The best part about giving presents to the orphanage children is seeing them receive it.    

I will never forget how warm my soul felt the first time I accompanied a certain special chica to the orphanage and gave an orphan a present.

So don't be cheap when it comes to giving because your Karma will thank you for it later, I guarantee it.

This is an excellent charity based in Chula Vista that helps the poor especially in the winter when people literally freeze to death.  Celia used to handle donations.  I don't know if she is still there.  Their office is open 9-5:30 and the person that handles most of this is Celia. They buy blankets with the money. You can also drop off clothes, food and toys to their office 642 3rd St. Suite I in Chula Vista. Here is an article printed in the past.

TIJUANA -- A single blanket covers the bed where 18-year-old Carolina Castillo Castro huddled two weeks ago with her two sick children, trying to protect them from the cold.

Today, a makeshift altar sits on a nearby table, candles burning before a photograph of her younger child. Marcelino Castillo died nine days ago from a respiratory infection. He was 4 months old.

Marcelino is one of at least six Tijuana children who have died from cold-related illnesses since the cold weather settled in last month. The oldest child was just three.

Yesterday, Carolina Castillo and her mother, Maria de la Luz, 36, waited at a school with hundreds of other residents from Colonia El Nino for a shipment of blankets from San Diego County.

"The needs here are so great," said Celia Diaz, director of the Chula Vista-based Binational Emergency Medical Care Committee, which has delivered aid to Tijuana's poor colonias for 13 years.

The group distributed 400 blankets, plus 800 bags of clothing, food and toys. Diaz plans to return to Tijuana every two weeks to deliver aid to other settlements.

The group selected Colonia El Nino (The Child) for its first stop this season because the mountain community's 2,000 families are among the region's most vulnerable.

In recent weeks, nighttime temperatures have dropped to the low 30s in the underdeveloped area across the border from San Diego's East County. Many families moved to El Nino after being pushed out of their old neighborhoods by the heavy rains of 1998. Most of the houses are made of plywood, wooden pallets and garage doors, although some lucky families live in tiny cement houses built by American volunteers.

Many of the houses have electricity, but few, if any, have running water. When the group arrived yesterday, the sun was shining and the air was warm.

But the noontime warmth can be deceptive, residents say. "By the afternoon, when it gets cold, everyone will be rushing, and nothing but the cold air will be on the streets," said Beatriz Jordan Llamas, who brought her three daughters to the school.

Many of El Nino's newer residents came from Mexico's warm interior and are shocked by the cruelty of the cold weather.

"We're from Acapulco. We're not used to this cold," said Victoria Chavez, 42. "It's the reason why my husband's nose bleeds. He's sick but he still has to go to work.

"Thank God my girls (ages 16, 12, 11) are older and can defend themselves against the cold. I feel sorry for the children who've died. They can't speak. They can't say where it hurts or how much."

Four-month-old Marcelino Castillo began wheezing two weeks ago, when temperatures turned so cold "it hurt your bones," his grandmother, Maria de la Luz, said.

She took the boy to Tijuana's General Hospital, where he died three days later from pulmonary problems. The family brought his tiny body back to El Nino and placed it in a box for a viewing held at the entrance to their small home. Neighbors came by with food. The boy was buried nearby, at Monte de Olivos cemetery.

Although the Castillos are still mourning Marcelino's death, their worries have shifted to his brother, 18-month-old Alejandro, who still has a runny nose.

Last night, he and his mother slept beneath heavy new blankets donated by the San Diego County volunteers.

"All you have to do is to look around at the poverty of these people to make you want to do something about it," said Julia Trigero, 12, of Rancho San Diego.

"This is a wonderful ministry and we wanted to be a part of it," said Jim Stark, 74, whose church in Julian donated 130 blankets.

Gustavo Friederichsen, a Sharp HealthCare representative, brought his 6-year-old son, Adam, with him "to expose him to something he hasn't seen before" and to teach him the joy of giving.

Four adults have also died in Tijuana in recent weeks, bringing the city's weather-related death toll to at least 10. Last winter, Tijuana didn't record its sixth weather-related death until Jan. 4.

How to help

The Binational Emergency Medical Care Committee collects and delivers aid to families in Tijuana throughout the winter. Donations are being received at the Binational group's office at 642 Third Ave., Suite I, Chula Vista. For more information, call (619) 425-5080.

Milk... I most probably will not be able to attend, so please PM me the paypal address. If you are not a VIP member here on TER, you can PM me on the chica board.

Gracias, dawctor