tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-350548162024-03-13T03:04:06.770-07:00Lynn Connell - MAJENGOLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.comBlogger145125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-89879293562571468792014-06-05T06:24:00.003-07:002014-06-05T06:26:21.482-07:00Creemore Echo: May 2014...Celebrate the MAJENGO miracle!!<style>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 24.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-font-kerning: 18.0pt;">Celebrate
the Majengo miracle</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">By: Kristi Green</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">May 29, 2014</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Written for the CREEMORE ECHO, MAY 2014...</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">By Majengo c0-founder: Lynn Connell</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">TO DONATE online: www.majengo.org</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">thank you!!! </span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">In Swahili, the word majengo means
“a building up.” But for me, what has happened in the last six years, means a
miracle. </span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-o0leBHMFTgE/U5BubBQFMbI/AAAAAAAAAqE/ntBM9Mm7Nzc/s1600/beginning+March+2008.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-o0leBHMFTgE/U5BubBQFMbI/AAAAAAAAAqE/ntBM9Mm7Nzc/s1600/beginning+March+2008.JPG" height="162" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Six years ago, while teaching
painting in Africa, I was taken to visit 52 little kids, ages two to nine,
huddled together on a wet, mud floor in a leaking, dark foyer set up as a
makeshift daycare, with virtually no resources: no food, no furniture, no
teaching supplies – and, in most cases, no one on the planet left to care for
them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Ragged, starving, and in some cases
wandering from farm to farm begging for food and lodging, they’d been gathered
together by local farmers, their wives cooking out back over fire, serving the
children the only meal they would have in a day. </span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-X2vyjhKM2h4/U5BuPgmlHmI/AAAAAAAAAp8/KzRHK9zkgKo/s1600/charles.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-X2vyjhKM2h4/U5BuPgmlHmI/AAAAAAAAAp8/KzRHK9zkgKo/s1600/charles.JPG" height="200" width="183" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">That day, I, along with Charles
Luoga, the HIV/AIDS Project Coordinator of the local NGO, Institute of Cultural
Affairs (ICA) Tanzania, made a commitment to help those kids in whatever way we
could. Miraculously and amazingly, from that moment on, with the help of many
generous people, Majengo now thrives.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Building Majengo</span></b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />
Charles found a half-built home down the road and made a deal with the owner:
we finance the building of the house and get to use it for four years. I came
back to Canada and brought Majengo to Creemore. Creemore folks, family and
friends raised $23,000. One year later, the kids moved in, along with a
hard-working, local staff of 12, all of whom had cooked for the kids for free
that whole first year. They are still there.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Two years later, the government shut
down five corrupt orphanages on the safari route. These had been set up as
businesses with a steady stream of money going into the pockets of their
owners, while the kids were overcrowded, sick and starving. In one day, the
government dropped off 67 new kids to Majengo. I even had my life threatened by
one Director whose orphanage had been closed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">At Majengo, we went into rescue
mode. Our cooks were now feeding more than 100 people per meal, three times a
day. Terrified and starving children who had been torn from shocking,
indescribable circumstances, were now thrown together after eating leaves off
the trees and garbage from the street, stampeding the kitchen with other
equally frightened children, who were forced into a new cohabitation with each
other.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Total chaos. Yet our staff pulled
through, and within a month the security, health and well-being of those kids
changed radically. Today, they live as one huge happy family… the older kids
look after the younger, and a staff of 17 cooks, cleaners, watchmen and
teachers are committed to raising them, lovingly, as their own.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Majengo grows</span></b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />
We’ve come a long way in such a short time. Matt McKissock and his family from
Warren, Pennsylvania came on as a third partner, joining Majengo Canada and ICA
Tanzania, (which each have official charitable status), to issue tax receipts
for donations.</span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-QjJsuizq9fM/U5BtDqjYTXI/AAAAAAAAApw/-7MCzJWqXnk/s1600/planting+tree.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-QjJsuizq9fM/U5BtDqjYTXI/AAAAAAAAApw/-7MCzJWqXnk/s1600/planting+tree.JPG" height="200" width="152" /></a><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Two years ago, the local Majengo
community government gifted us 10 acres of open clean land just outside the
village of MtoWaMbu, which is an hour’s drive from the famous NgoroNgoro Crater
safari. With the help of many supporters, we built three big houses, a dining
hall, kitchen and soccer field. Last June, we relocated 83 kids, plus chickens,
goats, sheep and puppies into their own brand new Majengo Children’s Home. Your
money has been put to tremendous use.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Just this year, we hand-drilled 40
metres down to flourish unlimited fresh water to Majengo and equipped the
kitchen with two top-notch stoves to help relieve our cook’s respiratory/eye problems. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">We also planted three huge vegetable gardens, with each child choosing,
planting and watering their own tree, and we built a security fence dancing
with bougainvillea.</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-85lgiUo6Qlc/U5BvF7c2btI/AAAAAAAAAqM/K3LyA9k9uXE/s1600/IMG_simone.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-85lgiUo6Qlc/U5BvF7c2btI/AAAAAAAAAqM/K3LyA9k9uXE/s1600/IMG_simone.JPG" height="200" width="180" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Since January, 73 Majengo kids have
been sponsored into Mama Anna’s English Medium School where Susan Lee’s
daughter <b>Simone Lee Hamilton</b> just returned from six months of teaching. Simone will be at
Sunday’s party, regaling you with fascinating stories of working and living on
the ground at Majengo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">We strive to improve the lives of
the surrounding Majengo community. We do this by offering education to
vulnerable children who do not live at Majengo, at our onsite preschool. The
school is staffed by three trained teachers who work side by side under the
direction of our ICA Tanzanian ground support and village leaders.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">What do we need?</span></b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />
Since we started, our operating costs have risen from $55,000 to $135,000. This
covers food, medical, education, accommodation, sports and local staffing.
Other than the required bookkeeping and government auditing, postal costs and
photocopying, every cent that we raise goes directly to supporting the
children. Our directors and volunteers do so entirely at their own expense.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Can you imagine feeding 83 kids and
putting them to bed… in the dark? This year, on top of our operating expenses,
we’re aiming to raise $50,000 for solar energy. We’re wired for electricity,
but it could be years before we get connected to the grid. For more
information, check out www.smilemajengo.com.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Simply put, we need your continuing
enthusiasm and support, as founders and in a way, “surrogate parents,” to give
these kids a chance and help them grow through childhood until the day they
leave Majengo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Without your help, Majengo would
still be only a dream. To make a donation, visit www.majengo.org or send a
cheque (payable to Majengo Canada) to 284 Major Street, Toronto, Ontario, M5S
2L6.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Since Majengo opened, the lives of
83 vulnerable, orphaned and displaced children, many of whom lost their parents
to HIV/AIDS, have changed astoundingly. Today, they thrive – because of you. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Here is to you – our friends and
family in the Creemore area, who have supported the magical Majengo Children’s
Home, in central Tanzania, since our beginning in 2008. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Please join us on Sunday, June 1 to
celebrate Majengo and to celebrate you. The event is free; all are welcome.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Celebrate the Majengo Children’s
Home</span></b><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />
Sunday, June 1, 2 to 5 pm<br />
Creativity Art Retreat, 8961 County Road 9, Dunedin<br />
Food, bar and live music with Rusty McCarthy<br />
Free<br />
www.majengo.org</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">Lynn Connell is Majengo Canada
Director and Co-Founder.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;">PS...THANK YOU ALL FOR COMING TO OUR CELEBRATION PARTIES...We raised over $15,000, made lots of new friends and supporters for Majengo...huge thanks to Lyndon Wiebe for delicious food...Rusty McCarthy and Anne Lindsay and her band for enchanting music, John and Shauna Connell for their stunning Toronto home, and to everyone who volunteered.... </span></i><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-55200254000479883192013-12-01T19:19:00.000-08:002013-12-02T07:19:35.994-08:002013 A FABULOUS YEAR...thanks to you!! UPDATE!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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JAMBO!! and KARIBU..welcome!!!<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zPlz64YCy-k/UpuyAxRYDNI/AAAAAAAAAoA/K7rnj5qGH-4/s1600/IMG_0983.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zPlz64YCy-k/UpuyAxRYDNI/AAAAAAAAAoA/K7rnj5qGH-4/s320/IMG_0983.JPG" width="219" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: red;">Here's to another wonderful year at Majengo...</span>.with so many great things happening this year...season's greetings and thank you so much for all your help; without you, Majengo would be lost in a dream...but today, 5 years later, it is a miracle..<br />
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Just got back, and today sitting at my desk in Toronto - outside it's cold, wet and gray - and I can't stop thinking of the kids at Majengo and that hot, pulsating life there, the music, the drumming, the explosion of joy and love, the fun, no kidding, it's like one huge happy family, with our kids, everyday...blossoming and growing...truly a dream come true. <br />
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2013...not in order or in importance, it is all important!<br />
...but in a nutshell:<br />
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<span style="color: red;">December 2013 - Majengo now supports 140 children.</span>..86 living in with all their basic needs being wonderfully met, growing bigger and taller and flourishing, and another 56 living out with family or friends, Majengo supports their education.<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-X-R10JOmSaI/Uptv2873LnI/AAAAAAAAAjc/1kXvve_Pcqs/s1600/group+shot.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="241" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-X-R10JOmSaI/Uptv2873LnI/AAAAAAAAAjc/1kXvve_Pcqs/s640/group+shot.JPG" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kHqtG1JUHqE/UpuI2ifYxsI/AAAAAAAAAlQ/KHMWwXxtImQ/s1600/DSC_0407.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kHqtG1JUHqE/UpuI2ifYxsI/AAAAAAAAAlQ/KHMWwXxtImQ/s320/DSC_0407.JPG" width="320" /></a> ...as the only officially government recognized orphanage facility in the entire district of Monduli, we welcomed an additional 12 vulnerable kids into Majengo, selected by govt social worker Mr. Denis, and double checked, interviewed and verified
for authentic needs by our ICA Tanzania project coordinator Charles Luoga.<br />
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<span style="color: red;">55 Majengo children will be enrolled into Mama Anna's English taught Primary school...</span></div>
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We have 55 kids enrolling in Jan. '14! With 29 more to go... This is incredible and by learning English, these kids, chosen by our head teacher Grayson and ICA Charles not only for their marks but for how hard they are trying, a much better chance to succeed in their future life.<br />
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55 donors have chosen to sponsor 55 children into Mama Anna's starting in
January each one commiting to helping 'their' child through whatever grades they have left in primary school...!! <br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-q31x-tlCtD8/UpuHkzti36I/AAAAAAAAAlA/Hf2NO6Igpas/s1600/DSCN4377.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="264" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-q31x-tlCtD8/UpuHkzti36I/AAAAAAAAAlA/Hf2NO6Igpas/s320/DSCN4377.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
English is not taught at local govt primary schools. Most of our kids have been going to the local govt school down the road, until now. Secondary school is taught in English..miraculously the kids at govt primaryschools are expected to head into secondary school with a good handle on English, but
without instruction they have no chance. Now, 55 of our 84 kids are heading into English taught school.<br />
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Thank you to their sponsors...<br />
<span style="color: red;">Our goal:</span> to register all our kids into Mama
Annas...29 to go..at $540 a kid per year...<br />
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<span style="color: red;">To sponsor a child into Mama Annas:</span> please email me at lynnconnell@sympatico.ca to arrange your sponsorship...<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-a7ES_6a5Rxs/UpuIdCAQQvI/AAAAAAAAAlI/S8XoMxrFaAU/s1600/DSC_1419.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="427" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-a7ES_6a5Rxs/UpuIdCAQQvI/AAAAAAAAAlI/S8XoMxrFaAU/s640/DSC_1419.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Majengo childen celebrating at Mama Annas...</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<br />
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="color: red;">New Sponsor coordinator:</span> <span style="color: black;">Simone Lee Hamilton, </span></span>our Toronto volunteer teacher is there now until May 2014, teaching at Majengo and Mama Annas...she will be responsible for updating sponsors with pictures and updates of their kids. Thank you Simone..<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">2014 OPERATING BUDGET - $130,000</span></b><br />
We spent 3 intensive days in October, with ICA project coordinator Charles Luoga, volunteers Matt Brewster and Heidi Wiebe, Majengo staff head Killo, logistics coordinator Hamidu and local govt. leader Mayunga detailing our 2014 operating budget for 140 kids and a staff of 20: their food, maintenance, medical, education, clothing, trips and sporting needs, totalling $130,000: everything to ensure our kids a wonderful life...<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: red;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lAz_zdjiYYk/UptxdDwdA3I/AAAAAAAAAjk/U2ri4JBsmrQ/s1600/IMG_7107.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lAz_zdjiYYk/UptxdDwdA3I/AAAAAAAAAjk/U2ri4JBsmrQ/s640/IMG_7107.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: red;">Mayungs, Killo, Charles, Matt, Lynn, Hamidu and Heidi</span></td></tr>
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<span style="color: red;">FUNDRAISING...in 2013...thanks to all our Majengo team...</span><br />
* we managed to cover our operating costs for 2013: $115,000<br />
* we supported 30 kids into Mama Annas...@$540 each: $16,200.<br />
* we raised another $130,000 to build phase 1 of our new Majengo <br />
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All of our fundraising is through the generosity of friends and family and their friends in Canada and the United States from the proceeds of birthday parties, gifts, prizes, family foundations and international Rotary, and you....<br />
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In September, we raised over $45,000 at Dunedin, Toronto, Washington and Warren fundraisers..huge thanks to everyone who came and donated, who helped with the parties...to fiddle/violinist Anne Lindsey and her band in Toronto, to Toronto caterer Lyndon Wiebe and Paul Copeland for lending us his loft...to Ian Ashburgh in Warren for his Grains and Grapes funder..to all 4 Matts, Di, Kym, Jamie and Chrissie for organizing, to Alicia and Matt Brewster in Washington..and to all of the great people with their ongoing support of Majengo in every way, thanks!!<br />
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<span style="color: red;">Hot off the press!! for US donors only!!</span><br />
Check out our Majengo fundraiser on CrowdRise (http://www.crowdrise.com/majengochildren) - a great and easy way to donate as well... <br />
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<span style="color: red;">NEW MAJENGO FACILITY.</span>..the local goverment gave us 10 acres of open clean land in the valley of the Rift Valley. We started building in Sept 2012 with Warren's Jamie Bees and her Presbyterian friends, and finished most of phase 1 in June 2013, completing 3 big spacious houses for big boys, big girls, and a centre house for little boys and girls - each with a room for a mama and volunteer..open, airy and solid..with huge thanks to Charles for overseeing everyday, a team of 20 local builders,<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ut1ioW-jTpU/Upuba4xcMhI/AAAAAAAAAmo/iuM_dSdcuWs/s1600/IMG_6193.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ut1ioW-jTpU/Upuba4xcMhI/AAAAAAAAAmo/iuM_dSdcuWs/s320/IMG_6193.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Uncle Ed from Toronto,</td></tr>
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<br />
..assisted by Canadian tour company GiveGetGo and their volunteers <br />
(see givegetgo.ca), who have successfully organized 2 trips this year, with more scheduled in 2014, where volunteers spend 8 full days working on construction at Majengo, coupled with an exciting safari to the Serengeti and Ngora Crater, visit local peoples and events and on to the beach in Zanzibar...<br />
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..and so many others...<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-wkDIV1rLg8s/UpuNBujxg6I/AAAAAAAAAlo/kQakmTEJ_0Y/s1600/IMG_6202.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-wkDIV1rLg8s/UpuNBujxg6I/AAAAAAAAAlo/kQakmTEJ_0Y/s320/IMG_6202.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
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Especially the children... getting their new home ready...<br />
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...washing the floors...<br />
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...sorting out clothes <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Diana moving clothes</td></tr>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Dhs6ZAK5YTE/UpuqrfABtRI/AAAAAAAAAnk/iPBiX30Qgpk/s1600/IMG_6255.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Dhs6ZAK5YTE/UpuqrfABtRI/AAAAAAAAAnk/iPBiX30Qgpk/s400/IMG_6255.JPG" width="400" /></a><br />
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<br />
...dismantling 35 bunk beds at the old Majengo and transporting them over to the new Majengo...and putting them all together...<br />
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<span style="color: red;"> </span><br />
<span style="color: red;">MOVING DAY....June 9, 2013...finally....</span><br />
Moved 86 kids in, carrying chickens, ducks and puppies a few days later...sorry I wasn't there and didn't get a great shot of that but I can assure you it must have been crazy...walking the 3 dusty miles from the old location to our new Majengo...animals tucked firmly into their little arms, with great determination...squawking, squirming, leaping alway....<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-izi99UZQ1_0/UpuF5LVlsII/AAAAAAAAAkU/5ErVzOrCsdo/s1600/dining:kitchen+office.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-izi99UZQ1_0/UpuF5LVlsII/AAAAAAAAAkU/5ErVzOrCsdo/s320/dining:kitchen+office.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">dining room, office and kitchen half finished... </td></tr>
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<span style="color: blue;">PHASE ONE </span>construction: thanks to Warren for raising $130,000, Margie Zeidler for designing and to Charles our project coordinator supreme, keeping costs down as much as possible: 3 houses, kitchen, dining and office spaces ..washrooms inside and out....bravo!<br />
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<span style="color: blue;">PHASE TWO <span style="color: black;">construction:</span></span><br />
<span style="color: blue;">.</span>..currently raising $85,000 for a 4th house, resource library, soccer field, net ball court (our girls going to Mama Anna's just came first in the entire district in Netball for the school) and playground...landscaping, security fence...vegetable gardens, goats, cows....<br />
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If you would like to help us, please donate online on our website or by cheque to Majengo Canada or Warren Majengo Foundation...see our website: <span style="color: red;">www.majengo.org</span><br />
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Kids playing on the sandy floor of the new dining room space, which Charles decided to close in, rather than open..so that we can rent it out eventually, as conference space, sustainability for Majengo! <br />
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<span style="color: red;">OUR STAFF...</span><br />
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At left, some of our 20 wonderful staff, without whom we could not operate...with over 100 mouths to feed 3 x a day, showers, washing clothes...no electricity.<br />
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Can you imagine trying to put 84 kids to bed every night without light?<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-VKkoqTXDhL4/UpuHJZw1dPI/AAAAAAAAAkw/v2RDvHEyxaA/s1600/IMG_6956.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-VKkoqTXDhL4/UpuHJZw1dPI/AAAAAAAAAkw/v2RDvHEyxaA/s320/IMG_6956.JPG" width="320" /></a> At our new Majengo, we have a much bigger albeit half-finished kitchen...where the meals are deliciously and magically prepared...ugali, beans, rice, meat, silvery fish, chicken, green..chai..<br />
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Cooks and cleaners live out, but come to Majengo every day...working hard to keep our kids and their clothing, clean and well fed...<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--y7iznU9SOQ/UpuSOUKm15I/AAAAAAAAAl4/2BCHJsMBliY/s1600/IMG_6940.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--y7iznU9SOQ/UpuSOUKm15I/AAAAAAAAAl4/2BCHJsMBliY/s320/IMG_6940.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
Our staff..who love the kids as their own...never ever complain about the amount of work...ever!!...most of whom started with us from the very beginning
