Best/Worst day ever

It was a lot of fun today, it was the toughest day yet.

We started of the day headed to meet some fellow Canadians today to work with them.  Along the way we took some pictures of a steel factory that once was booming here.  In its day it was rumoured to employ 40,000 people.  Now it is nothing but rubble. There are many factories that look similar, only smaller.  My pictures don't even capture the size of this factory.

 I was also told that when this plant was running all of Calarasi was covered in thick black smoke.

 Parts of this track look like they are almost ready to fall onto the highway.  I didn't get any good pictures of that as we were driving down the highway as I Cole and I are taking turns with the camera out different sides of the van.

Everything that could be taken and sold as scrap metal is gone.

Next we were off to do some shopping we were spending 1000$ at a grocery store to make some food hampers for needy families. 

During our trip we found these bacon flavoured chips that actually look like bacon.  They didn't taste very good though.

These are what the hampers looked like when we were done.  Then off to deliver them.  Along the way we ran into many of these things on top of poles.  The are stork nests.  The storks are south for the winter but there nests are left behind.

Then the deliveries happened, not the storks but our food hampers.  :)  Okay stupid joke but I am really tired so it seems funny to me.

This is where the day became the best and worst day at the same time.  It was great to deliver these and everyone was very excited to see us.  One lady was so excited she said she couldn't find any words but continued to talk so fast and non stop that no one could get any words in between.  Some of them had run out of food and didn't know what they were going to do.  Some had run out of wood to burn and were cold. Many had no men around.  It is common for older guys (20) to marry 14 year olds, have a couple kids then run away.  There is a lot of alcoholism, depression that comes from having no hope and no job.  Unemployment is huge.  One family had 8 children living in one room about 12ft by 8ft.  Another place had kids everywhere but no adults.  One of these places needed social services to step in as it was obvious that these kids were being neglected. 

I just hope that our tiny gesture will be enough to lift some of these peoples spirits.  It was a great pleasure to do this today but you leave wishing you could do more.