VOP Front Porch Diaries

Christie Kargbo

Petersburg Team

Working with VOP has been one of the most amazing things that have happened to me in my years as a young adult. I’ve gained so much strength this summer and learned a lot about the world around me that nothing can hold me back from the things I want to accomplish in life. Having people talk to you at the doors and let you into their lives have been one of the many things I enjoyed from interning. Whether it be good or bad, I’ve learned to internalize things as apart of life and not to charge it to the heart and allow it to become a negative aspect.

I have meet so many people with different stories of what they have gone through in life but my favorite one was of an elder lady from Haiti.
In Petersburg, I was canvassing an apartment building where there was nothing but broken windows, and vacant apartment house. The whole area looked like no one resides there except there was  music coming from the second floor. I went up to the building to see if there were kids hanging out. To my surprise it was a 68 year old women that was sitting on the balcony all by herself.  After talking to her for about five  minutes she told me how her husband was the only one working and supporting the family. Her veins on  both feet had burst and she wasn’t able to walk or stand for a long period of time. She told me how they didn’t have enough money to afford health care and she wasn’t able to get treatment.  She also told me how they can barely afford to put food on their table now-a days because the person that use to help them lost her job. So her husband and her were not receiving help from anyone but were still making ends meet to survive.

I told her how sorry I was about everything she was going through, and that there are organizations out there like VOP that are working hard to help people like her. Afterwords, when I continued on to the next turf, I felt so bad that I asked my Petersburg crew if they can take me to the store when our day was over. I brought her some can goods, and easy to prepare food and took it back to the house. She was so thankful for what I did and repeatedly blessed me.  It was one of the most influential moments for me throughout this internship.