and worked for free that whole first year before we got started. We've created a micro - finance program to loan our staff money to enable them to enrol their own children into prohibitively expensive secondary school education.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zoApM5-N2Nk/Upud1eJVquI/AAAAAAAAAm0/zT60jd0pyDQ/s1600/IMG_7083.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zoApM5-N2Nk/Upud1eJVquI/AAAAAAAAAm0/zT60jd0pyDQ/s320/IMG_7083.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Staff, voluneers and visitors at an October staff meetingm where each member of the staff are encourages to speak of successes and challenges, issues and needs, creating trust, care and, communication and connection between all three groups...</td></tr>
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<span style="color: red;">VOLUNTEERS:</span><br />
Big thanks to the generosity and enthusiasm of volunteers who give their time, expertise and love <br />
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to our kids, from their hearts..<br />
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This year welcoming Canadian Heidi Weibe and Matt Brewster, from the Warren Pa area...both of whom came for 6 months and might well stay forever....<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-sP8V7vU_pMA/UpyJHtdiWKI/AAAAAAAAAo4/6LZFx_10e2Y/s1600/IMG_6875.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="250" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-sP8V7vU_pMA/UpyJHtdiWKI/AAAAAAAAAo4/6LZFx_10e2Y/s320/IMG_6875.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Matt with kids in front of 55 brand new matresses</td></tr>
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They are here assisting Charles, our main guy and Majengo co-founder from ICA Tanzania: Matt Brewster on-site with our new build construction, working side by side with local workers, learning Swahili in only a few months<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_kHbwapREDQ/UpuTvQKLHwI/AAAAAAAAAmA/EZz5maSsR-g/s1600/IMG_6876.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_kHbwapREDQ/UpuTvQKLHwI/AAAAAAAAAmA/EZz5maSsR-g/s320/IMG_6876.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Heidi Wiebe doing bead work with the kids</td></tr>
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and spending most nights at<br />
Majengo - showing movies on his laptop, hanging out and lying under the stars teaching the kids the galaxy...check Matt out on Facebook for wonderful persona anecdotes and updates..<br />
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..and Heidi Wiebe from ICA Canada, assisting Charles with ICA work in the office, evolving into full out work for Majengo ..helping wonderfully to organize our updates, charts, children's bios and photos, financial statements and everything...<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-S7MSbBLW0RQ/UpuuyqDrxdI/AAAAAAAAAnw/y3F7XcG-VmI/s1600/IMG_3589.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="276" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-S7MSbBLW0RQ/UpuuyqDrxdI/AAAAAAAAAnw/y3F7XcG-VmI/s320/IMG_3589.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
...and Simone Lee Hamilton, from Toronto, her 4th time over, just graduated from Queen's University in Early Childhood Development, just arrived in November '13 to teach English and no doubt all the other subjects at Mama Anna's and Majengo for 6 months, bringing over lots of friends, and encouraging their parents to sponsor Majengo kids into Mama Annas...bravo to Simone, and her mom Susan for bringing her here..<br />
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Canadian violinist Anne Lindsay from pop group Blue Rodeo singing and playing for the kids...<br />
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...my friend BH Yael...taking hours of video...teaching the kids how to shoot film and take great pics with the cameras...<br />
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Matt's wife mom, Ronnie<br />
fully equipped with dental equipment to test every one of our kids' teeth...making detailed records with the help of Matt's 13 year old daughter Jacqueline, her second trip to Majengo....<br />
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Matt McKissock, ICA Tanzania Brian Gick and team spent June in meetings,
proposing a 10 year financial plan re education and living costs...huge
undertaking, thanks to Charles, Doris and the board of ICA Tanzania, Heidi Weibe and Matt
Brewster and everyone who participated.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Charles Luoga: ICA Tanzania, Lynn Connell: Majengo Canada and Matt McKissock: Warren Majengo Foundation from Warren Pennsylvania </td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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Majengo Canada was absent and
caught up all July thanks to an exceptional education committee in Toronto with
Simone Lee Hamilton, Seanna Connell, Judy MacLellan, Nancy Goodman and
Cathi Bremner<br />
......assisted by Maxine Sidran..<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tqJ6yTQ57fc/Upug6s2_NxI/AAAAAAAAAm4/MAuNMylnzGs/s1600/IMG_7035.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tqJ6yTQ57fc/Upug6s2_NxI/AAAAAAAAAm4/MAuNMylnzGs/s320/IMG_7035.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">my brother Rick and Baby Anna</td></tr>
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My brother Rick...with 4 enthusiastic and supportive friends from
Canada...all contributing in their own wonderful way...and in the end
each sponsoring a few kids to Mama Annas, researching and fundraising for solor....and maybe a new truck for majengo....<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RxP2s_kDtn8/UpuhG4AhBWI/AAAAAAAAAnA/4zjzgh6Yzb8/s1600/IMG_7029.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RxP2s_kDtn8/UpuhG4AhBWI/AAAAAAAAAnA/4zjzgh6Yzb8/s320/IMG_7029.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sue Freeman on her second trip to Majengo, Sherri and Lisa..</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MR-y753VJxw/UpuihYRhwfI/AAAAAAAAAnI/cTKwBvSHCD8/s1600/IMG_6908.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MR-y753VJxw/UpuihYRhwfI/AAAAAAAAAnI/cTKwBvSHCD8/s320/IMG_6908.JPG" width="250" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Suzanne with the kids...</td></tr>
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Big thanks to Lisa, Sherri, Denise and Suzanne for continuing huge support when we got home. Fundraising, arranging bookkeeping, organizing and secretarial help and researching for solar....and to my brother Rick..for putting this all together...a great trip with a great group...<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">AND SANTA.</span></b><span style="color: red;">..last, and not least....</span><br />
<span style="color: red;">we need lots of stuff for Christmas, Dear Santa...</span><br />
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• our operating costs went up to $130,000 for next year...<br />
• we have 29 more kids hoping to get into Mama Anna's January.<br />
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<span style="color: red;">We need new shoes..if someone out there knows Mr.Bata please let us know...</span><br />
<span style="color: red;"><br /></span>
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<span style="color: red;">•3 pairs shoes per kid per year $75 x 86 kids...</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;">•a second water tower</span> and $3,000 to pay Mr Spears to drill us our own well and a solar pump to pump it up into the water tower...<br />
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<span style="color: red;">•electricity!! </span>working on it..and big thanks to Lisa Oelke from Toronto who is researching a solar system for Majengo...and Santa.. we will need money for that...$3,000.<br />
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oh and Santa, <span style="color: red;">we need furniture, badly</span>.....our kids are still lined up in rows patiently eating their dinners on the floor!<br />
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Dining room tables, benches. a couch and chairs for our new houses are desperately appreciated... tables $80.<br />
Benches $20...Couches $95... <br />
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<span style="color: red;">OUR RED TRUCK died...we have no wheels...Our visitors run around in tuk tuks like this, but we walk....Santa...we have two suggestions for you.. or maybe, cause we've been real good...both!!</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is Dr. John's 3 year old Izuzu truck..he will sell it to us for $14,000</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">or...we could buy something like this..at around $10,000 to carry us to school</td></tr>
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<span style="color: red;">with love and thanks Santa...for yet a wonderful 2013, </span><br />
<span style="color: red;">from all of us children of Majengo....</span><br />
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<br />Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-12749986013028379882013-06-18T16:01:00.000-07:002013-06-18T16:01:29.490-07:00MAJENGO KIDS move into their new home!!! June 2013Jambo!!<br />
Back home!!! reeling from the last 13 days in Tanzania, magnificent trip and well worth the current jet lag experience now...we did it! after 9 months of construction, beginning September 2012, Majengo gave birth to its brand new home! <br />
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With 3 big new houses designed by Margie Zeidler, finished and ready to go! <br />
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plus a big dining room, kitchen and offices (the last three almost built as i left last Friday..), 72 kids moved in, in complete darkness Sunday June 09, ecstatic and happy....<br />
Sorry for not keeping this updated when i was there, everything technical for me was down.<br />
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Flew over with Ed Nedzielski, a guy i barely knew from Toronto who for whatever reasons i invited to fly with me..the best choice ever as he plugged in and hit the ground running...right up to the moment we moved the kids in, a paintbrush in hand, sticky thick dark brown oil, the frames and doors of all three houses had to be painted with brushes with hairs flying every which way, a challenge but we did it! <br />
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Windows went in, had to be scrapped down with the one remaining razor we brought over out of 5....clearing...rooms swept and swept, the kids running from our current space through the back woods leaping across 20 minutes of skinny trails, muddy or dusty, everyday rushing just to be there <br />
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working alongside the 19 local workers who've been on the job doing everything by hand since September...mixing cement, chopping huge stones, carrying, lifting, hammering, building..all from scratch, plus....Ed..me, <br />
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Charles (our ICA project coordinator on the ground), Heidi Weibe an ICA Canada volunteer who is there working with Charles for a year, as is Warren's Matt Brewster, on the site everyday as Charles" right hand man....what an amazing team!!<br />
Day one...with 5 days to go before the move in...houses 1 and 2 emmersed with 4 inches of water covering the floor, impossible i thought to ever get these houses together by the weekend...the cement they had mixed covering the floors had cracked, looking like a wide expanse of parched dry and crackling soil, had to be completely done again, with a guy on the floor chiseling out and filling the cracks....dragging in the hose and flooding the rooms with water to help set the cement. Impossible we all thought. But within those 5 days, the floors set...the kids raced over dancing all the way with long squeegie mops slapping the water out of the houses, letting them dry, and painting the entire surfaces up and into sheer darkness, a flashlight showing the way...it was insane but we got it done!!<br />
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I'd forgotten how much I laugh and sing there!!! Telling stories over beer at night, laughing, relaxed, happy...by day a dark oily brown paintbrush in hand, or a broom, or rags, exhausted but working all of us so hard to get the job done! And in late afternoon, hop into the van and bumped back over a couple of miles to our current site where the kids were, our neighbours in mud and stick homes coming out and waving, JAMBO!!! all along the road...one day, my daughter Seanna and Sierra at Montcrest school in Toronto called at the exact time that 12 year old Sierra, my grandaughter giving a speech to 100 kids and teachers at Montcrest....the kids at majengo sang a couple of songs thanking Montcrest for their wonderful donation last year of over $3,500. raised by Sierra and her classmates....with our girl Tato fluent in English now...speaking and answering questions over the line, projected by mic in Toronto to a room of cheering and teary Toronto kids. <br />
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The kids were ecstatic about moving into their new home..running around, measuring shelving, furniture....Everyday asking When!! Everyday coming over to help.....<br />
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packing their clothes wrapped up in huge bundles of sheets, books, desks, <br />
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beds broken up and taken down stacked into the back of the old red truck, it took a day with 6 people puzzling how to put them together, floors painted, beds in...<br />
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shelves....mounds of clothing divided up, the big boys in house 1 painted bright lime green...the little boys and girls in house 2, mauve....and in house 3 the big girls, sky blue..clothing stacked in piles, divided up into all three houses, kids on the floor folding into piles, and onto the shelves...workmen installing door knobs, plumbing in...one toilet working - in the whole place, you head toward it TP in hand, a crew of 20 lounging on a big new porch taking a break, cheering you on....Hamidu our truck driver, hauling a long hose over into house 3...sloshing in the water to clean the floors, handfuls of soap thrown helter skelter the kids with squeegies again, pushing it around and out the door, dancing skipping singing....<br />
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Warren Majengo's Matt McKissock..with his 12 year old daughter Jaqueline arrived 6 days later, with his mom Diana, and mother in law Ronnie, and a friend Pam from Warren......rolled up their sleeves and pitched in to help...Murray and Barbara Brown from Edmonton showed up on safari with their son and his girlfriend, a great visit first to the new site with a great talk under a canopy of trees meeting all of us....then over to the current Majengo...meeting the kids..what an experience for them, and what a great time to be there on the cusp of the kids moving in...<br />
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Ronnie, a dental hygienist laden down fully with dental equipment, setting up shop on the huge open porch of house 3...inspecting each child meticulously....for cavaties....any problems...<br />
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Diana taking pictures with Jacqueline recording, here with Fillipo....a roomful of waiting children inside, sitting on benches in a circle singing... <br />
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The kids moved in at night....only Charles and Hamidu were there to help, it was so late they ushered us off, no doubt thinking that we would have only gotten in the way...we'd just had a welcoming celebration with all the local village leaders, speeches of welcoming and good wishes for the new site. Chickens and ducks were to be carried over by hand by the children a few days later....<br />
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flashlights led the way, we don't have electricity yet, here we are drawing by flashlight! could be months before it is installed, but our staff there seem to take it all in stride..imagine putting 72 kids to bed....in the pitch dark...!<br />
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But they love it here!!!! Here's Jacqueline making bracelets with the kids<br />
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Ed and I and Matt brewster took off the next day on a 5 hour safari bumping along amidst zebra, giraffe, buffalo, elephants, wildebeasts roaming freely in the Manyara national park, 15 minutes from Majengo....monkeys and baboons leaping and jumping wildly threw canope of trees, knarled...sitting on logs cleaning and picking away in pairs.....another great day....wonderful meals with all of us, meetings about Phase 2....including a new library with computers, books, dvds, soccer field and playground, all three to be shared with the whole surrounding Majengo community...the idea being that our kids now living in homes far superior to surrounding mud and stick huts...will open up Majengo and share what we have.....<br />
It continues to plague us, the financing of such a magical endeavour....this year our operating costs $105,000, plus about *15,000 more for special English education....with $85,000 more to raise to complete the buildings.....<br />
Again and again, thank you to everyone who has contributed through these last 4 years...and welcoming you to bring Majengo to your friends and family....every bit counts, and I can only wish that you could be over there seeing where your dollars have gone...it is a miracle to me that we have gone this far!!! <br />
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And here we are, Charles on the left...me, with Matt expressing a little mock frustration! an incredible team with an incredibly wide expanse of skills, philosophy and methodology...but most of all, each and every one of us are drawn together with an incredible love for these kids...<br />
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we've watched them grow up....they are close to us as our own...<br />
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Home again...after 13 days, and for me back up to Dunedin....the night before i left June 2...ahuge party here to celebrate marci lipman's birthday, Rusty playing rock and roll, dancing, great food and wonderful people....her gifts, donations to Majengo....thank you everyone who participated....<br />
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will write again, when i am fully awake!!<br />
xxLynn<br />
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<br />Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com64tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-39845437118094514392013-01-17T10:54:00.001-08:002013-01-18T18:35:46.700-08:00MARCI and LYNN...December 2012<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Jambo!! from Marci and Lynn, 3 weeks at Majengo...I'm writing this in January, cold, dark and grey in downtown Toronto, remembering... Marci's first time over, and every once in awhile she might say "well..it's not for everyone!!", rice and beans, rice and beans...sounds healthy and good..but everyday?? lunch and dinner?? But now that she's back......<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Qf0jnwqUHEk/UPVUHDIqLrI/AAAAAAAAAbk/b46-aucK6xU/s1600/IMG_5014.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Qf0jnwqUHEk/UPVUHDIqLrI/AAAAAAAAAbk/b46-aucK6xU/s320/IMG_5014.JPG" width="320" /></a>Our first day, off to Majengo to visit the kids who swarm us as we climb out of the old red truck, so heart warming to see them again...4 years now and how they have grown.<br />
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The big girls, not little kids anymore, but young women now, teaching us line dance in the middle of a field with Filippe holding Charles' laptop blasting Itunes - the girls asking for long skirts now and nice shoes.<br />
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The boys, well like all boys, a little gawky, not wanting to show a lot of emotion, but its so there. Our visits twice a year - we get to follow their lives closely. When we first met them coming from such unspeakably terrible early years, either on the streets without family, or worse, and then into their first home at Majengo, in March 2009 when we opened with 27 kids living in. Now, jammed into 3 rented cottages, 4 years later, bursting with 77 kids and, as of this month, another 60 living out.<br />
And can you imagine! by April they'll be moved a few miles down the road into their brand new home <br />
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So on day one, I couldn't wait to see it! after 8 months of Margie's designs we pile the kids into the back of the truck and pull up to the site, astonishing! Imagine 2 football fields of wide open space under the magnificent rift valley, with 2 houses built up to the roofline..and the 3rd- its footprint started with foundation. <br />
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The kids leap out of the truck and scatter....like birds set to flight, I can't begin to imagine how they must feel seeing their future home pop out out the ground, like a miracle...This place will far surpass our current facility, in space...with big airy homes, a room for a mama in each, good open ventilation, and wide open spaces, to run and play, a soccer field, play ground, a big open dining room for 100 kids, kitchen, pre school..and someday, a library with computers and lots of books, and DVDs...a tv for once in awhile watching...chicken coop...goats, cows..a vegetable garden behind every house...and a tree for every child!<br />
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We start walking from house to house, from room to room...this one is for the girls, the boys, the mama..here is your bathroom, your bedroom, kitchen, here is where you do your homework!! Can you imagine how this must feel to them!<br />
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19 guys are working on the spot, hand mixing cement, and lugging it over to house 3, truckloads of stones dumped into the the foundation, to be broken in small pieces with a sledgehammer, again, all by hand. No electricity. Awesome!<br />
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Here is Charles, our build supervisor and engineer and Majengo project coordinator extraordinaire! who is holding it all together on the ground. Over at the site every day, revising plans, enlarging windows, doorways for better ventilation, doing estimates, buying materials, organizing labour, touring us around.....Majengo would not be happening without Charles...<br />
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On day one, we're at a meeting with village leaders on site, and tour them around how could they not be impressed! I report on a project back in Canada called POWER AFRICA...raising money to bring wind and solar into rural Africa, interested in appraising Majengo and the community early in the new year. Free technology and hook-up. Very cheap electricity. I'm meeting with them late January...<br />
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The days fly by...everyday we head off to Majengo, to draw with the kids, read stories, just hang out...budgets with Charles, we headed 100 km from Mto Wa Mbu in the old red truck to speak at an international celebration for HIV AIDS day!! to a place called Locksale...way out in the middle of no where, a Masai village bustling with market day, top politicians who had come a long way for the celebration, hundreds of school kid, songs, dance, speeches...<br />
