More Than Just Potatoes!

By Gianna B. Volunteer in Romania

Every Wednesday we take a short bus ride to the hills outside the city, to a town called Mintia, where we visit many Roma families and play with the kids. Many of the families here live in poverty, and the conditions are hard to see and harder to forget. However it’s the beauty of the people that make this place so memorable.

On my first visit, a mother named Rebeka welcomed me and another volunteer into her home. It was evident that this family suffered a lot from material poverty. However, she had prepared potatoes for her family and eagerly offered us some. At that moment, I didn’t know if I should accept it- I had just eaten a big lunch, and it seemed like this was all they had. I didn’t need the food, and definitely didn’t want to take it from them. But there was something about the way she offered it to us, so eager to share, and with so much love that we decided to accept. We told her we would share one potato, but moments later, two large potatoes and a pouch of salt were placed in front of us. It was such a simple gesture, yet profoundly beautiful.

Later Rebeka told us that she knows she is poor and has very little to offer, but she loves to share the small things she does have, and she gives them from her heart.