Amber is a young woman with a generous heart and courageous spirit. On Sept. 10 she embarked on what she calls "the biggest adventure of my life so far": to Mwanza on the shores of Lake Victoria in Tanzania to spend seven weeks volunteering at Forever Angels, a home for orphaned and abandoned babies, some healthy and some who are sick, HIV positive or terminally ill.

Amber took our family along via e-mail. Her stories have brought tears, prayers and renewed awareness that life for many is not as we live it in this country.

A 2003 graduate of the University of San Francisco, Amber works as a pediatric oncology nurse and enjoys being part of an institution that offers resources and hope to children diagnosed with cancer, and their families. Social workers, dieticians, special teachers and financial help are available to support and monitor all aspects of life for her patients.

In working with these families, it dawned on Amber that there were children elsewhere in the world who did not have the medicine and expertise so readily available to children in her care. She searched for clinics that needed volunteers, but most commitments were longer than she was able to give. Finally she connected with Forever Angels.

"I wanted to help people that truly need help," Amber explains. "I wanted to try to make a difference in the life of a child and give them a chance to be successful in life. I wanted to give love and make them feel valued and important, the children that don't have these things for some reason or another." Her work at home fills this desire, but there was something calling her to serve poor children who are alone with no family.

Amber's messages are full of stories of the children. Some are heartbreaking. One little boy, a year old, was brought to the orphanage by a landlord. The boy's mother left him alone in their house for a long period of time. Malnourished but otherwise healthy, he is slowly warming up to the caregivers.

On a trip to the HIV clinic with two children, the Forever Angels staff was met by the local social welfare people with two more babies in need of a home. One of these babies was only a month old. The other, four months old but weighing only as much as the month-old, had been living in a linen closet. Both of the babies' mother's were mentally ill and could not care for them.

Visits to the HIV clinic at the main hospital are not easy for the children or their caregivers. According to Amber, the circumstances could not be more different than what happens in the state of the art hospital she works at in San Francisco. She tells of taking four children to the HIV clinic at the main hospital to have blood tests. Three needed routine tests; one is seriously ill and needed medication. They stood in line for 45 minutes in a room full of about 150 people waiting for HIV treatment.

When it was their turn, they were told that no more blood work could be done. They had been told the same thing two days earlier. They were informed the machine in the lab had been broken for a month and a half and there was no word on when it would be fixed. The woman in charge told people to "come back tomorrow."

Most of the people walk many miles to get to the clinic and wait all day, often with children in tow, only to be told to come back as blood cannot be drawn, or that anti-retroviral medication is not available, or the doctor did not show up. The journey is repeated, with the people never sure they will be seen or treated.

Amber relates other stories about babies being abandoned, scared and hungry. "It is crazy," she says.

And frustrating. But there are good stories. Babies are adopted by kind loving families and those brought to the orphanage are treated well and loved. They have food, mosquito nets, toys and medical care. Amber says the children do not cease to amaze her with their trust and how much they love touch and attention. She cannot walk into a room without a group of children running up with their arms held up wanting to be held and cuddled. She would like, she says, "to grow a million extra arms" so she could hug and kiss them all at the same time.

Forever Angels --- whose work cannot be done justice in this or any column --- cares for children from birth to five years of age who are severely disadvantaged. Their website, www.foreverangels.org, is worth a visit if only to remember the children and their benefactors in prayer.

Anne Hansen is a member of the Camarillo Catholic community. Her e-mail address is familymail@aol.com.