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....after a big lunch of rice and beans, jumped back into the truck where it broke down. 3 hours later, as dusk fell they found a village truck to haul us 75 kil over bump and dale to the main road, no bus, no truck, waiting, Marci and I and a delegation of HIV positive people, tired and starving, we rustled up a bit of dinner, in the middle of the night, dark, cold...waiting...and finally finally, finally....home.<br />
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Marci was clearly on a work-a-day tour, as opposed to a nice safari, where wheels stay on the trucks, the windows go up and down, and people are on time. Rice and beans, rice and beans, rice and beans....Working at Majengo equals local food at $3 a meal, lodging ($15. a night - private room and bath with hot water!) on a back street, dirt road sort of motel, side by side with women cooking dinner over fires on the side of the road - real Africa...our days filled running after Charles, doing or waiting for Charles. I have tried to learn patience here. Cause I know when he is an hour or two late it is because he has taken a baby to hospital en route between Majengo and picking us up, or attended a funeral - always a good reason. But communication is a challenge, and when it happens it is thrilling!<br />
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Wow!! Right this very minute, as i am writing today, I got skyped by Charles with all the great kids at a good bye party for the first <a href="http://www.givegetgo.ca/" target="_blank">Give Get Go</a> Majengo build tour!! they have had a fabulous time over the last two weeks...every day out there in the hot sun lugging rocks, building walls, on safari to the Ngora Crater, visiting Masai markets, and biking through banana plantations. Monika, who has worked on 5-6 Habitat for Humanity builds wrote that this far surpasses anything she has EVER done!!! wow!!! Check out Give Get Go for their next trips (February!!). It was so much fun seeing the kids...I miss them so!!<br />
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We took the little kids into Arusha to a great playground for the first time, all 40 of them, and then of to the NgoraNgora Crater with the big kids...37 of them...what a fiasco, waited a couple of hours for very late vans to arrive, drive up to the crater their very first time! Kids were crazy with excitement, they'd been talking about this all week...<br />
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Got into the park...a few hours late to meet the big old bus that was certified to take all of us down into the crater. Well he got tired of waiting for us, and took a group of Asian people down, driving around looking at lions until Charles hit the roof...! we were up on the rim waiting with all these kids, eating lunch in the van, pouring rain outside when the poor guy pulled up the crater, we loaded in and got on our way. Well we were only down there for 15 minutes when the back left tire burst. All the guys poured out, and took awhile to fix it, all the while i had diah. and had to be escorted out to the back to do my business a little worried about lions and tigers and bears...the kids, once i was done, followed suit. Finally we were on our way.<br />
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Zebras...wildebeasts! lions..male and female, leopards lurking through tall grasses, elephants and even a rhino, we saw them all in a few hours..back up before 6pm closing time..Marci and i headed out on our trek...back into the red truck, pouring rain, and searching for the park ranger with a gun, all the way over gutted wet muddy roads slipping and skidding to Nanokanoka...we found the ranger, headed out to his cashe to pick up the gun, when after a big fight with our tour director Frederick with cook Mohammed, took off, the gun flopping up and down on his back. What!! we had paid for him, but not enough, or he didn't have the money but all we knew was that we didn't have a ranger with a gun. In the middle of no where out there, with said lions and hyhenas...and whatever else, we called him back. And paid. Double. but we had a guy and a gun.<br />
An hour later, rambling driving in the dark, pelting rain...arrived on the ridge of the Embarkai crater, too dark to see anything, but squeezed into our pjs in the dark while those guys set up our tent, and theirs, canvas to canvas, side by side, a few inches away. As we crawled in wondering whether this was a big mistake, their last words to us were to stay in our tent, and to call our them when we needed to pee. The Masai warrior who had walked 20 miles over with 4 donkeys had given up waiting, turned around and headed home..another 20 K - we dined en tent a la spagetti with carrot/tomato sauce, tent leaking, tired, disgruntled, sort of, and off to bed, chuckling. Sort of.<br />
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The next day dawned bright and beautiful. Hamidu and I did a bit of a workout on the road...Mohammed made a great breakfast, Frederick took down the tents and the park ranger watched it all. He'd had a bit of a tough night, with both Marci and I getting up twice each, fending off mosquitoes and wart hogs and what not...down into the crater we trotted in a line...me, Marci, Frederick and the ranger with the gun. Through glorious rain forest and dew, bits of sunshine seeping through high entwining vines and mist, awesome. Flamingos pink and white basked at the bottom around a vast lake, the mist lifting...smoke from a hidden Masai camp pretzled up in soft swirling circles, up the other side, no path, rock, hard...the warriors in hiding, hunkering in there to regain their strength, a donkey tied to a tree nearby.<br />
The trip up was not terrifically to my liking. I am strong, thankfully but i don't like up. Marci was fine. I was not, counting my steps, swearing under my breathe enough already.<br />
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Saved by our driver Hamidu, jumped on his back piggyback style to the top..and on to the masai village to pick up the warrior with our four donkeys...a circle of women on the ground now, more and more coming as they see a chance to sell the lovely beaded necklaces, bracelets they wove...we choose a few from each one. When you visit me, at one of our next Majengo fundraisers I will show you them..We take off after a few hours...the Masai with the four donkeys burdens of beast now laden with all our kitchen, bedding, food, and whater...rushing alongside a herd of cows...<br />
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one like Jonathon Livingston Segal rushing out from the group towards me!I am running along, and he is running along beside me, a big black cow of some sort, but with ill intentions, he is almost alongside when Frederick, who is also in orange, batts him off, not once but twice, this guy is persistant. And on we go, rushing, power walking ...the entire Masai village running along at our heels hoping to sell us of more beads, followed by four donkeys, the herdsman, the cows....a procession. We hit nightfall at dusk. A tranquil rural setting amongst hills and valleys...cows mooing....they unpack, unleash the donkeys and set up tent as Marce and I head downhill to lie on old burlap sacks...cover our heads from the late afternoon sun and rest ourselves.<br />
...a boy of about 8 is hiding behind a tree drapped in dark brown rags...the shepherd of 17 cows loitering below and proceeding steadfastly in our direction, a flotila of flies and flees and flying things carving the way. There is no rest. The boy is fascinated by us, i give him water. He doesn't go away. His cows attuned now to the seeming attentiveness we have shown to him, draw closer. Covered in flies we scramble up and back toward our tents, where just behind a line of Masai women wait patiently, for us to get up in notice of them....and their beads.<br />
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Then, suddenly, out of the jungle, Masai warriors appear, dancing, jumping high, wailing with aborigional sounds just like the warriors I once knew in the American Indian Movement in the Black Hills of the Dakotas ... we amalgamate, the men, women and us..in celebration. And later, deep into the silence of night, cries of whooping, laughing and joy. <br />
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The next day is beyond anything i have experienced. We walked, hiked, hung on to each other, well here is where for some reason i could dance and sing and hike 8 miles down a series of blackened volcanic ash mountains to our old red truck at the bottom...My dear friend Marce who forgot her hat, improvised swirling her Tilley blouse round and round leaving the collar tilted high as a sun vise....a Masai stick in her right hand and Frederick on her left, she was like her mom, with vertigo, and a lovely man aside. African men, are real men. They haven't been liberized to the point where they are unsure of how to be, who to be. They get out there and do their job, the guy stuff...and let the ladies lie in rest in the sun. They laugh, their camaradarie is infectious...lovely...<br />
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We treked across rift and mountain, valley, alongside the sacred Mountain of God...forever...in land untouched and unseen by fellow man, at least for that day, we were alone on the planet. The last bit across acrid plain. Hot, dry....with Hamidu's red truck in the distance. Lake Natron. We visited Chief of the Engaruga tribe on our way home, love to his family and the 27 goats i now own...next stop a quick visit on our way home, <br />
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with Tatu, one of the 24 Masai girls supported through Majengo's Masai Girls Education Fund, sponsored by Marion and Peg with artist friends, at their annual Art Show. Tatu, four years of secondary, now married with baby Lynn running her very own successful shop, with help from Matt, in the village of Selela...<br />
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The next day, back to Mto Wa Mbu to interview another young girl just starting out thanks to the Education fund. Here she is with her family, her mom age 32, raped by an employer, (her father) now wracked with the HIV AIDS virus her little sister at her side, her gramma and uncle behind. She is going into 2nd year, like Tatu, her life will change dramatically over the next few years.<br />
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Ah...and Baby Anna..everyone asks about her, the little 9 month old brought to us by police a few years ago, emaciated, dying, with a day or two left to live. Hadija, our cook, took her home...and here she is today....bravo!! <br />
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Back to Majengo for our going away party, so hard to leave, but so good to know that soon i will return.<br />
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House three is built all the way upn to the roof!! Here Charles is inspecting every room, window, wall and foundation carefully. Next, the roof and the insides...<br />
We hope it will be finished by March or April to move the kids in!<br />
And for Marci and I, home...a six hour bus ride to Nairobi, catch a flight to Paris, smoked salmon with little toast pieces and chardonay at 10am..on a plane with a guy whose passion is to grow big vegetables...so you fill up a rain barrel with water and sink into it a burlap bag of cow or chicken manuere...let it mull about and water your veggies every few days and stand back andf watch them explode! or..if you like long straight carrots..get a 28 inch long, 2" inch wide circular plastic pipe...the ones they use for plumbing..sink it 10 inches into the ground, with 18 inches above. Fill it up with good soil and plant three carrot seeds at the top, watered with the manuered water. One week later, snip off the two little plants leaving the best one to grow, water every three days. Wow! one big 18 inch long straight yummy carrot delicious he tells me. Yum.<br />
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Next trip over...Give Get Go!! watch for it on our updates, home page!<br /><br />
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<br />Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-44736785969116524952012-11-23T11:03:00.005-08:002012-11-23T11:03:55.809-08:00MARCI and LYNN, on our way!!!<br />
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ON OUR WAY!!!!Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-58399113616790937442012-11-21T20:10:00.000-08:002012-11-21T20:10:04.543-08:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Leaving Friday for Majengo!!! With great friend Marci Lipman, her first time. Haven't been over since January, so very exciting. Can't wait to see the kids especially...Tatu speaking English!!!! This is just astounding...she came to us from one of the 'bad' orphanages set up on the safari route to lure in tourists, until the govt shut them down and brought 67 new kids to us, back in Dec 2010. Total mahem, but today, they have amalgamated into one huge happy family with 77 kids living in and another 35 or so, living out.<br />
So she came from one of those places, abused, hurt, sullen, angy...she barely looked at me the first time I met her. Held back. Distrustful. Angry.<br />
8 months later, on my next visit she had settled in, had confidence in Majengo, it was a good place, she was getting three meals a day, and cared for by some pretty wonderful people. She loved looking after the little ones. That second visit, she started hanging out with me, a little.<br />
But watched a lot.<br />
Four or five visits later. I am her mama.<br />
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Last January we registered 14 of our brightest kids into Mama Anna's English Primary, based on marks. We told the other kids: if you do well, we will do our best to get you into Mama Anna's (it is not govt, private i guess you would say, teaching everything in English and the best thing going education wise in the entire area, but $420 per child per year).<br />
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Our criteria back then, was marks. <br />
She hung her head.<br />
She'd been held back with little opportunity to excel, at the other orphanage. She knew she would never make the grade. But she was huge in her enthusiasm, her love of life, her love of helping the other kids at Majengo. She bursts with happiness when she sees you.<br />
She tries real hard.<br />
WE said, ok, she's going. No matter what.<br />
And here we are 8 months later, her marks catapulted...her confidence blossomed. And she is now speaking English!! Bilingual!! <br />
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Me...i am put to shame. I have been going over for 6 years now, and can't speak Swahili. So this year, my Majengo partner Matt informed me that not only had HE learned Swahili last spring, but so had his 12 year old daughter who he just took over! Yikes! I bought PimLeurs Swahili and did my best to learn. In the car, at the counter over coffee...not easy! but between my trainer and swahili, i am challenging myself big time this year...not there yet...but hopefully this time over it will be a bit better!<br />
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Last night Joan Vanduzer of the Harbinger Foundation called with a great idea of starting a sewing component at Majengo...teaching our kids how to sew, so that they can make their own clothes, uniforms, and someday maybe get out there and start their own business! To top it off, Joan donated our first sewing machine which i am going to pick up in Arusha soon as we arrive.<br />
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And huge thanks to my great friend Rick Hart for coming up with the idea of people donating to Majengo by SELLING STOCKS....especially at this time of year. They would get a full tax receipt for the amount of the stock, and would not be charged capital gains as it would be going to a registered charity. Great!!! Email Rick at MacDougal, MacDougal MacTier: 514-394-3000, rhart@3macs.com. if you are interested:<br />
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Power for Majengo. In the process of building our brand new own facility for our kids... Today, I met with a woman from Kenya, who is working with Power Africa, a group here in Canada who are getting grants to provide Canadian wind and solar technology and hook ups/maintenance to help whole communities in rural Africa, grow! Why not..very exciting...checking with Charles, our project coordinator at Majengo and an engineer...everyday, something coming together...<br />
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Marci and i went to the Goodwill yesterday, crawled out with $500 worth of clothes for the kids, piled high on my table, along with 80 plush toys for Christmas, balloons, tennis balls, skipping ropes, felt drawing pens...<br />
More tomorrow! <br />
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All set to go, bags packed... Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-55660610041567894712012-11-02T11:33:00.000-07:002012-11-02T11:33:37.982-07:00Charles house flooded; children trapped inside. Halloween update...Breaking news! Charles' house flooded; children trapped inside:<br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Helvetica, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 12.0px;">Dear Lynn and Matt! "I am still in Nepal. the global conference has just ended today, tomorrow we will be traveling to a town called Nagarkot for ICA gathering, for two days and then home.<br />
It rained a lot yesterday night in Arusha and my house was flooded, some of neighbors houses went down in the street am living, it was sad that my wife was in Dar and my little cute kids were with their aunt and a house maid when water came into my house and flooded, neighbors jumped into my gate and rescued my children, most of properties, food and clothes have been damaged. Grace flied to Arusha from Dar and now they are cleaning the house which is full of mud<br />
Thank you God my kids are all ok, although they suffered to be in water for some hours inside the house without knowing where to go at night".</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Helvetica, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 12px;"></span></span>Oh Charles...thank God the kids are safe and no one was hurt. We wish you well...be safe and love to Grace and your kids. I will see you in a few weeks...! xxLynn<br />
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I just got this email while finishing my Halloween update...<br />
Halloween 2012...update on Majengo, and thanks to all your support and interest we are flourishing! I'm usually over there at this time, but this year am on dinner, baths and overnight with Lindsey's two little ones - Jim away filming, but back over Nov 23rd-Dec 14th with Marci Lipman this time, who is planning to climb Kili! Very exciting! More about that from Africa, when we land in a few weeks!<br />
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So much to say since i last wrote this blog in Feb!!, been consumed with revamping our website with web-wizard Cassie Barker, holding two big Majengo parties, one in Toronto and one up at my Creativity Art Retreat which were so much fun, and great to catch up with so many friends, plus running last summer's art retreat in Dunedin (www.lynnconnellart.com) which was a big success - ook for our new lineup for Spring/summer 2013! Huge thanks to all who came to support Majengo, to all who helped out, and to Margie Zeidler and her staff who gave us her perfectly fabulous roof-top garden at 401 Richmond to hold that awesome springtime party, with singer songwriter Mary Margaret O'hara and Rusty McCarthy on guitar, the parties raising over $23,000, thanks Majengo Canada!!! And to Judy Steed for getting an article in the Toronto Star. <br />
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So here we are! catapulting into our 4th year at Majengo: 114 kids, safe and really happy after so many of them rescued in 2010 from abuse and corruption along the safari route...settling into their huge bubbling happy home, swarming with kids age 2 to 14, 75 bunking onsite into three small cottages, cramped but clean, desperately in need of more space and more mamas to provide emotional and individual attention.<br />
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Our rental contracts expire in 2013. This year, we vowed to build them a new home. I bumped into Canadian designer Margie Zeidler last December pulling out of my back yard parking into the laneway behind her house. Upon hearing what we were doing and having worked in Africa a few years back, she jumped at the opportunity to go over, and donate her services, first with me last January and again in April to complete our conceptual drawings. She working hand-in-hand with Charles and the staff at Majengo, visited other established orphanages, with months of drawing, materials and space. Ultimately we've decided on 6 houses for the kids, each with a room for volunteers and a mama; a pre-school, library, computer room, infirmary, arts and craft centre, soccer field and playground, and outdoor kitchens and dining for over 100 people. Our current dining room's thatched roof collapsed a couple of weeks ago, lying now in a heap on the ground! Luckily no one was hurt! They quickly set up eating operations inside the three small cottages - a huge crisis, but soon to be solved! <br />
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In June, the government granted us 10 acres of land 3 miles down the road from our current facility. A huge plot, a stones-throw from the soaring local water tower amidst acres of small farms spotted along the road - a wind swept, wide-open palatte on which we hope to paint a wonderful new life for these children. Matt went over to finalize the legals with Tanzanian and US lawyers to ensure North American donors ultimate control over the usage of the buildings and land for as long as Majengo is in operation.<br />
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We expect that to be a very long time! Our goal is to support these children through primary, secondary, trade schools, even on to university, whatever is needed to provide them a great start in life, to create a safe, healthy, permanent home for them for as long as they need - an opportunity to flourish.<br />
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Between Warren Majengo and Majengo Canada, we raised about $115,000 by August, enough to start Phase One of the build, with another $175,000 to go! Plus, we have to keep up with our $90,000 annual operating expenses covering medical, accommodation, food, staff, eduction - life. Our situation is always 'fly by the seat of our pants', and miraculously to all of us, it continues to keep working! But only because of the hundreds of people generously donating time, energy and money here and in the States. Someone asked me recently, how do i keep the energy going, it has been over 6 years now...and the answer is simply, we have 114 little lives out there that we are responsible for, and there is no way we can stop. So. Anything we can do to help you help us, please let us know! I'm totally open to visiting homes and friends with a slideshow, speaking at local events - whatever it takes. For those of us who have been lucky enough to visit these Majengo children, experience their shining happy faces, the progress of their lives, embrace intimately this African culture, you will see, we get so much more than we could ever give. Welcome aboard!<br />
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I'm thinking now of Baby Anna, who was dropped off to us a year ago by the local police, a 9 month baby with the body of 3 months, emaciated, starving, with, they said, a few days more to live. Our cook Adhija took her home by night, and by day she flourished at the orphanage, with staff and children alike making it their purpose to keep her alive. Today she races around, healthy, exuberent and full of life - abundantly loved by everyone. <br />
