Feeding the hungry
October 18, 2009
It's lunchtime at the soup kitchen in Stauceni - a town only eight kilometers from Moldova's capital, Chisinau. German Catholic priest Klaus Kniffki stands at the end of a long wooden table saying grace. Twelve hungry men and women sit with their backs hunched and heads lowered, waiting for their share of bortsch, or beetroot soup.
"The people can take as much as they want - two or three portions - and most of them will. For many, this is the only meal of the day," says the 62-year-old priest.
The meal normally costs 2 leu (about 12 cents), but payment is voluntary. Up to 100 needy people come to the soup kitchen every day, according to Kniffki. "Hardly anyone pays," says the priest with just a hint of disappointment.
Living on 140 euros per month
The young Republic of Moldova, which gained independence from the disintegrating Soviet Union on 27 August 1991, is one of the poorest countries in Europe. The average monthly income per head was around 140 euros in 2008.
Moldova's countryside provides ample proof of how impoverished the eastern European state really is. Kniffki leaves the village of Stauceni and after just a few miles the streets become dusty. When it rains everything turns into a muddy quagmire, he says.
People have access to electricity but there's no running water. At first sight, the front gardens appear idyllic, but these are the sole property of the people who often use the small patches for keeping chickens or a cow.
Kniffki visits an old woman who is tending to her sick son Pavel. The young man used to be a soldier stationed in the Russian town of Sotchi. Two years after leaving home he was returned to his mother, having lost the power of speech and covered in bedsores. He spends his days just sitting in his chair without moving and traumatized. His mother always sleeps beside him.
"We have no way of finding out what happened to him. That will stay his secret. But we treated all of his wounds," the priest says, passing his hand gently over Pavel's head.
Back at the priests' house, Sister Liliana shows photos of other sick people. Once a week, she drives through the villages and seeks out the most severe cases, then bathes patients at the church's welfare station.
"The people have no sanitation facilities. They are bedridden. They cannot leave the house, and they are poor," she says.
Battling windmills
One-fourth of the country's four million citizens have already left Moldova in search of a better life abroad. It's mostly the aged and children that stay behind, the latter often growing up with just one parent.
Kniffki, who has lived in the country for 13 years, tries to do as much as he can to help the poor of Moldova. Alongside the welfare station and the soup kitchen, the Catholic Church has also financed a homeless shelter and a nursery school. But he hasn't always found politicians eager to help.
A couple of years ago, a severe heat wave led to water shortages in the region.
"Back then we went to the mayor and asked him to supply water for the children," the priest recounts.
But instead of help, they got a terse reply: "Then close the nursery school."
Last month, Moldova’s parliament approved a new reformist government which has promised to move the former Soviet republic closer to Europe. Kniffki said he hopes the new pro-western government will be able to improve the situation in the country. In the meantime, Kniffki will continue to feed the hungry.
Author: Kathrin Erdmann/nk
Editor: Trinity Hartman