Saturday, August 29, 2009

Safe House for Albertina.

Albertina is 8 1/2 months pregnant with twins. She has three other children, all girls, 10yrs, 6yrs and 2yrs old. They are all malnourished.

Albertina is married to a very physically abusive man. He has been threatening to kill her. Just a few weeks ago, he threw her out of a window and she rolled down an embankment.
He has also brought another woman to live at the house and this is causing a huge amount of stress for Albertina.
Her husband is not giving her money to buy food and she has been eating only once a day, usually tortillas with salt. She has been surviving mostly on the charity of her neighbors who have been giving her small amounts of food for her children.

There were very real fears that he would make good his threat to kill her and some neighbors helped her seek legal advice. A woman lawyer who works with a group to help protect women against violence , helped her get a court order to protect her. But she had nowhere to go, she was living at the husband's family home.

Her own parents have a very small house that 12 people live in. They had no room in the house for her. But the father offered a very small piece of land that could be built right up against the house.

We learned about Albertina's predicament on Friday, thanks to our wonderful supporters, by Monday we had enough money to start building a safe house for Albertina and her children.

Her father offered to do a lot of the labor, he even contributed 200 cement blocks that he had been storing in the hopes of being able to build an extension.




Albertina signs the papers that says that his house belongs to her!
Albertina's father signs the papers that says the house being built belongs to Albertina.

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