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In September, Jamie Bees and her husband Larry from Warren organized a group of ten Ist Presbyterian church members to begin the build. I drove down to Warren with new Canadian board member Brian Metcalfe who has fabulously taken over the job of Majengo N.A. treasurer - a great friend and accountant for 30 years. He was greatly inspired by the dinner Matt and Kym threw with Jamie and her crew openly sharing their excitement and fears a few days before they took off. Their trip was a huge success. Especially as they were the first group to go over to help build, with no idea what to expect. They broke into three groups: one working alongside local labourers on site, hauling bricks, digging trenches and foundations, and cement-mixing under the hot African sun,
astonishing local workers who saw a different side of us North Americans not only sending over money, but getting down deep and dirty to
actually help make this dream come true. At this writing, they've dug foundations for three houses and created a series of outdoor toilets and showers. <br />
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The second group spent time with the kids at Majengo, teaching art, English, chopping and cooking, washing clothes and cabins and kids.<br />
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The third teaching English over at Mama Anna's English school where 16 lucky Majengo kids have been attending since January 2012, chosen by teacher Grayson based on marks and how hard they are trying. I met Mama Anna last October and was instantly drawn to her. After putting her own three children through university, she started her own school with 4-5 kids in her kitchen, which, in 3 years has erupted into a substantial facility with 300 kids and 16 qualified teachers. Since January all 16 of our kids are bilingual according to Margie Zeidler who visited 4 months into their enrolement. My goal is ultimately to be able to afford to enrol all 114 Majengo kids into her school - at a further $420 each a year. <br />
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In Tanzania, public school is basically free, from age 7 to 14, but taught totally in Swahili, which i am trying to learn, after Matt disclosed that after working with Primleur for three months last year he can get by in that language!" Yikes! And me, over there for 6 years with a vocabulary of Jambo! Hi, how are you? It is not easy. Anyway, for those who can afford the annual fee of $650 for Secondary school, they stumble, as it is taught totally in English, almost impossible to transfer from Swahili to English without lessons, and with teachers struggling themselves to learn English. So you can see why our goal of getting all our kids into Mama Anna's will give them a huge advantage down the road.<br />
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Back to Jamie's group. At lunchtime everyone congregated over a 7 course delicious African lunch of goat, ugali, rice, beans, bananas, avacado, catered by the popular Double M bar/restaurant in the centre of town, culminating with a fabulous going away party with children and staff - acrobatics, songs and dancing with the kids, local government and neighbours all giving a hand - it doesn't get better than that!<br />
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You too can be part of the build!<br />
<a href="http://givegetgo.ca/who-we-are.html">Give Get Go</a> (http://givegetgo.ca/who-we-are.html) came on board this year in the form of three wonderful women who have worked on over 20 Habitat for Humanity builds around the world, Laurie, Michelle and Kim, now creating their own company to bring groups over to help build Majengo, go on safari and visit Zanzibar, starting in January!! Check them out! A great way to get the experience of a lifetime for themselves and give back - all in one fell swoop!<br />
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So many great people to thank this year!!! <br />
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Bravo to Peg Graham and Marion Burnett who raised $5,000 at their annual May <a href="http://theartshowtoronto.ca/">ART SHOW..</a>..and to the artists who donated a portion of their sales to send 16 more Masai Girls to secondary school...I'll be creating a Masai Girls Education fund page on our website for details...this program is a part of Majengo Canada's charitable foundation projects. <br />
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And to Mike Donovan and his <a href="http://liondogafricansafaris.com/">Lion Dog African Safari</a> whose clients are visiting Majengo with donations and books to read to the children. I've been back and forth on visitors to the orphanage, worried that the children will soon feel like fish in bowls, or worse, begin to change their behaviour to favour western tourists. Consulted with Charles, our Majengo project coordinator, who advised visitors to do something with the children while they are there, rather than just taking their pictures. So Mike and I, and everyone else who wishes to visit, worked out a program, where visitors are asked to donate $100 for the priviledge of spending time at Majengo, sign our Visitor regulation sheet, and spend their time there reading English books which they have brought, playing soccer, or games, teaching the kids English or art. Because we don't yet have a volunteer coordinator, this process seems to be working well. A win win for both visitors and the children! Also...no candies, money, or favouring individual kids, please..<br />
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Lots and lots more..it has been way too long!<br />
again all the best Charles to you and your family...the wild flooding, hurricanes, Sandy, winds, rains, fires and devastating drought this year gives thought toward so many on this planet suffering...who says there is no global warming? And on that note....Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-69107753231338111192012-02-07T03:14:00.000-08:002012-02-07T04:48:25.458-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9p0gqvTZknM/TzEdEM7nblI/AAAAAAAAAY0/VdXzR6HLLjk/s1600/IMG_3159.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9p0gqvTZknM/TzEdEM7nblI/AAAAAAAAAY0/VdXzR6HLLjk/s400/IMG_3159.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5706374160883084882" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZiEkrreBdKU/TzEdCxnaWKI/AAAAAAAAAYo/9lGOVpkCiGQ/s1600/IMG_3344.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZiEkrreBdKU/TzEdCxnaWKI/AAAAAAAAAYo/9lGOVpkCiGQ/s400/IMG_3344.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5706374136370714786" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-JYLcV-J1P2E/TzEdCmK1sBI/AAAAAAAAAYc/O_s1Z3hGbnQ/s1600/IMG_3128.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-JYLcV-J1P2E/TzEdCmK1sBI/AAAAAAAAAYc/O_s1Z3hGbnQ/s400/IMG_3128.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5706374133298081810" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-t6nxPdc15Ow/TzEdA2WybeI/AAAAAAAAAYQ/0GGjCEa1ZEU/s1600/IMG_3589.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-t6nxPdc15Ow/TzEdA2WybeI/AAAAAAAAAYQ/0GGjCEa1ZEU/s400/IMG_3589.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5706374103283428834" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZrgFeSovYLc/TzEdAh1ZVDI/AAAAAAAAAYE/q-Rxgb4YdAU/s1600/IMG_2963.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZrgFeSovYLc/TzEdAh1ZVDI/AAAAAAAAAYE/q-Rxgb4YdAU/s400/IMG_2963.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5706374097774662706" border="0" /></a><br />JANUARY 2012 visit to Tanzania...accomplished!!<br />Jambo!! Before our January trip, joint meeting in Buffalo with friends in Warren, Pennsylvania and Majengo Canada. We created a long list of things we hoped the team from Canada could accomplish to move us forward....<br /><br />Huge thanks this time to Canadian team of Seanna and Sierra Connell-Snell, Susan Lee, Simon Lee Hamilton, Margie Zeidler...to Charles Luoga, our on ground project coordinator and our wonderful staff at ICA and Majengo!!!! A whirlwind three weeks...with everyone back home now, jet lagged, exhausted, and missing those kids at Majengo, terribly. Ah...but the memories..<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Briefly....impossible to sumerize....but here i go!!</span><br />• Team thought kids are in really good shape....happy and settled in one huge Majengo family, staff too. It's been a year since 67 kids arrived at Majengo en masse, a year of huge adjustment for kids and staff plus a major budget explosion for ongoing costs here in North America. Well done to everyone out there who has been helping, both in Tanzania and on the ground here in Canada and the US. WE are in this for life!!! With 114 kids depending on us...what a challenge. And what a feat!! thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!<br /><br />•Majengo Canada got our official charitable status from the Canadian government.... transitioning now into a legal and substantially verifiable organization, responsible for tax receipts, financial accountability and Board approval both here in Canada and in Tanzania. It has been a huge feat! And again i thank everyone on our board in both countries bearing with me especially ....I called it the Founder's Dilemna back in the spring, adjusting from the sponteneity of creative spirit toward growing a grounded, ongoing and successful organization.<br />A challenge, and I thank everyone for bearing with me through this process!!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">JANUARY trip highlights and accomplishments:</span><br />•MAJENGO STAFF: Hired Spora Waziri: a nurse/matron with 40 years of government hospital experience in charge of the emotional/physical needs of the kids, diets, monthly reports, education. Welcome aboard! WE now have a staff of 16 local people overseen by Charles Luoga from local agent ICA Tanzania and local village leaders: Mayunga and Raymond, as follows:<br />-Killo and Martha, sec and treasurer who oversee daily operations, buying food, maintenance, bookeeping, health and well being of the children and staff...<br />-Grayson our fabulous pre school on site teacher assisted by<br />-Matilda and Eve, two Masai girls who we supported through 5 years of secondary school and Montessori teacher's college;<br />-Nuruana, Mariamu and Sauma: three cooks who manage to serve up over one hundred meals, three times a day, over an open fire within a small outdoor kitchen:<br />-Janet, Hildegarde, Hadija, Felister and Ameni: 5 cleaners who not only shower and keep 77 kids clean everyday, and wash hundreds of items of clothing everyday, but also keeping our three cottages clean and maintained.<br />-Maulid and Mhina, two watchmen, equipped with bows and arrows to protect the kids night and day...<br />- beginning the process of finding a great English teacher.<br />- updated staff salaries, reviewed and approved budget<br />- assisted 5 staff members with interest free loans to support their own children through secondary school.<br />-great visit with India and Peter, co-founders of Rift Valley Children's home ourside Kiratu, to research their children's home, for design ideas towards our new Majengo facility, which we hope to begin building this summer....pending on raising capital funding.<br />-Canadian architect Margie Zeidler volunteering her expertise with photos, sketches and great ideas, in the process of creating initial conceptual drawings for our new Majengo facility, collaborating with staff, ICA, local leaders and children.<br />- approval from Monduli District Council (like our provincial or state governmental body), of local Majengo government gift to Majengo of a 6+ acres of wide open windswept plot of land, 3 miles away from Majengo, for our new facility.<br />- Susan Lee and Charles interviewing local lawyers to draft contracts re ownership of buildings, land.<br />-initial discussions with Charles re ground supervisors and builders for new facility.<br />-took Majengo kids and staff on safari in nearby Manyara national park: delighted by giraffe, lions hanging and hissing overhead in a tree, zebra, flamingo, ostrich, wildebeast, buffalo, gizelle, elephants!!! all there, 15 minutes from Majengo! 3 vans filled with kids, one getting hugely stuck in three feet of sinking mud and water....<br />-trips to Kiratu for older and younger kids to playground, swings, slides, climbing walls....blast!<br />-daily English, jewellery making, craft and art classes...with Simone, Susan, Seanna and Sierra.<br />--organized and Olympic field meet, with three legged races, running, jumping games.<br />- Sponsorship Program: 11 children to date<br />- registered 26 kids (age 1-7), into Majengo pre school, 88 (age 7-14) into primary school, and 2 into secondary school,<br />-17 kids into nearby Mama Annas English Medium School, big thanks to sponsors Joseph Slepertas (England), Susan Lee, Ralph Hicks, Peg and Marion's Masai Girls Education fund. On Grayson and Charles recommendation of kids doing well, and/or working hard... English vastly improved with older kids teaching English to staff and little ones.<br />-Simone donated computer for Majengo, taught Killo, Grayson computer skills, which they now teach the children! Wait till we get our new facility, with computers and a library!!<br />-Registered 16 kids into Masai Girls Education Fund, secondary school program thanks to Peg and Marion.<br />-Visited 4 street kids in jail for stealing food, in process of getting them out and into govt boarding school, primary. Need sponsor.<br />-Margie Zeidler creating sponsorship for teacher Grayson into one year Early Childhood Development degree in Arusha. (Grayson preparing teachers Matilda and Eve in his absense.)<br />-huge staff meeting: with challenges, successes, bought new needed items; maintenance, etc.<br />-Created proposed policies on children’s rights, behaviour, staff, vision, mission, treatment of kids, properties. To be approved by Board.<br />-Dennis (govt. social worker) reviewing backgrounds of all kids, to determine vulnerability and need to meet Majengo criteria.<br />-Welcomed 2 more vulnerable kids into Majengo.<br />Currently supporting 114 kids: 76 children living in. 37 living out.<br />-Updated Staff and Children’s bios and pics, age, schools, charts.<br /><br />And had a fabulous time doing it!!!<br />Decided to include this into my blog....a record of hard work and great fun...<br />NEXT STEPS:<br />-New Majengo facility: estimated cost: $250,000.<br />-Major fundraising efforts in the US and Canada planned. Anyone willing to help,<br />please EMAIL!!! In the US: majengo@majengo.com; In Canada: lynnconnell@sympatico.ca.<br />-Matt's visit June to review legals, set up process with Charles and staff re building new facility, on ground contractors, builders, construction drawings....<br />-begin building new facility.<br />-Jamie taking church mission over in Sept/Oct to assist building.<br />-Lynn back to Tanzania November....<br /><br />Would love to hear from you...and welcome everyone to get involved....<br />Thank you to everyone out there helping...I only wish you could visit to see for yourself what your dollars are directly doing....thanks~!!Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-42625532482499919352012-02-02T02:26:00.000-08:002012-02-06T03:03:14.516-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x0_PawyOlyw/Ty-xvOgBCII/AAAAAAAAAXk/teb3g6uGFSc/s1600/IMG_3544.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x0_PawyOlyw/Ty-xvOgBCII/AAAAAAAAAXk/teb3g6uGFSc/s400/IMG_3544.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5705974677806057602" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AYRUStFW_Hs/Ty-xuxPMwsI/AAAAAAAAAXU/W1CK-8mUIKs/s1600/IMG_3239.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AYRUStFW_Hs/Ty-xuxPMwsI/AAAAAAAAAXU/W1CK-8mUIKs/s400/IMG_3239.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5705974669950894786" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LLsPqF1Wya4/Ty-xurbZo_I/AAAAAAAAAXM/pqJBd2b1xVI/s1600/IMG_3119.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LLsPqF1Wya4/Ty-xurbZo_I/AAAAAAAAAXM/pqJBd2b1xVI/s400/IMG_3119.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5705974668391457778" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Gpu7kDuuDMQ/Ty-xxwqjCbI/AAAAAAAAAXw/o27dDNWMfSE/s1600/IMG_3176.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Gpu7kDuuDMQ/Ty-xxwqjCbI/AAAAAAAAAXw/o27dDNWMfSE/s400/IMG_3176.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5705974721336773042" border="0" /></a><br /><style>@font-face { font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }table.MsoNormalTable { font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style>Version:1.0 StartHTML:0000000105 EndHTML:0000014858 StartFragment:0000002298 EndFragment:0000014822 <style> <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Times New Roman"; panose-1:0 2 2 6 3 5 4 5 2 3; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:50331648 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";} table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-parent:""; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </style> <p class="MsoNormal">TEAM JANUARY 2012 visit…a fabulous three weeks with Susan Lee and her daughter Simone, Toronto architect Margie Zeidler and my daughter Seanna and granddaughter Sierra..seems like we have been over here for months! In a way it is much harder to get things done in Africa for me, without Swahili which is no one’s fault but my own and my inability to remember! It’s a language which has absolutely no reference to English, French, Italian or Spanish. It’s here like grabbing a multitude of sounds out of the air, starting usually with MB, or MV, or Mn. M anyway and it goes on from there. Memorizing is the only way to beat it, and when your brain is wired for details, not sound, or images, colour, ideas, and not sound. Ain’t easy!</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’m sitting propped up on my bed at the Continental, which again is a bit of a stretch, Tuesday morning around 6:30, a rooster’s crow squawking a little above the incessant idling of a safari truck, parked, going no where but with the engine on, outside my window. It’s cool at this hour, the raging sun still at rest, the sky blue promising another great day here in the dusty village of Mto Wa Mbu.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">When I was first coming, we did art classes and HIV AIDS workshops, but these days we do orphanage, day and night..</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Since last December’s explosion of 67 new kids to Majengo, raising our numbers up to 114 kids to look after, with 77 living in, things have settled in beautifully. The kids are happy, calm, and finally in a place where they are safe, fed well, looked after medically and are loved, especially by our 17 staff: cooks who dole out 300 meals a day, cleaners who wash the kids, their clothing and the three cottages we rent, two night watchmen, one great teacher with 2 Masai girls who a great group of Canadian artists sponsored through Montessori, a couple of assistants and a mama and baba who look after keeping the whole thing together.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">This trip has been about spending lots of time with the kids, Seanna and Sierra running art workshops every morning, Susan and Simone English classes, crafts, yesterday a full session with all 77 kids stringing beads and looping paper clips together creating magical necklaces and bracelets. Seanna brought in a couple of local jewellry makers last week to weave bracelets for the boys, necklaces for the girls- all decked out and looking great.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">A group of sewers from a fabric shop in Minnesota sent over a huge bag of beautiful cotton dresses, gorgeous!! plus all the clothes donated by Simone’s friend Martha. Lots of pics to post when I get home.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">We’re finally learning names….especially challenging with the little ones who all wear their hair closely shaven, with beautiful round little faces, Careen, Pauline, Jeska, Esther, Anna, Amina, Fausta.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">NEW FACILITY: we’ve been renting three cottages over the last four years…leases up in 2013….77 living in, sometimes 2 to a bed, with a couple of mamas sleeping over. This trip, we’ve been visiting other orphanages, lodges, schools, houses, as research with planning a new facility which we hope to get started this summer!! Architect Margie Zeidler shot hundreds of photos: roof, window styles, size of rooms, furniture, shelving, colour, materials, wood, brick, concrete blocks, ventilation.. lots to think about, working with Charles who'se an engineer, the government inspectors, our staff, kids and village leaders as to what kind of children’s home they best want and what we can best create. Can’t wait to see what she comes up with!! Visits to Rift Valley Children’s home…a very well put together facility, small houses, each one with a mama and volunteer… loved the U shaped home founder India shares with 10 kids, a courtyard dancing with flowers and climbing vines surrounded by bedrooms, indoor bathrooms, and a huge living, balcony and dining area with bright blue chairs lined up aside a long table to seat everyone.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Recreation/gathering hall, big communal kitchens like the one we visited yesterday at Manyara Sec School with 4 huge brick stoves, built to conserve firewood, huge sunken pots of beans boiling and a guy with a paddle big enough to fire a canoe plunged in and circling around a massive pot of traditional ugali, a sort of crème of wheat national dish.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">A great library with quiet space for homework, a line of computers, books, DVDs. We just got electricity hooked up in our office, with Simone's friend Amy donating a computer and teaching sec. Killo, our top teacher Grayson who we’re sponsoring to further his education with a year of Early Child Development in May, and Hamidu, our driver, computer skills. Education and learning is everything here. Great to see one of these guys surrounded by kids around his desk practicing, cut, copy, paste!</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Infirmary, office, indoor and outdoor dining….sports field, and dreams of a big playground with swings, climbing apparatus, which could be nailed together by a handy volunteer showing up next year. It will happen, as the process of Majengo creates itself with the right person coming along at the right time. Susan Lee has been fabulous helping charles and I with budgets, financial statements, logistics, with a great sense of humour along the way….Margie with ecological sensitivities, her adherence to good community planning a la Jane Jacobs, and her architectural and building background…Simone with her camera and incredible connection with the children….Seanna and Sierra too with songs, art skills, fun, creativity, colour….</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me, I am trying to put it all together, harassing Charles daily for updates on legals, land surveys, budget details, staff salaries, comparison's with other orphanages, government minimum wages, numbers of kids, bios, pictures, registering Masai girls into education programs. Every day.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Charles is the glue that holds this whole thing together. Believe me. Not only does he have to deal with us 7 from Canada, driving us around, meals, safari trips with the kids, running up to karatu for the bank, government officials..there is a constant stream of people lined up on benches against turquoise walls, waiting in the ICA office. HIV testing, legal rights, land rights, abuse..there was a flood here in December, one woman had 6 huge bags of incredibly hard worked rice in her room which soaked, started to grow sprouts, losing all but the one on the top. Destitute now, she has to start over, and on it goes. January time to register secondary school aged kids, if you have the money,which no one does. Bits and pieces pulled together to keep their kids off the streets, into school, the most important goal of African parents here.