in size. I counted eight people from three generations living in the room, but there may have been more who were not present. The floor appeared to be dirt covered with scraps of vinyl flooring. The house was situated directly beside the town garbage dump.

After taking some pictures, I got back in my car and went on to the centre of the gypsy town. Here the people live in long houses that are very similar to North American animal barns. There is a long central aisle with small rooms off to each side. There is no heat in the building, no running water, and no bathrooms. Each concrete room is about 8 feet wide and 10 feet long. About 5-7 people live in each room. There are 9 of these types of buildings on this street.

This photo shows the front of one of the group homes for gypsies.

The buildings all share a public washroom. There are 4 stalls for men, and four stalls for women. Even in the cool of the morning the stench is very bad.

Women's washroom (right)

Going further down the street, I met more people who spoke to me excitedly. They spoke very little English, and I speak very little Romanian. After about 15 minutes, some of them returned with “Johan”, a Christian man I met on an earlier trip who speaks English. I was able to understand that there was some land made available from the mayor’s office for them to build on, but that they lacked the materials to build with.

The land that was available was where their church had been earlier in the month. It was torn down on orders from the mayor’s office. Most of the “buildings” here are made from salvaged materials and mud & straw bricks.

During the earthquake last month many of these structures were damaged, and now they must be torn down. In the photo below, the blue portion of the wall on the left is actually leaning out from under the roof by about 5 inches. The rubble on the right was from a wall that collapsed on a child.

These buildings are scheduled to be torn down in March and April of next year. In the block building in the back of the picture on the right there are 22 people living. Understandably, they are greatly concerned for their safety and their future living accommodations.

It is here, directly across the street, that we will be building the first 18 social development houses and a Kindergarten. Johan explained to me that each time someone from outside comes to visit them it gives them such a great hope.

They asked me to photograph everything so that others can see their miserable living conditions and learn of their distress. Some of them have worked with me unloading the containers of building materials that have been shipped from Canada.

They begged me to please give them some of the materials so that they can construct a home for their family. I asked Johan to explain to them that these materials are designated for the project and cannot be given away by me. The people understand, but it does not relieve their distress.

It is for this project, and others like it that I am also involved in, that I am appealing to you for your help. My family and I originally planned to come to Romania as self-supporting missionaries. Prior to our leaving we learned that the for-profit projects which were to generate our support would not be ready immediately on our arrival. As it is now, the earliest date we can begin construction for those projects will be in the spring. We made the decision to go out anyway since the non-profit work urgently required full-time coordination and supervision in order to proceed. We went out in faith that God would touch the lives of the people here in Romania through our lives and work, and we have had first hand experiences of this happening on a daily basis. We also trusted that God would touch the lives of people in Canada to provide support for this work so that it would continue. I now ask you if you would consider supporting this work and our family financially as God leads you.

Martin Sommer and family