Bring the Siklosi's Stateside

Hello,

My name is Corbin, I am the proud oldest son of Gabor and Candy Siklosi.  I am also the oldest brother of Canaan, Chloe, and Celah.  A little more than five years ago, my family (minus myself) took a leap of faith and moved to Guatemala.  Not only did they move to one of the most impoverished countries in the world in hopes of finding solutions to the endless cycle of poverty; but they also did so with very little financial support.  They gave up everything, holding onto the idea that if Christ was right in saying that the kindgom belonged to those with no earthly possessions, then maybe they should be spending their time with these people in hopes of discovering and enriching this kingdom.  They truly demonstrated what most of us are afraid to do; step out into the unknown of reckless faith.  

Flash forward five years, to the present day.  The organization my parents established in Guatemala, Global Community Works, is still alive and well.  Through five years of hard work, people's support, and God's grace, the organization owns a coffee shop in Antigua and has been involved in numerous community development intitiates throughout all of Guatemala.  But here is when it gets tricky for people who have not been part of a non-profit or missionary organization.  Even when there is starting to be success in GCWorks, most of the profit always goes back to the people that the organization is focused on helping.  Thus, the people that have started the organization do not receive many financial benefits until many years down the road.  Ultimately, this is a true act of faith.  An act of faith that prevents my family from affording trips back to the United States.  If I've counted correctly, I believe that in the past five years, my family has come back to visit three times.  

Some of you might think that this would be easy, I mean, if you live far away you might see your family twice a year for the holidays or vacations.  In my dad's case, he will be lucky if he gets to go visit his family in Maine every other year for Christmas.  This year was supposed to be the year for him to go see his family.  But once again, like last year, my family cannot financially afford to travel back to the states.  This would be a difficult year again but I have been trying to work out a way to go visit them halfway in Mexico.  This Christmas would just be an interesting one with my direct family, in a warm place.  Then we received the bad news: my grandmother has  been diagnosed Stage 2 breast cancer.  She will be having surgery this next week to hopefully rid her body of the disease.  With a recent history of health problems, this could turn out to be a more dangerous surgery than normal for my grandmother.  As most of you know, cancer can also spread so unexpectedly, leaving the future in doubt for her health.

So, without my family's permission, I am asking for direct help.  I am asking for $3,500 to help my parents, sisters, and brother fly from Guatemala and Arkansas to Maine for Christmas.  This will cover plane tickets (around $2,500) and expenses for the rest of the trip ($1000 for food, rental car, possible lodging).  I hope to have this money raised within the next two weeks in order for the plane tickets to still be reasonably priced for the holiday travel.  Please help out my family that has sacrificed so much for other families' in the third world country of Guatemala.  It would mean so much to me to spend time with my family and for my dad to be with his mom in this time of difficulty.