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Charles knows all the stories, the woman waiting for her daughter out in the corridor, who'd been raped by her boss while cleaning his house, fast forward 14 years of supporting this girl, both she and the child with HIV, she waits with the hope of He gets it done, but on Charles time. Drives me crazy, sometime, but patience is something you have to learn to work well in Africa.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Working on legals…the local village of Majengo govt are giving us 8 acres of land down the road, a huge open flat grassy plot next to a half finished govt school which I envision we will help to run with the village, down the road. Most of our kids are either in our own Majengo on site pre school, or trudging down the dusty roads to one of 4 primary schools in the area, a couple of kids walking over 3 miles each way! Along with Mama Anna’s English medium school, a private school teaching all subjects in Engish, a short walk from Majengo.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Met this time Joseph Slepertas, a great young guy from England whose living full time now in Moshi, a town about 4 hours away. H stumbled across the GoodHope orphanage out on the safari route and sponsored two of their older kids a couple of years ago into Mama Annas…coming back this year he discovered it closed, shut down by the government for corrupt practices, the Good Hope kids now living over with us at Majengo. After a few visits he was blown away by what he saw at Majengo, with how much greater the kids were now, happy, safe and well fed…and began to sponsor more and more kids to Anna. We now, along with Susan Lee and Canadian sponsors Peg Graham and marion Burnett, have 14 kids at Mama Annas learning English.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">For me it’s been a question of making sure the kids who aren’t going there, are okay. Along with teacher Grayson and Charles, we agreed to support the older kids at Mama Annas, heading into Secondary School in a few years, with only English taught there.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Without English, secondary school kids are completely lost here, as govt primary schools are taught in Swahili only. These older kids who get to go to Mama Annas can teach the younger kids, and staff what they are learning, each night. Last night, during bead threading, it is awesome to come across 11 year old Tatu yesterday with an English kid’s book on her lap, a circle of younger kids around, reading stories in English!! Incredible what Mama Anna has done in only a month for Tatu!!</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Spent three weeks working on getting the land grant gifted by the local government, passed by the District Council….and just before leaving, we received a letter of approval. We are on our way!!! 8 beautiful acres of land….to build on, about 3 miles down the road from our current location. There’s a half built school on the property, which the govt plans to finish this year. Margie Zeidler is on her way home right now, armed with photos and drawings,…about to put it all together, after months of research. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">WE’ve got our own lawyer, setting up a US/Can and Tanz Board of Trustees or NGO to own and have full control over new facility buildings hopefully to start building in August this year!</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Back home Matt wrote that someone has donated $50,000 towards the new orphanage project!! Wonderful and thank you whomever you are!!!</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <span style="Times New Roman";mso-ansi-language: EN-US;mso-fareast-language:EN-USfont-family:";font-size:12.0pt;" >I’m back end of this week..to start a great fundraising campaign up in Canada, now with full tax receipt ability, since October. Anyone out there who wants to help, with dinners, fundraising events, speaking engagements, let me know!!<br />Just got home...30 hours...Kili to Dar...Dar to Amsterdam..thank you Merit for coming out to meet me! 7 hour wait and on to Toronto, three films later, with the kind of jet lag you can't imagine...all that energy put out there for three weeks, and it's over. Over are the meals, endless of rice, bananas and beans!! Hopping in and out of safari trucks, getting stuck in the mud with 30 children atop the van waiting, looking out my window and way up just above the van, a lady lion perched on a swinging branch, barring her teeth, ready to pounce!! Filippo covers his head with canvas for protection, as we speed away.<br />I'm going to write more later, with lots of pics. Huge thanks to Margie Zeidler, Susan Lee and her daughter Simone, my daughter Seanna and Sierra for their incredible imput, everyday over at Majengo running classes with the children. Making bracelets, necklaces, teaching English, playing, drawing, dancing, singing...it was fabulous...<br />more later....<br /></span> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:16pt;"><span style=""> </span></span></p>Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-44979634948817434382012-01-01T18:59:00.000-08:002012-01-01T20:31:48.320-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qdANja_N0dY/TwEkAXoSlLI/AAAAAAAAAW8/1B6ubYY40Kw/s1600/IMG_2779.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qdANja_N0dY/TwEkAXoSlLI/AAAAAAAAAW8/1B6ubYY40Kw/s400/IMG_2779.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5692870992734622898" border="0" /></a><br />Tatu....oh....she breaks my heart...she is 14 years old, and came to us last December, one of the older girls from one of the corrupt orphanage, age 14, wary, hard, tough, one can only image what she has been threw...when i first met her in January. We didn't have electricity back then, it only came in April, after three years of begging..imagine putting 77 children to bed in the dark. But at the end of our visit, we threw a big welcoming party for all the kids, with great food: rice, ugali, greens, cobs of corn, beans, goat meat and beef, chicken, a real feast...set it all out under the stars, with tables and benches nearby when a huge storm blew open the skies, big rains poured down and we all raced with platters of food under shelter squished into one of our newly-renovated houses, the children sitting on the floor with paper plates filled..clumps of mud a buffet table outside quickly set up and laden with wet food, the generator on full blasting the joy of music in the dark with Matt holding a flashlight as kids poured out and started to dance; they knew all the music, the lyrics, the African beat, dancing, wild, excited. They get the rythm. In their blood.<br />Suddenly Tatu....so hard and tough and staying away only a few hours before, now dancing as with the wind in her soul, eyes flashing, she grabs my hand, Tatu exploding with life, with hope. We connected that night in the pouring rain, the music, the dance. And as I left the next day for Canada, once again saying goodbye, tears of once again losing, once again connecting and someone leaving, falling, hugging, and once again sadly pulling away from each other. We are, their mama, their baba, with a hug, a love and then, once again, leave...<br /><br />Coming back a few months later in October, I look for Tatu and find her there. Watching. Outside, away from the others. Crowding around. Filippe, I have known him from the beginning 3 years back, with big ears that stick out and buck teeth, the boy who was nicknamed "fearless one", who had been left alone for over 24 hours by himself, both mama and step papa gone... asking for bicycles. Five of them. The last time he asked for a car or a bus to carry them to school, walking the two miles to and fro, he was pushing for help...but bikes, sure we could do that. And all the while Tatu is standing back behind the crowd watching.<br /><br />We spend a morning in and out of the shops finding oil paint in colours of red, yellow, blue, green back and white...in little cans, we buy brushes and get the kids to draw animals with felt pens on paper, and buses, and children in front of houses with mamas and babas....I head over the next day with the images and draw big and huge on all four walls of our newly-built office outside the orphanage for guests to come and visit....and the next day invite the kids to come and paint. Wow, it was insane with everyone of them crying ME!! ME!! ME!!!.!!!! I am going crazy, i tell them they are driving me craxy. but....They did it...covered in oil paint which doesn't come off, Proud of their work, every one of them painting....you have to see it...<br />The day the bikes arrive...they are carreening around the grounds, all of them taking turns on all five bikes...swishing and wizzing about, like mad...jumping off, falling off, laughing...crazy...<br />Tatu comes to me and says. Holding my hand.<br />Quietly.<br />"No mama. No baba. I have a sister."<br />I say to her, great, wow...where is she?<br />She bows her head and shakes it back and forth. She doesn't know. With tears.<br />Until a bike becomes free.<br />And with her wild skirts flying, she takes off, free.<br /><br />Tonight here back in Toronto on the first day of the year, after a few days at the River House in Dunedin..i am back in Africa...Tatu...Filippe....Amina...Godlisen, (as in God Listen, oh i love that little kid..he jumps from the top of the bunk beds from one to then next, breaking them...!!! He wants to be a policeman when he grows up....). I once taught them how to swim....<br /><br />I haven't written for so long..<br />Once you start something like this...it gets bigger and bigger...<br />There are things you can't write about anymore..Like the nights you lie in bed and hope with all your heart and dear soul that everything is okay over there....<br />Funny...it all begins with seeing 52 kids on a mud floor...you, and why you? have to do something about it...i say now, the right person at the right place at the right time...that's about all it is...I was there. Charles brought me kicking and screaming. I'd just been bamboozled by a corrupt orphanage director who threw me out of his lucrative orphanage business on the safari route, luring in tourist money, cause i was the whistle blower. I wanted out. Out of Africa. Weeping, couldn't stop, that day in our office. I'm leaving. I'm heading up to Nairobi...<br />I want out. I want to go home.<br />So he takes me on the back of his big old red truck to see 52 kids on the mud floor and hey they are kids. He says you've learned so much about orphanages...so why not put what you've learned towards these kids. Kids are kids. Over there in Africa it doesn't really matter, there are so many kids, like 16 million orphaned out there by HIV AIDS...who cares, in Charles' opinion..if one thing doesn't work out, move your energies to another....so we founded Majengo.<br />That day. March 2008.<br />And here we are almost 4 years later...we've got 114 kids depending on us. So. How did this happen? This isn't a situation where you go over there, somewhere, anywhere...and build a school, or a dam. or whatever...you start and orphanage and you build a house and move 27 kids into it, and all of a sudden, three years later you have 77 kids, with 37 more living out that you are responsible for, and you can't sleep at night.<br />you can't be there full time...no. You have your own kids and grandkids back home..and you are an artist and have friends and a life in Toronto, and in Dunedin and you are running an art retreat for people who want to paint, but all of a sudden you have this huge responsibility a long way away, but so very close to your heart, to your home...<br />Till tonight, i have been writing, in a more business kind of way.<br />And i have been very stuck. Writing about catch-ups on visits, on new facilities..on what we have to do. On structure. On administration. This year i have learned much about charitable status, about boards, about structure. Structure. About how it has to be done. About the administrative ends of things.<br /><br />So. When you donate, I race to my drawer, haul out my bank book and thank you cards, and tax receipts, and photographs of the kids, and get busy...boy am i paranoid of getting it wrong...I got my good friend who is an accountant, Brian who brought in a bookkeeper. My gawd. Believe me, everything i am doing is A one...and if it isn't, it is out of ignorance.<br /><br />Marci my good friend called today. A friend of hers who wrote me a cheque for $150. asked her, how exactly does the money go "straight over to the kids at Majengo", and Marci said, well, "i don't really know. Knowing Lynn, she probably stuffs it into her bra and underpants!!".<br /><br />So...I told her what we do, i have to sit down and write it all out, as it is.....<br /><br />From you...into our MAJENGO CANADA..or in the US, the Warren Majengo Foundation, who have had their IRS status for the last two years or more...<br />Every month..our local NGO Tanzanian agents over there, ICA TANZANIA..through Charles, the guy i have been working with for over five years now..send us a requisition of how much money the orphanage needs for the next month.<br />Our budget is 1/3 lower than the two other orphanages we visited..we work every time we are over there, with Charles and with our Majengo staff..to correct and keep our budgets up to date.<br />So we get the requisition, check it with our agreed upon yearly budget, and wire the money into the bank accounts of ICA TANZANIA. They send the money down to Mto Wa Mbu, where Charles distributes it for food, clothing, medical needs, cleanliness needs, education, staff salaries, etc..with receipts for everything...He keeps the financial statements which we receive every month...and on it has gone....for the last almost three years...<br />Do I worry. Sure i worry.<br /><br />There is corruption and deviences and discrepancies everywhere on the planet.<br />It is your money i am responsible for. That is a huge worry for me.<br />Now i am painting for Majengo.<br />All the proceeds of my paintings go toward the orphanage..<br />I asked tonight a great old friend of mine to give up her life in Canada to work over at the Orphanage, to be our liaison there......yes...Kathie.....yes...think about it. Do it!!!<br />I haven't written for a long time, and tonight...it feels good to be back into the sheer bones of what we are all doing here...hey..there are 77 little kids over there...and 37 more living out in the community who depend on us...none of whom have a mama and a baba who can look after them...and tonight on this first day of the new year...i thank you all for being such a huge important part of helping them find a way to be part of this world, to grow, into leaders, maybe, of the future....<br />thank you..xLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-69337852331012510802011-12-27T04:56:00.000-08:002012-01-01T18:57:24.727-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bhTheUmP6wQ/TwEdBjcEwlI/AAAAAAAAAWk/S2N-CDRbRW4/s1600/IMG_2257.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bhTheUmP6wQ/TwEdBjcEwlI/AAAAAAAAAWk/S2N-CDRbRW4/s400/IMG_2257.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5692863316503085650" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bKMX9xW5_Uc/TwEdBgVnnxI/AAAAAAAAAWU/o-p9t2cJVVM/s1600/IMG_2563.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bKMX9xW5_Uc/TwEdBgVnnxI/AAAAAAAAAWU/o-p9t2cJVVM/s400/IMG_2563.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5692863315670703890" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7sOZdMdvk5k/TwEdAvQ3x5I/AAAAAAAAAWI/TzlY8Li6Xxs/s1600/IMG_2582.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 300px; height: 400px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7sOZdMdvk5k/TwEdAvQ3x5I/AAAAAAAAAWI/TzlY8Li6Xxs/s400/IMG_2582.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5692863302497453970" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JAaUtXP8QlI/TwEdAT1YukI/AAAAAAAAAV8/F24ahHVh5eg/s1600/IMG_2753.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JAaUtXP8QlI/TwEdAT1YukI/AAAAAAAAAV8/F24ahHVh5eg/s400/IMG_2753.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5692863295134415426" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0DVMF8kl3do/TwEdCy5i5RI/AAAAAAAAAWs/HujW6JwRwsk/s1600/IMG_2311.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0DVMF8kl3do/TwEdCy5i5RI/AAAAAAAAAWs/HujW6JwRwsk/s400/IMG_2311.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5692863337833096466" border="0" /></a><br />Happy new year!!!!<br />It has been too long since i last wrote..so many wonderful things have happened this year with Majengo...they pile up and become overwhelming....thank you to everyone out there who has contributed to our ongoing operating costs of Majengo. Without you, this little orphanage that grew and continues to grow, would never be happening!<br />Summing up this year 2011....<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">January expansion of children</span>: 114 children at Majengo now!!!<br />A couple of days before the chiming of last year's bells ringing in the new year, the Tanzanian government made a sweep of 5 corrupt orphanages along the safari route shutting all 5 down in and bringing 67 new children to Majengo. We weren't ready for this! Jamie and I'd gone over a few months before and renovated two new houses just behind our main Majengo house, so basically, and very basically! the beds were ready...but without warning, the buses pulled up and dropped off these new kids - scared, not knowing why or where they were going, without a single belonging to their name. Some of our staff were away on holiday, leaving the remaining 10 to cope with the onslaught! I could only imagine the chaos of feeding over 100 mouths at each meal, the new children stampeding the kitchen, our 27 original kids overwhelmed, and our cooks coping without knowing how much rice, cooking oil, vegetables to buy, always running out!! Peter from ICA leapt in and did an incredible job along with Hamidu our driver racing back and forth to town picking up groceries by the seat of their pants.<br /><br />I called every morning, offering support - basically all i could do so far away.<br />The children were not in great shape. Desperate for food, and starving, they ate leaves off the trees, garbage from the street. Many of them sick, needing medical attention. On top of this, the former directors of the five orphanages rounded up the guardians of the children, and with lies of abduction and mistreatment, encouraged them to verge en mass into Majengo to take back their kids. The police were called in on behalf of the government. The guardians were interviewed, and those who could, who had the means, took back their children. The rest saw for themselves how, in just a few days, Majengo was treating their children, with a clean healthy environment and regular nutritious meals, three times a day - and backed off, thankfully.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">January visit</span><br />Matt and I flew over a few weeks later, expecting total mayhem..but instead, amazingly, found the staff resting under a big old tree outside our open air kitchen, the children taking their afternoon nap- surreal, quiet! A short time later they crawled out of our three houses and flooded the grounds...it was a mob, but not unruly. Some played soccer in the neighboring Catholic Mission playgrounds..little groups of kids throwing stones into holes dug into the mud, some skipping, swinging, whirling about with spare tires circling their waists as hoola hoops. A little boy running a flip flop shoe up a mound of mud carrying a big stone, his version of a moving van...orderly, quiet...<br /><br />Big staff meeting with 18 staff, our ICA team on ground, Matt and I, some village leaders, Raymond and Mayunga. The cooks, cleaners, night watchmen and teachers all telling their version of what happened when the new kids came, laughing, in retrospect.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Escalating budget!</span><br />Budget meetings: our annual operating budget skyrocketing from $50,000 USD to $80,000 now with 77 now living in, as opposed to 27!! 18 staff, up from 12....and another 37 children living out in homes in the community, but coming to Majengo by day, or being supported with medical and educational needs....WE are coping by the seat of our pants. But it is not good enough. 25 kids per house, not enough mamas to give them good emotional loving care.<br /><br />We have to move the kids out into a much better environment.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Majengo Canada charitable status!!!</span><br />Warren Majengo, Matt with his family and friends, have generously covered most of the operating expenses over the last two years, about $6,000 a month!! Unbeliveably. Go on the website and check out Matt's Letter, in the Story of Majengo section, how he came on board. www.majengo.org. This truly a miracle.<br /><br />But now with all these new kids, this additional $30,000 was simply too much!! I went back to Toronto, and applied for charitable status in Canada. Ten months later, with $7,000 in legal fees to ensure we were applying properly, I am thrilled to report that MAJENGO CANADA now has official charitable status, and can offer now anyone donating to Majengo from Canada, a tax receipt for their generosity. It has become extremely difficult in Canada now to be accepted.<br />Now, along with Warren Majengo's charitable IRS tax status...<br /><br />We are on our way!!!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Our ICA agents on the ground....</span><br />Charles, our ICA project coordinator in Mto Wa Mbu on the ground, who co founded Majengo at the very beginning, is soley responsible for the logistics and financial operations of Majengo, moved his wife Grace along with preschoolers David and Derrick into nearby Arusha to be close to his family, currently applying for an online Masters degree in Public Health, will spend his time working at Majengo and in Arusha working on his degree. Doris and Joseph, directors of ICA visiting regularly, attending staff and budget meetings, keeping their eye on things and offering good local experience and advice.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">October visits to other orphanages....</span><br />In October we visited 2 other well established orphanages: Rift Valley in nearby Kiratu and JBFC: just outside of Mwanza, a town on the banks of lake Victoria: INcredible was JBFC, run by Chris Gates, a tall, burly, sunburned wonder from Oklahoma who, at age 26 has accomplished a dreamof a lifetime for many. His JBFC houses 45 girls living in, in houses which support no more than 8 girls per house, with a permanent mama living in...a situation for which we strive. At this point we have 77 kids living in 3 houses....with two mamas per house, and certainly not the individual care we hope to achieve for our kids when we build our new facility....Chris's dream is to become self sustaining. He runs a primary school with 250 kids from outside the orphanage, each paying yearly fees to help keep the operating expenses of the orphanage intact. He has all kinds of animals: chickens, goats, cows, pigs, living on the land, and a great vegetable garden operated by the staff and kids themselves..a fabulous operation and one which we hope to emulate soon...WE learned so much. But especially the huge need to move our kids into smaller quarters of their own, small houses, with 8 kids per house..with their own mama to look after them...so important for their emotional health.....<br />With each facility, we realized the possible need to bring in a person from Canada or the US to work directly on site with our Tanzanian staff....communication has always been a challenge. I am believing the African adage that oral communication is where so many are most comfortable, whereas we in the west prefer emailing, a quick note, getting it down on paper, so easy for us to do, but also so alienating as well sometimes...In Africa..the spoken work, the handshake, the looking into each other's eye...the time to spend together, to learn, to seek, to quietly ask the questions, to discover along with each other... So keeping a regular stream of thought via the internet, via email, or skype, or the telephone with crazy electrical outages, blackouts, is a constant and often frustrating challenge...<br />It is only when i get over there, when Charles meets us at the airport, when we get settled into the van jammed packed with clothing and toys for the children and heading for Arusha, that the questions and answers begin their natural course to flow again, as if we have been together always.....without a few months of silence in between, it all begins to make sense.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Donation of land....</span><br />Our village leaders, Mayunga and Raymond, at a government meeting, local and district, presented us with 6 acres of land nearby to build our own orphanage facility. Already on the land is a half built primary school with 4 classrooms and office - a government project slated to be fully built by next year.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">New Majengo facility:</span><br />With 77 children all living together in 3 houses..it has become increasingly urgent that we build our own facility. What we have now, has been totally make-shift, a place to house the unexpected but necessary expansion of kids last December, totally a temporary and urgent solution - a fly by the seat of our pants situation which solved a very crazy time. We had no choice.<br />But after visiting both established orphanages in the area in October we came away with some great ideas of the orphanage we hope to build, soon.<br /><br />Our budget to get the children into better and smaller homes right off the bat is about $100,000. including a big communal kitchen with outdoor and indoor dining facilities and playground, next to the primary school the government has promised to complete by 2012. Once that is done, another $200,000 will afford us a proper volunteer house, library, computer room and recreation hall. A total of approximately $30o,000 to do the job well.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Buffalo meetings....</span><br />Great once-every-three-months meetings in Buffalo with Warren Majengo folks and Majengo Canada, keeping our eye on what is going on in Tanzania.. our 2013 new building group reporting back and keeping in touch with those two orphanages i mentioned above, arranging for Matt, Lauren, Rose and I to visit in October...pulling together the best ideas from both visits....organizing time lines and plans for our own new facility once we get our funding in place....our new website..thanks to Kym setting it up with people from McKissock in Warren, and to Maxine, Nancy and yours truly for pulling the writing and the pics together, it looks great...we're meeting Jan 07...a few days before I take off again for Africa...Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-27763401980329746812011-11-02T05:03:00.000-07:002011-11-02T06:22:02.146-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QYVwjfnrnzY/TrFD8idpkLI/AAAAAAAAAVw/tLsqU7w1OAk/s1600/painted%2Boffice.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QYVwjfnrnzY/TrFD8idpkLI/AAAAAAAAAVw/tLsqU7w1OAk/s400/painted%2Boffice.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670388113158541490" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-XuExk5LSZBs/TrFDetpFvBI/AAAAAAAAAVk/FYC0lUlpS_M/s1600/boys%2Bhanging%2Bout.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-XuExk5LSZBs/TrFDetpFvBI/AAAAAAAAAVk/FYC0lUlpS_M/s400/boys%2Bhanging%2Bout.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670387600763239442" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-2uwp89CcSrk/TrFDM4FU4lI/AAAAAAAAAVY/g9olXwVDGPI/s1600/magician.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-2uwp89CcSrk/TrFDM4FU4lI/AAAAAAAAAVY/g9olXwVDGPI/s400/magician.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670387294328382034" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FfW6JRdphRw/TrFDD_cVPMI/AAAAAAAAAVM/g3sl6A0zeNA/s1600/girl%2Bin%2Bpink.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 300px; height: 400px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FfW6JRdphRw/TrFDD_cVPMI/AAAAAAAAAVM/g3sl6A0zeNA/s400/girl%2Bin%2Bpink.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670387141685099714" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uwVdYNXkeMI/TrFC0bblMXI/AAAAAAAAAVA/Zo9xrN_mlig/s1600/Matt%2Band%2Bkids.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uwVdYNXkeMI/TrFC0bblMXI/AAAAAAAAAVA/Zo9xrN_mlig/s400/Matt%2Band%2Bkids.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670386874320236914" border="0" /></a><br />BREAKING NEWS!!! MAJENGO CANADA, now an officially recognized Canadian charity, able to provide YOU with Canadian tax receipts!! And more about that later...<br /><br />Back home a few days, jet lagged, tired but thrilled with our October visit, we have managed to accomplish so much!! Briefly....visited two wonderful established children's homes, as they prefer to call them, not orphanages, in Tanzania....one JBFC near Mwanza...the other Rift Valley Children's Home...near Karatu, a stone's throw from Majengo.<br /><br />And we're in the beginning stages of building a brand new facility for MAJENGO!!!<br /><br />We learned and saw so much! Great ideas to move forward ..the govt has approved giving us 6 acres of land, flat, wide open - a huge cry from our current site, where we look after 77 children living in or should i say squeezed into three houses!<br /><br />It is insane, but totally understandable. One year ago we were flying by the seat of our pants, with the government shutting down corrupt orphanages on the safari route, last December, and bringing to us 67 new children, freaked out, badly abused, starving, not knowing where in earth they were heading...<br /><br />No warning. All these kids arriving by bus over a two day period!<br />Our staff, half on holiday, scrambling to keep up, especially with the food, dinners, cooking, cleaning clothing and washing kids. Big challenge...but we did it...with huge credos to our staff who managed to pull it all together, beautifully infusing all these new children into our once calm, together, well organized and quiet facility.<br /><br />And huge thanks to our friends in Warren, Pennsylvania.<br />Our budgets skyrocketed overnight, from $55,000 annually to $85,000 now...not bad considering the support of 114 children and 17 staff, but way more than they can handle.<br /><br />So it's my turn now...<br />As they say on CNN: BREAKING NEWS!!!!<br />MAJENGO CANADA just got our official approval from the Canadian Government to become a registered Canadian charity. Thank you thank you thank you!! As a result we can offer tax receipts for the first time, to all our incredible donors out there who have been supporting us over the last 3 years! bravo!!<br /><br />Off and running....stepping into a brand new phase, our goal to raise $300,000 over the next 6 months toward the new facility..the situation now is desperate. With 77 wonderful beautiful children squeezed into three small houses, with not a lot of land in between. We feed over 100 mouths, three times a day, with 4 cooks spinning their magic out of one, not that big, outdoor kitchen. Lines of laundry swinging from post to post throughout the site... cleaners and children alike, scrubbing madly to keep all those clothes and children clean, every single day.<br /><br />It is a miracle. We have managed to pull it off.<br />But we need more space for those children!!<br />Our goal: to give them every opportunity in a safe loving environment, to grow and blossom into happy, responsible and self sufficient members of their community.<br /><br />Starting, with our new facility....dreaming, but I know, within only a short period, it will become a reality: here's the picture: lots of wide open playground space for the children to run free, soccer field, great climbing jungle gym with slides and swings, buildings designed with solar, skylights, with wonderful smaller dormitories, each with their own living in mama, sitting areas, study areas, bathroom, a big open library, dining hall and kitchen, rec room, with a nearby fully equipped primary school, goats, vegetable garden...chickens....the ideas go on and on..<br />.<br />I invite you to become a hands-on helping member of Majengo's TEAM CANADA!!<br /><br />Revving up an exciting fundraising drive....with presentations, parties, sponsorship programs for every one of our 11 4 children, pictures, bios...raffles, paintings, exhibitions with all proceeds going straight towards this new facility. We need your help!!!<br /><br />Please email me your ideas and suggestions for how you can help...lynnconnell@sympatico.ca<br />Lots of love, and huge thanks for everything, so far....xxLynnLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-67686738635552632832011-10-26T13:33:00.000-07:002011-11-02T05:03:04.641-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3M-FrtM7kpM/TrExa92yMOI/AAAAAAAAAU0/IPpt2pyjJoY/s1600/*LYnn%2Bwith%2Bkids.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 376px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3M-FrtM7kpM/TrExa92yMOI/AAAAAAAAAU0/IPpt2pyjJoY/s400/*LYnn%2Bwith%2Bkids.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670367745186869474" border="0" /></a><br />Greetings from Addis, Ethiopia! 7 hours here waiting for a 2:45 am flight to London and then home! Crazy, but you just relax into it; there is a great little cafe wedged into the middle of souvenir shops, duty free, clothing, misc...mostly woven scarves, shoes, African jewellery and dresses for little kids, leather bags...I'm sitting on a stool in the cafe watching the stream of humanity glide by... huge muslim community here, men and women wearing white from head to foot, the men in long wrapped gauzy long dress, groups dressed alike, a team of men in green, emerald green tops and long pants passing by, some dressed in what we would call pajamas, the matching designed fabric of the loose pants and tops...not alot of North Americans here tonight, mainly African from every country...in the women's washroom, next to the women's prayer room, a low sink where muslim women slip off their shoes and wash their feet before entering to pray, water everywhere, another woman bent over a piped in speaker spewing out an African beat, she is rocking, moving her hips and swaying, mezmorized.<div>It was an incredible week...Rose, Lauren and Matt from Warren flying into Mwanza meeting me at the hotel, and off we went to spend the afternoon and dinner with a fabulous guy who has opened an orphanage school on 46 acres on the lake, beautiful setting, 40 kids living in, all girls and another 250 coming everyday to primary school. We're researching back home different places to see; heading into building a new facility for Majengo by 2013 when our leases run out. Between this centre, and another one up in Karatu it becomes evident what works best for the kids: small houses, with 8-12 kids per house, each one with a live in mama to cook and clean for just those kids, a big communal kitchen is great with an adjoining dining room where everyone can hang out together, continuing the feeling we have now of one big huge happy family. Both children's homes supported primary schools, either on site or nearby, offering good teachers, English, and welcomed an ongoing flow of volunteers, mainly women coming from Canada and the US, and staying for a month or two, each one paying $35. US a day for the priviledge of working there. It works! Very exciting, and great that our team back home did a great job finding these facilities for us to visit. </div><div>Visited the 6 acre plot the village leaders of Majengo have agreed to hand over to us to build our new facility, about 3 miles down the road from our current site, big open field with a quarter built primary school at one end, a project of the government,promising to have it finished by the time we start to build. We are working together, the best way to do things over here. If you get the backing of the local village leaders, and then on up to the Executive director of the entire district who reports directly to the president of Tanzania, you are on your way..and we are!</div><div>Meetings all week, sometimes three a day! Focussing on 2013, the new facility, our education plans for the children, budgets....a great few days for me painting animals and children on the outside of the new Majengo office, with the kids. Finally getting to know them a lot better this time around. Education: lots of talk about sending our kids to the English medium private school a good walk away from the orphanage, someday. Here all the subjects are taught in English, a great advantage from the government schools where kids learn everything in Swahili, until they hit Secondary school, where they plunge into English. Still talking... getting to know the director of that school, Mama Anna who i am totally enamored by. Her views for me on education, and what is important for the growth of the children, for now and into the future make sense to me. But it is costly, about $400 per child per year for this special education; we've decided to step back, take a good breath and wait...our budget has exploding with all our new kids since December last, the three houses we rent Tiger, Serengeti and Kilimanjaro on site bulging with 77 kids, a far cry from the spaciousness of those other orphanages we visited early on in the week. </div><div>A big staff meeting with all 17 of our staff.. each one expressing big thanks and good feelings about where we are going, along with the challenges...Four of our Masai girls sponsored through 4 years of secondary school have gone back home to their Masai bomas, pregnant.</div><div>ON Saturday after an incredible few hours roaming around the big monthly Masai market, which is almost indescribable, but if you can picture small grass huts with legs of goat roasting inside, we join Masai men and women wrapped in the bright red and blue checked sheets, lounging on plastic chairs, a Morani warrior bringing in the leg along with a long sharp knife, cutting the meat off the bone into chunks put into a big round bowl in the middle of the table, we all lean forward and chew and chew till your jaw hurts, delicious! Stuff sold outside, laid out on blankets, stuff, everything you can imagine, clothing of all kinds, shoes, underwear, sports jackets, shirts dresses, plus jewellery, kitchen good, hardware, everything, this is the way the Masai shop, moving along from blanket to blanket, a goat and cow auction going on at the far end, packed with Masai and us....and that same day on to visit the Chief of the Engaruga tribe to his boma, meeting once again his two wives, children, and greeting his 95 year old father who sits at the entrance of the boma, a cluster of cow dung and grass circular houses, surrounded by a fence made from thorn trees, we make sure we bring the requested bottle of Konyaki, bending over to pay our respects, the young women bowing low their heads for the old man to spit into their hair. It is all part of the experience and on to the goat yard where Chief introduces us once again to our goats which we have purchased, one or two every year, who have had babies. I now own 9 goats...!! Named for my family back home! This year two new white ones, twins, bought for Pyper and Finn!</div><div>Culminating with a wonderful last night at Majengo with the children, all lined up along four long tables on benches, receiving juice and goodies as a good bye treat...a show of dance, song, and acrobatics a first with these kids for us, mixed with laughter, and tears, so difficult to say goodbye. They have become our other family away from home, these children and for us, it is heartwarming, these visits, and heartbreaking to leave...</div><div>Got to run and catch this flight!</div><div><br /></div><div>homeward bound!! talk soon!!!!</div><div>check out our new website: www.majengo.org...it is pretty wonderful!</div><div>Lynn </div><div><br /></div>Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-53535745702014393772011-10-19T01:08:00.000-07:002011-10-19T02:57:43.953-07:00Update!! Jambo!! a great week....in Mto Wa Mbu...and today in Mwanza, a beautiful town built up on hills circling around the massive Lake Victoria on the west side of Tanzania - the second largest fresh water body in the world. I am hot, soaking hot, but happy at an internet waiting for Matt, Charles, Lauren and Rose to fly in from Kilimanjaro - flying in happy, dazed and exhausted last night. Me, i took a local bus all the way across the wild and rugged terrain of Tanzania bumping along from Arusha to have an adventure, leaving yesterday at 7am, on what they said would be a 10 hour ride, which turned into 15 hours on the slowest local bus anyone has ever ridden. Miles and miles of African villages, mud huts held together by sticks cow dung, busy markets filled with bananas, cooking oil, bright plastic kitchen attire, hardware, socks, bright coloured cotton and satin dresses hooked onto wire hangers and squeezed into small top frames expanding into huge voluptuous hips, swinging and sache-ing next to plumbing poles and women stooped bent in half stirring pots of freshly made ugali over open fires. Pulled in with wild lightening and thunder, mvua sana, much rainfall, me, tired and very cranky by 10:30 last night. Rasta...a friend of Dula, who regales me all the way from Arusha with stories of Rasta beliefs, meets us at the bus station. Goodbye to Colliette my good German friend who spends two months every October in Mto Wa Mbu, awesome, working by herself traveling into four primary schools gathering lists of children desperately needing uniforms, shoes, sweaters. She hits the local markets with Dula, her Rasta translator, to buy clothing for 200 kids in the area with money she raises back home all year. She visits Majengo laden with 120 single bedsheets and 70 pairs of Masai shoes made by a shoemaker in the corner stall of the Masai market, the money a gift from a German company interested in working with someone who uses his hands. Masai shoes are made from rubber pieces cut with a small sharp knife, away from old tires. Everywhere she takes pictures of children with the new sheets and masai shoes, to take home, a record of what a few Euros can do here in Mto Wa Mbu...<br /><br />Last week a government inspector makes a surprise visit to Majengo, a program social workers are performing all over the country to all children's homes. For 7 hours she questioned our staff, and me: what do we do when a guardian shows up abusing a child? how many beds do we have for 77 children? are our kitchens clean? do we have fire escapes and extinguishers? what education do our staff have? what are we doing to help them? On and on with questions..and a visit around the orphanage, through our three houses, which just last week painted clean and fresh, across the grounds past outdoor toilets and showers, to the big open dining room area with the cement floor and high thatched roof, electricity now, with four tables lined with happy healthy children squeezed along benches eating a sort of beef stew, greens, and rice, a banana on the side. All is well.<br />On that day i interviewed Zack who came recommended by the private English medium school down the road. He stays with his sister next door at the Catholic Mission, from Kenya, having just completed his teacher's certificate to teach English. I am ecstatic. It is perfect. We have been trying to find a good full time English teacher to help our kids and staff learn English, since we started. Hopefully, Zack is the answer. He comes the next day to work with our staff and teachers setting up a schedule and began the monumental task of teaching everyone English by January 2012. Every day, 8 hours a day!<br />Visited the director Anna and her principal Mr. Thomas at the nearby private English medium school, where all primary classes are taught totally in English. The kids there can speak well after only a few months in class. We set out an idea where we hope to enrol all 51 primary kids into Anna's school, this January. It has to do with loaning her money to finish the building of three new classrooms, and for this, getting a year free for our children, and two more at half price. Matt comes today, we shall talk it over, he will visit Anna and her school and we will decide. For me it is a great idea. I have loaned money here, through my People Living with HIV AIDS program, where, after one year, all four HIV AIDS groups of 80 people, almost all women, paid me back interest free, in full - but in shillings, not dollars. USD can't be transferred back from shillings except at an exhorbitant (sp) rate, up to 25%. So how do i get my money back in dollars? Almost impossible. But if we can funnel the shillings back into great programs for our children, it will cut costs on the USD sent over each month in accordance with our budget.<br />Win win on every side.<br />Promised Charles i would paint animals, fruit, graffiti, children on the walls on the outside of the office, with the kids...but with great trepidation. He has the walls left white for this endeavour, but the day i showed up someone had painted them brown...ack! what to do? We had all the kids draw animals, buses, airplanes, birds, and children on paper, which with a highlight marker, two of the older boys and I drew huge on the walls, on day one. Then, with a lot of help from enthusiastic and impatient kids, painted those images white again - all 77 kids swarming me and the freshly painted images and coming away slathered in white oil paint indelibly stuck onto fingers, faces and hair. I am dreading the next day's job of colour.<br /><br />I am trying to think of a way where only two boys brighten up the images with colour, but how to do that with all these kids, curious, enthusiastic, desperately wanting to paint! I give up and mix colours into lots of small plastic containers, hand out sponge brushes, and watch them go at it. Mimi, mimi. Me me...!!! ME! they are all shouting, stampeding, the colours, the brushes falling on the dusty ground, a mess! I am drawing as fast as I can now, leaves coming up from the bottom of the office up and onto brightly coloured animals, everything dripping wet with paint, with kids vying for pots of green, blue, brown, orange and red, splashing and splattering it, they make them come alive.<br /><br />Hamisi, the night security guard at my hostel who has been painting the walls on the inside of our main house all week, appears with a can of black paint and finishes off the job by painting the ledge along the bottom, covering up the splatters and drips.<br /><br />It looks incredible!! All painted entirely by the kids. A great day. I walked home well after dark alongside the long main road, past vast expanse of rice fields blackened by the night sky, sprinkling with stars, so dark you can see nothing but for the flash of bicycles coming into view just in time to jump aside safely.<br /><br />I visit the children at the nearby Pambazuko children's home along the way last week, passing Colliette taking Tabia, the mama of those children to the market to pick up needed kitchen supplies, they wave, as i head over to their house. The kids racing out to meet me, one of the joys of each time i visit Africa, these kids I have known now for 5 years...coming from the very first orphanage i volunteered with back then, so long ago. I know them well, especially Elia, Sifuni, Jackson, Ruth, Zack, Justin, Melania and Fabiola...my daughter Seanna and Sierra coming to Africa two times laden with art supplies teaching these children. They are loved and blessed. Tabia and her husband Elias are their mama and baba, with my Swedish friends Kerstin and Berndt now in charge of supporting the 14 kids here at Pambazuko. It is truly a lovely small family, and a good example of how children coming from many tribes, orphaned mostly by HIV AIDS, can come together in one small house and become brothers and sisters together, with a mama and baba. We hope someday soon, at Majengo to emulate this example there, with the 77 children we look after, creating a new facility encompassing a number of small houses, each with up to 14 kids, overseen by a mama and baba, if our dreams can come true.<br />I set up my computer and roll back to 2006, when i first met those kids waving outside the rickety orphanage along the safari route, Home Comfort. Photos, hundreds of them, of us on safari with those kids, painting with them, drawing, and my teaching them how to swim at the nearby tourist campsite swimming pool, every Saturday afternoon for two years, until they raised the prices, and rules encouraging 'whites only', where we no longer go. Watching the photos, the kids crowding around the computer, entranced. Memories of images of them spanning the last five years, beginning as little kids, and now healthy, strong, and tall.<br /><br />Today begins my final week in Africa...with Matt coming with Rose and Lauren, with Charles flying in from Kili to Mwanza, where we visit an orphanage set up by Jamie and our team back at home, to learn and see what they have done to make their children's home a success. Then back to Arusha tomorrow, to visit three more, and on to Mto Wa Mbu...a week set up of budget review, visits to Majengo with big staff meetings, time with the children and Doris, our ICA director, meetings with government officials and visiting possible plots for our new facility. Always a whirwind when Matt arrives, I look forward to his laughter and jokes, his enthusiasm, his positive energies and good sense. Catch up next week!<br />Have a great one....!! LynnLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-73459725784992276002011-10-11T00:21:00.000-07:002011-10-11T01:26:35.356-07:00jambo!!<br />sitting here the bright morning sun blasting into the courtyard outside my office door, i can see a group of 8 men, lounging on tippy plastic chairs, engrossed, Swahili, Charles inside the closed door across the hall giving someone a test for HIV AIDS...emerges to tell me that these guys are planning a friends father's funeral, who can contribute what, who can go to the burial, tonight..in Africa they don't embalm and celebrate soon after the death..all the while i am waiting very patiently and very silently without complaining for one hour for this computer to connect into my blog, and finally, after many attempts, i am here. Bravo!<br />Wrote yesterday...and since then- a day later, reporting a great meeting with Charles and Abdul about our possible future orphanage facilities...I drew out the idea plans we have talked about, a big communal kitchen...a pre school, maybe a primary...with small houses big enough for up to 14 kids sprinkled about, a playground, goats, veg garden...library...we look at all three options for where this could be...a govt given plot, the land and houses we currently occupy, or the big plot across the road...Abdul settles on the one i like best...IF we can strike a deal with the owners of all three houses...plus two adjacent plots, with one, get this, adjoining the English medium primary school..where, if we can manage to reduce the private school rates with the principal...maybe our kids can go there...<br /><br />it is now, all a dream...but dreams here in Africa come true and i'm banking on it...<br /><br />And in the afternoon, sitting here at this computer with Charles working on staff and visitor policies...rules for child protection...another chart of our organization...one with the staff and their responsibilities..one with the names and ages now of the children...living in and next week meeting the guardians and the kids living out sprinkled around the community...our menu..<br />And last night, dinner of shish kabobs with little pieces of charred beef bbqed alongside a plate of chipsies...a boy from the streets slumped into a nearby chair, maybe 12, 13years old, he can't go home, his father beating him brutally, with no relatives or friends to take him in, watching the guy cookingthe bbq..watching us eat.<br />Charles calls him over...what can be done about this boy? As they talk in Swahili i see that look of such pain on his face, the way the mouth is open and set, drooping, holding itself there. i have felt it once in awhile in myself. that mouth, just open and hanging ...the eyes brimming hot almost with tears, shining and anciently sad...he sits down - i can't help myself, i rub his back, i am so sad and sorry..our orphanage is full ...and this boy, Charles calls him Msonjo cause he comes from the Msonjo tribe, but what is his name? has made his way on the streets, stealing and prostituting, whatever, anything to keep himself alive, and tonight talking with Charles and this white lady from Canada rubbing his back, he doesn't flinch. Waiting now for his dinner..<br /><br />This morning at MiCasa, the cafe around the corner, i am lying on the floor showing Miriam the owner some pilates moves, and she invites me to run with her tomorrow morning at 6am! great...i am feeling good...much better than the days around missing Thanksgiving back at home...another day!!<br />but here...i copy yesterday...and see you tomorrow!<br /><br /><style>@font-face { font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }table.MsoNormalTable { font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Jambo! Happy thanksgiving!!</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >I miss you all out there…tried to reach Canada last night, so many times, but every time someone picked up, a series of weird screeches sounding like the yelping of some wild animal emoting from this side of the planet! The lines went dead. Ah…I am lonely...<br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Mto wa Mbu..Saturday night, driving over here from Arusha we saw over 20 giraffes standing silently alone, or in groups chomping on the top branches inside a clump of thorn bushes, alongside the road. The sun setting, long dark and very tall silhouettes against the night sky. Welcome to Mto Wa Mbu….a supper of roasted goat chopped into small pieces and served on one plate for all of us to pick at, dip into salt and hot sauce and encircle with a right handful of ugali, the national staple in Tanzania, other than rice, sort of like thick crème of wheat cereal, hot, where you grab a clump of it, make a ball, stick your thumb into the centre to indent into a spoon-like scoop, to collect your goat and hot sauce!</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Hamidu our driver without a car, but always with one of Charles friends from ICA lending transportation for us…this time a Masai guy called Henry - a safari driver, who speaks great English, who will be my translator I hope, when Charles is away this week…</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Charles’ family, Grace his wife with his two little boys, David and Derrick moving from Dar to Arusha to be closer to Charles. Grace transferred her work as a nurse for the military..their worldly belongings being shipped in this week, with Charles at the other end receiving, then driving to Dar to bring his family back. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >It is good. He needs to be near them. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >I am sitting in my office at<span style=""> </span>ICA Mto headquarters, with, in the next room<span style=""> </span>one of our PLWHA people living with HIV AIDS support groups meeting Monday morning – a roomful of mostly women, wrapped in colourful cloth and magnificent and matching head pieces, great habari, jambo!! How are you doing? Karibu, welcome back! </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >My uncle lent them through ICA one year ago, four seed start-up money to embellish their small businesses, and here we are one year later, all four groups have paid us back. Great…meeting in a few days to determine success and challenges of that project.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" ><span style=""> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Over to Majengo orphanage bright and early Saturday morning<span style=""> </span>heralded by a stampede of welcoming happy children, showing us the new office they built this year just outside our main space. It is big, spacious, clean. Charles had the outside painted pure white. Yesterday I bought cans of oil paints to create a mural with the children…lions, elephants, giraffe, sun, moon, stars..whatever they want, in red, pink, blue, green, yellow…pouring rain today, so we start tomorrow…one of the older boys, an amazing artist. On Sunday surrounded by a mass of kids, I am drawing animals on one of those echo sketch pads, this boy takes it, erases mine and draws a much better elephant than I ever could; wow! This guy, who has just graduated from primary school will design the mural. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >They’ve built a huge outdoor dining room, cement floor and thatched roof at the back of the group of houses we call Majengo. Philippe, one of the original boys, points up to an empty space on the ceiling and says TV…he wants a TV plus 5 bicycles for the older kids to run around in, and they shall get them somehow, this week. The inside of our main building, which we have occupied for the last 2 ½ years is filthy….the plaster crumbling – two years of a hundred little hands, n dire need of a paint job. Charles hired Hamisi from our overnight pension, we bought four buckets of good paint, brushes and plaster, and today they begin. Plus ordering 4new tables and benches and the promise from a local carpenter to repair the ones we already have, the slats holding them together broken down from a million little feet, kicking. We’ve done a lot in a couple of days.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Big talks about education. For the young kids under 7, a pre school on site with two great teachers, Glory and Grayson who speak only a little English; the older kids trot off to one of four nearby govt primary schools, but with no English….consequently, when they graduate after 7 years into English-speaking-only secondary schools, they have trouble. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >On the side, four of our kids are being sponsored by a guy from the UK into nearby private English medium schools - a decision we have to discuss. Is it fair that only a selected few get to go to private school, the others waiting and hoping for their chance? Or who are we to deprive those chosen kids an English education? What is best for the orphanage? We have heard from other orphanages who observe a ‘no gift policy’, where each child must be treated the same, otherwise jealousy and discrimination can divide and erode.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Charles says the govt primary schools actually offer a better all-round education than expensive private English medium schools, but they don’t teach English. We have decided to bring one or or two really good English teachers on site and full time to teach our kids and staff..at least for a couple of years before we build our whole new facility. At that time, we may build our own primary school, one that teaches English and Swahili, in a government approved program. And when they get older, maybe a secondary school, or trade schools….</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >We’re considering options. We’ve created a 2013 group back home to research other Tanzanian orphanages to decide what kind of facility we want to build over the next two years. I toured 6 acres of land that the local government is offering us for free which includes an already half-built primary school, with four classrooms and one office. It is a big wide plot, open and flat, but about 3 miles away from our existing premises. Location, location, location. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Across the street from where we are now is a huge plot, perfect for our purposes, owned by a Tanzanian woman married to an American, who we’re checking into, re availability and cost. There<span style=""> </span>ia a possibility of buying our existing three rental buildings and expanding from there. All options at this point.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" ><span style=""> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Currently, with last December’s expansion, there’s no doubt, we are overloaded! Where once we had 27 kids living in with a staff of 12, we now support 77 kids living in, with 18 staff, with another 37 kids living out around the community, their education and medical needs! It was an emergency, we pulled together the best we could do. We’ve got three houses with 3-4 bedrooms in each,<span style=""> </span>a dormitory system with as many bunk beds possible, and in the case of little ones, sleeping two to a bed. The dormitory system is common in Africa.<br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >But we have seen also a system where smaller houses are built around one big communal kitchen and dining area, with each house supporting a mama and 12-14 kids, offering a much better sense of family…Kids in each house become a unit, a family unto themselves. A much preferred system, more expensive, but one well worth considering. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >But for now,<span style=""> </span>our kids are getting the best we can provide: a clean and loving environment, good food three times a day, regular medical check-ups, and clean clothing and uniforms. We realize this as temporary, excited by plans down the road for a<span style=""> </span>much bigger and better facility for these kids. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Last night, Charles and I raced across a wide plain of darkened desert just outside of town, for dinner at our friend Abdul’s incredible, brand new lux and wonderful safari lodge. Outside on a stone patio overlooking Lake Manyara in the distance under a sprinkling of a million stars and almost full moon, a warm wind blowing, with a few glasses of wine and dinner fit for me! Any of you out there coming to visit Majengo, and going on safari, you must stay a night or two at this magical place. Abdul has hired<span style=""> </span>Masai tribal warriors as his manager and security guards, adorned in beaded necklaces and great drooping ear lobes, dressed in red plaid blankets and carrying spears, they are stationed at every corner along paths winding through tall grasses to separate boma like guest homes, made of thatch and cement, fit for me! I helped Abdul a little last year. He had finished this incredible place, but had no water! He’d erected a pipe running from pure spring water some 20 miles away to his hotel. But along the way, Masai women chopped into it, collecting pools for their cattle…Not once, or twice, but along the route in a period of 6 months, a good 250 times!!! refusing to leave it alone, despite what Abdul promised and did for them! He gave up and tried to drill for water on his premises, but found it salty. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Finally, he built a separate line for the Masai, teaching them how to turn off and on the water themselves. Abdul’s hotel pipe now is strong with good pressure, the only guaranteed water source in the district. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >Every time I come here it is a different experience. With Charles last year applying for his masters which would take him away from Africa for a couple of years,<span style=""> </span>our ngo, ICA, wound down their main projects. Charles was refused his visa twice to the UK for no good reason, is moving his family to nearby Arusha, and plans to take an online masters in international public<span style=""> </span>health from Liverpool. All good. He will be able to stay with his kids and wife, work on his masters in Arusha at home, and still coordinate the comings and goings of the orphanage in nearby Mto wa mbu. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >But with no other major projects in Mto Wa Mbu…the office is quiet these days but for the mooing outside my window of a neighbouring cow and the incessant blasting of rap down the road, a rooster crows. We’ve cut our staff down to two, Hamidu who doesn’t speak English and Charles. When he takes off, I am on my own, struggling with kidogo Swahili, next to none! A challenge so they say in the struggling communities...a calamity in my world...but only for a few days...<span style=""> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" >And this too will pass….</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Helvetica;font-size:14pt;" > </span></p>Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-53540934452574966452011-10-07T01:12:00.001-07:002011-10-07T02:23:25.050-07:00Jambo! still in Arusha, the exciting Arusha Savings Group Summit over yesterday...learned so much! To clarify, this entire group of reps from 43 countries, all over Africa, India, Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Cambodia...from Plan, World Vision, Catholic Resource Centre, Feed the Hungry, Kids International - all the big world-wide organizations coming together to talk about how they are organizing small VSLs...Village savings and loans groups, in their countries..where poor people form groups of up to 25 people, elect their own leaders and each person putting as little as $.25 cents into the pot each week or every two weeks. The total amount accumulates, and members can borrow at an agreed upon interest rate. This money is used to enhance or begin small businesses. Profits from it are used to better lifestyles of their families, support education of their kids.<br />It is an incredible model.<br />I spent alot of time with Jones, a great woman working in Zimbabwe, setting up these small savings groups especially with teenagers from age 13 on.... sometimes even with younger kids, from age 6 on! All wanting to learn how to save, many of whom have witnessed the successful results of their parent's in savings groups. The kids would borrow money from their parents to begin their investment. Then take out a tiny loan, buy sweets with it, and sell to other kids, raise a small profit with each sale...end up buying their own shoes, uniforms for school, and even helping their parent's with basic needs of their families. It is incredible.<br /><br />This VSL group model is different from micro finance.<br />With micro finance, someone from the outside lends money to a small group of 5-6 people...with an agreement that this money will be paid back, sometimes at great interest, at a certain date, each member responsible for each other. When someone can't pay back, the others must jump in to cover.<br />Micro finance has been a great model for years, but has been abused as well.<br />I heard, at a conference last year on alternative investing in Toronto, a woman from NYC actually stand up on the stage promoting micro finance as a viable option for your money, say "a lot of money can be made from the poor! They always pay back, much more dependable than most people from the west!" Shockingly, huge interest rates of up to 40-50% were sometimes demanded. Often borrowers were illiterate, not understanding what they were 'signing', or in many cases, this was the only game in town for them to borrow. Yes the poor were paying back, terrified of what might happen to them if they didn't. Harassed by creditors, I have been told that they actually sold family land to pay off debts, even hire their children out for prositution, marry them off - anything to get the lender off their backs!<br /><br />With VSL, outside money is not required which makes this model sustainable to the people in the group. Large interest rates are not incurred. The group decides and agrees upon the interest rate themselves. VSL is a model that was started by a Norwegian woman back in the 80s and has spread world wide...the people at the conference this week, some pioneers this movement, but all hugely enthusiastic about increasing the numbers from millions to billions in the years to come.<br /><br />Last year I sunk seed money (from my uncle, therefore from the outside), interest free, into four savings groups of 80 people, mostly women, all living with HIV Aids. These groups had been in operation for a few years, struggling along, not making a lot of profit, with more challenges than most - their money going toward good food to support their medication, travel to doctors, as well as toward basic needs for their families. So on Charles' advice we sunk this seed money into their pot, with a contract for one year. I am delighted that at this writing three of the four groups have paid it back in full. The last group promising by next week, the date of the loan last year.<br />Charles tells me it has been a success, with most of the people enhancing small businesses, like selling bananas and fruit at the market and along the main street, buying a little bit of land, renting a tractor to till it...and harvesting 150 times what they were able to make initially. Out of the profits expensive school fees have been paid for kids to attend secondary school, houses have been fixed, new businesses started.<br />I can't wait to hear all the stories next week during their paying back ceremony...great!<br />Jones from Zimbabwe tells me things are getting a little better since the opposition party is working hand in hand with the Mugabi govt..food in the supermarkets...a little fuel at the pumps...life a little easier..I'm told our western press embellishes stories, making them sound a lot worse than they are, according to the people living there. When i worked in Zim back in 2006 the US govt advised Americans not to visit. I was the only white I saw for a month, walking down the street, jammed into local buses. It was not what we were told. I never felt unsafe. The people were warm and welcoming. There was horrible sickness with an estimated 30% suffering the ravages of HIV AIDS, amongst terrible poverty, but in the midst of this I felt such resilience, banning together helping each other, community, joy, singing, dancing as well. WE can only imagine this at home in times of collective disaster. The ice storm; Sept. 11. the death of Kennedy, even Jack Layton.<br />People coming together, forgetting themselves. Working as a whole. It feels good.<br />Our truck broke down yesterday; Charles was unable to pick me up, so last night was spent buried into a book at the Naz hotel in Arusha...delicious after the mind bending intensity of the conference.<br />Today: the internet across the street from the Naz....a luxury...power on...rain falling softly outside, atop the crashing of traffic racing up and down, vendors selling shoes, fruits and vegetable, belts, cell phones alongside the road...and later, if Charles comes, off to the SOS orphanage just outside of town to check it out... starting to research other orphanages to determine the best way to go with a new Majengo facility to be built by 2013.<br />How many kids? Big dormitories or small houses with a mama and baba? How many staff, kitchens, toilets, government help?> restrictions? playgrounds, vegetable gardens, chickens and goats, pre school? primary...? I'm looking for an English teacher to hire full time in the interim...translators at the conference promise to send someone my way, someone qualified who comes from the Mto Wa Mbu village area...with family near the orphanage. All good...<br />Till then, I'm off to Mto Wa Mbu without easy internet access...<br />will get back to blog, when i can..have a great day! xxLynnLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-20064886989909636682011-10-04T22:11:00.000-07:002011-10-07T01:12:00.731-07:00jambo! hi from Arusha, arrived Sunday noon after a harrowing 2 days in the air and lounging on airport benches..Toronto, London, Ethiopia, Nairobi and Kilimanjaro! Charles at the airport with his wife Grace to meet me and over to the Naz, across the street from the best internet cafe in the whole of Africa I swear! It was cold..no kidding, cooler than the world i left so far away only a few days ago - meeting with Doris and Joseph, ICA Tanzania heads and Charles the next day, great...briefly getting caught up, things amazing at the orphanage, with our kids settling in, no one in dire need of medical attention...long talk about the new orphanage facility we need to build by 2013...either by buying the 3 existing buildings we already occupy and rent plus a few nearby plots, or by using the 6 acres of land the govt is giving us, not too far away from the orphanage and building fresh. I sketched out a quick idea that we've been talking about back home, especially emphasizing the small houses plan rather than the big dormitories we have now...they talked about a big operation here in Tanzania with three orphanages, called SOS which i will visit with Charles on Friday. Here they have about 15 houses scattered around, each with 5 or so kids and one mama in each house, and one baba overlooking the whole enterprise. a big kitchen to service all houses, dining areas in and out, playground, goats, chickens, eggs, vegetable gardens etc...sounds amazing...talked about education. When all those new kids came to us last December from the corrupt orphanages along the safari route, two of those kids were being sponsored by someone from the UK and sent, by day out to a private English middle school where they teach everything in English from the get go, pre school and primary. Much better than the existing govt schools where everything is taught in swahili. These sponsors came recently, checking up on their two kids now at Majengo, thought it was great what we were offering those kids, and chose little Pendo for a sponsorship this time as well, plus one more child. Had a long talk about this, whether it was good to have some kids take much better schooling outside the orphanage, yet living in with the other kids...and according to Doris and Joseph, it could cause jealousy, us and them etc...not a great idea...<br />they came up with the plan, if we can manage it financially to create our own pre school and primary based on the English Middle school way...which is regulated by the govt, the ciriculum being the same as in govt primary schools, but taught fully in English from the beginning..great idea...and by doing this we could not only offer this much better education to our kids, but charge neighbouring kids as well the opportunity thus becoming a little self sustaining ourselves.<br />RE the donor box over at the orphanage, an idea to request all visitors to put donations along with a note with their contact numbers into the box -<br />Charles and i are about to create a Volunteer guideline sheet, much needed as a lot of people are wanting to work at the orphanage, Jamie in Warren in charge of US donors and volunteers...<br />I'm off and running...<br />In the second day of a big savings conference, the first Arusha Savings Group Summit of its kind, held at the Arusha conf centre where they are conducting the international Rwanda trials...interesting. we have 250 people from 43 countries \across the world, all talking about their savings programs for very poor people, even with primary school children learning how to save, which i am most interested in. Yesterday after hours of small and specific sessions targeting the many aspects of village savings, many of which dealing with gender issues, culminating with a 'living room' discussion with the whole group, 5 people on stage...all men! The gender issue reminding me of what NA experienced in the 60s and 70s with 'woman's lib' which was really about equal rights, not the negative bra burning slant put upon it today...with women getting together, finding their own voices, empowering..men standing back wonder what the heck!! and sometimes denouncing the whole thing, or feeling intimidated a little or a lot...the same thing here 50 years later...<br />Thinking of Marg who lost her Ernie last week, my cousin David, and other friends struggling back home with such issues....missing you all and wishing you my love especially in these hard times...loving being back here, the colour, the noise, hustle bustle, the radiance, the joy, the everyday resilience...<br />Hey...did i tell you? Majengo Canada were granted our official charitable status from the Canadian government just last week!! We can now offer tax receipts to donors!! All set to hit the round running when i get home in November...love to all!! xxLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-24819380346815550992011-09-18T15:14:00.000-07:002011-09-18T17:14:33.493-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-plhS0Dd60fE/TnaI-R5bftI/AAAAAAAAAUk/rIT8LvaK2H8/s1600/MAJENGOLR.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 354px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-plhS0Dd60fE/TnaI-R5bftI/AAAAAAAAAUk/rIT8LvaK2H8/s400/MAJENGOLR.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5653856985747783378" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9LsmE6l7sgA/TnaI9wrvfdI/AAAAAAAAAUc/bjwSzlZmlNw/s1600/elephant.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9LsmE6l7sgA/TnaI9wrvfdI/AAAAAAAAAUc/bjwSzlZmlNw/s400/elephant.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5653856976832003538" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-geys9v7WVR4/TnaI-5qDzaI/AAAAAAAAAUs/H6sYTlJzlWU/s1600/Majengo%2B2011.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 237px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-geys9v7WVR4/TnaI-5qDzaI/AAAAAAAAAUs/H6sYTlJzlWU/s400/Majengo%2B2011.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5653856996420734370" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">September 2011....Toronto, Canada</span><br /><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Hi everyone..all the best to you all!!</b></span><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:100%;" > </span> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>I am in the process of applying to the Canadian government for charitable status and am reminded of the great enthusiasm and generosity of so many people who made this very exciting project actually come true! The Majengo Orphanage! Thank you so much!!<br /></b></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>I'm off to Tanzania in October...signed up for a great micro-finance conference in Arusha for a couple of days with a participant list made up mostly African people, very exciting. Our PLWHA (people living with HIV AIDS) micro finance project is coming to a close in October. So far 3 of the 4 groups have paid back interest-free loans my uncle donated a year ago..very successful, with lots of them reporting profits in small businesses, enough to enable their kids on into secondary school...</b></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>All is well at the orphanage. The 67 new kids who came to us last December have settled right in, our teachers giving them extra tutoring to bring them up to the levels of our original kids.<br /></b></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:100%;" >We're revising our website...just had a great meeting with the folks in Warren Pennsylvania to map out plans for the next year...our budget almost doubled with all these new kids...I'm praying for my CRA charitable status. Very exciting...</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:100%;" >I sent the following letter out to all our Canadian donors who kicked off the first year finances to get the orphanage going....you guys were the first FOUNDERS. You may have heard the story, but to refresh, sit back and enjoy!<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Like they say, we have come a long way baby…the above pictures are of the orphanage as I found it back in March 2008, with 52 little kids squeezed onto a mud floor in a dark, dank, leaking foyer of someone’s house – no furniture, no resources but for one teacher who gave a year of his time with no pay, and a few neighbouring farm women who came by to cook lunch for the kids – in most cases the only food they would receive all day.</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>These were the poorest of the poor kids in the district of Majengo, an agricultural community just outside the rural village of Mto Wa Mbu, Arusha, Tanzania. Back then they ranged from age 3 up to about 6…none were old enough for primary school. Many were found roaming from house to house without family, their parents lost to HIV AIDS…relatives and friends off at work, without a home. </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Charles Luoga our local project coordinator took me to see these kids the day after I was kicked out of an orphanage on the safari route, overloaded with sick and starving children set up purposely to lure in tourist money. I was the whistle blower, and after working with those kids for two years, was forced out by their director who in fact had a criminal record, had spent time in jail, and was paying off local church and government officials. </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>I was devastated and determined to pack it all in and leave Africa for good. But Charles dragged me over to Majengo, and that is where it all began..</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>You wonder whether, if you knew what you were getting yourself into, like for any project - a marriage, having a child, renovating a house - would you have gone into it in the first place? </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Sure, sometimes I wonder…But when I look into the faces of these kids now, and the so many others who have come to us since, I have to say YES YES YES!<span style=""><br /></span></b></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"></span>It has been a harrowing experience and a miracle too, as I will tell you…but before all that, know that you guys were the first, the FOUNDERS…who got this little orphanage off the ground…I thank you so much!!</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>March 2008….We found a half finished house down the road and committed ourselves to fixing it up at our expense, for use of it. We figured the reno would cost around $15,000, but once we put in a cement floor, new roof, electricals, (although we wouldn’t actually get electricity hook up till last December! Imagine putting 77 children to bed in the dark!!), water, built an outdoor kitchen, showers, toilets, ran a fence of bougainvillea around the whole property, planted trees and flowering bushes, tiled, painted, new windows, screens, 17 bunk beds, mattresses, kitchen equipment, cleaning, clothing, and towels…we were up around $23,000 when we were finished!</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> February 2009. Off to Africa but desperately short of funds to finish the job, erupting into Tim Forbes’ wonderful “52 thank you’s!”email to which so many of you responded,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>sending me off again with enough money to finish off the renos and furnishings..</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>March 2009. Enter Matt McKissock from Warren, Pennsylvania, who called to rent our family cottage via the internet, so fascinated was he that he flew over to meet me sight unseen a few weeks later to check out for himself the conditions I described during our cottage contract. He came with two friends, for one week. We pushed with all our might to finish the job, moved 27 kids in the night before, and celebrated his arrival with a very grand opening. Matt met Charles and our staff, our local ICA Tanzania agents and government leaders and was blown away by the children, ecstatically racing around<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>their new home, happy now with three meals a day, mosquito nets, running water and a team of 12 wonderful people to care for them. It was heaven. Matt stayed for one week, arriving with 12 duffel bags of everything we’d asked for, had the time of his life and took off with a film he’d<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>made of the kids singing “Twinkle twinkle little star”. He promised nothing, but I sensed something was up!</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Surreal. I’d focused on raising money to get the kids off the mud floor, and hadn’t thought for one minute about who was going to pay for basic ongoing needs: food, medical, education, uniforms, shoes, clothing, staffing and maintenance! Matt kept asking about operating costs, but it wasn’t till I got over there that we had the foggiest idea of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>our yearly budget. Insanity, really. But in retrospect, Matt would never have flown all the way over with such urgency had I appeared to be in control. It wasn’t that I wasn’t in control, I just couldn't focus beyond renovation at that point. </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>He went home and two weeks later wrote a letter to his family and friends that caused me to burst into tears in the crowded internet café. He committed himself and his family to taking over our operating costs of $31,000 for one year, and now, 2 ½ years later, these incredible people are still helping. If you want to read that letter <a href="http://www.majengo.org/">www.majengo.org</a>. It will make you cry. </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>With Matt on board, his mom Diana and her friend Jamie came over the next year. Matt brought another friend who teaches linguistics at UBC. I started going over twice a year: October and February…budgets, monitoring, working with the staff and kids and trying to learn Swahili.. Kids in our on-site pre-school went on to<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>primary and now stand in the top ten of each class, year after year. In Feb. 2010 the village leaders brought 15 new kids to us for pre school, by-day, at the beginning crying and too scared to open their mouths, but soon fitting in to the growing Majengo family…</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> </b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Until December 2010 we were whistling along with 55 kids, our staff happy with yearly bonuses and their own children helped by Majengo with the financing of their schooling. We had it made…</b></span> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Until last September. I got a call from Charles. The government was about to shut down the corrupt orphanages on the safari route running through town. The director I worked with back in 2007 had been charged with sexually abusing one of the girls en route to Secondary School. She escaped and charged him. He spent a month in jail,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> was </span>now pending court charges. The government could no longer ignore his behaviour. He’d wracked in thousands of dollars from unsuspecting tourists. They would close him down, IF they could find a safe place for the children. Maybe 20 kids, 30 tops, they said. I called Matt. I'm going on record, he said: "we have no choice. We have to help those kids. We will take them on."<br /></b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>I flew over in October. We organized the rental of two houses behind our main facility. Not an easy feat. Each house was overflowing with tenants who knew a good thing when they saw one. White people desperate for their rooms. We found them better rentals and renovated at our cost, and paid six months rent - the only way they would leave! Finally empty, we rebuilt them, new floors, windows, ceilings, the whole thing all over again, bunk beds, sheets, mattresses, towels….done.</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> And then we waited. I was worried; the shut down plan was kept secret from directors on the safari route. They were dangerous. Some were worse than others; one was running a pornography ring with the children. At this point we were told there were 5 orphanages slated for shut down. </b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>We had no idea how many kids we would be getting. I got shingles and took to bed. Not fun. Jamie flew over and together we waited. There was an election in Tanzania; the government was campaigning. Our two houses were ready; but we were waiting.</b></span> </p><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Charles arrived with shocking news. The same guy who threw me out for being the whistle blower, the one who was up for rape charges, was dead, thrown out of the back of a pickup which crashed into a lorry and flipped over on top of him.</b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> I jumped out of bed and went to his funeral, to see for myself that it was indeed him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>700 people in brilliant sunshine assembled alongside a dirt road with 8 guys in leather jackets and shades crashing through the dust and potholes on motorcycles leading a red pickup carrying a wooden coffin perched askew on back, the tall hand-made cross sticking out one end, sketchy lettering in white paint with his name, birth and death dates. I was the only white. And because of that, the honoured guest., pushed alongside the family behind the coffin threading our way into the courtyard into the house. Without question, it was him. He was the ring leader and now he was gone. In Africa, they say it was the word of God. He couldn’t hurt us or the children anymore. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></b></span> <p class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Tired of waiting, I flew home.</b></span><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:100%;" >Christmas, December 2010, the government sweeps in and shuts down 5 orphanages on the safari route, dropping 67 kids off to Majengo within a two day period, ages 3 to 14. The kids were freaked, our staff overwhelmed. Half of them off on holidays, with 67 new kids stampeding the kitchen, scared, bewildered and afraid - eating garbage off the street, leaves from the trees. I can’t imagine what our original kids went through either. But it couldn’t be helped. </span></p><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b></b></span> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Some guardians had been told lies about us, showed up the next day in revolt, demanding their children. The police were called in. The government declared Majengo the only officially-recognized orphanage in the district. The cooks figured out how much rice to cook. Over 100 mouths to feed per meal, three times a day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We called the staff every morning: Money wired over, food bought, kids checked for HIV AIDS, malaria, lice…washed and scrubbed. </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Majengo now supports 114 children. Age 3 up to 14. </b></span></p><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>But we said: no more, we are at our limit.</b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> And then the police bring in baby Anna, age 1 with the skin-drawn, gaunt and wretched body of a 3 month child, wracked with hunger, with 3 days to live. Our cook Adhija takes her home that night, for now and forever, home to her family with five children of her own, bringing her back by day, the whole orphanage, staff and the children, feeding and carrying that little girl around till she is right again…</b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b><br />How can you say no?</b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b><br />January: Matt and I flew over to see for ourselves. I am expecting mayhem… as we drove up, we find our staff lolling under the shade by the outdoor kitchen, laughing, talking, the kids quiet and safe, tucked into their beds…the afternoon nap. The next day, a meeting with the staff, ICA, government officials - each person telling their stories, chuckling now that the worst is over, the kids have settled in.</b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b><br />These kids are happy - little groups squatting in a circle, playing games in the dirt with stones, or swinging,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>gyrating with a hoola-hoop or racing across the field playing soccer or just sitting around gossiping together, watching the day unwind, happy, relaxed, finally, safe and at home. </b></span> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> Budget day. New stuff needed, recorded, priced: big pots, 40 new plates, cups, bowls, utensils, cleaning products, uniforms, shoes, Vaseline, rice, maise, new toilets, showers, enlarge the outdoor kitchen, build an outdoor dining area. A huge water tank on a tower. An office. It never ends. </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Our budget escalates, from $55,000 to $85,000 a year<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">. </span>And we are managing, or I should say, they are managing, well. </b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>WE fly home, and meet up in Warren, Penn. How to pay for it all. There’s no going back, we all have to help out now. I’ve gotten off easy, with Matt taking over a good lot of the operating costs these last two years, but it’s too much to expect, now. I have to do something that I have been avoiding for six years now, applying for charitable status, creating a board, establishing MAJENGO CANADA.</b></span> </p> <span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b></b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ></span><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:100%;" ></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>What a long way we’ve come since we saw those 52 kids on the mud floor… thanks to hundreds of people like yourselves,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>both on this side, in Sweden and in Africa, cheering this little orphanage to become a substantial, healthy and exciting part of rural life in Mto Wa Mbu, Arusha…</b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>Bravo to us all!!</b></span><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> Big thank you!</b></span> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b>And the pictures…at the top...of the kids at the beginning..of us all now, and of a local painting with the names of so many of you who have helped, from the beginning....<br /></b></span></p><span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:100%;color:black;" ><b> </b></span> <span style=" ;font-family:Garamond;font-size:16.0pt;color:black;" ><b><span style="font-size:100%;">Enjoy!!</span><br /></b></span>Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-30172235274373941152011-03-21T06:59:00.000-07:002011-03-22T06:29:40.474-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IgpL2zPnsrA/TYiesPhaprI/AAAAAAAAAS4/8SGbvzeCt-s/s1600/IMG_0813.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IgpL2zPnsrA/TYiesPhaprI/AAAAAAAAAS4/8SGbvzeCt-s/s400/IMG_0813.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586889820671223474" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yauFfWl24k0/TYierkZLhEI/AAAAAAAAASw/WYv7maSg6Qo/s1600/IMG_0759.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yauFfWl24k0/TYierkZLhEI/AAAAAAAAASw/WYv7maSg6Qo/s400/IMG_0759.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586889809093952578" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-glaBCx91j1U/TYiVkHxBrKI/AAAAAAAAARo/T2UbtQEgVTA/s1600/IMG_0316.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-glaBCx91j1U/TYiVkHxBrKI/AAAAAAAAARo/T2UbtQEgVTA/s400/IMG_0316.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586879785545608354" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2D9tj44vnkU/TYiU32BXPZI/AAAAAAAAARg/AjSjlXyci4c/s1600/IMG_0878.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2D9tj44vnkU/TYiU32BXPZI/AAAAAAAAARg/AjSjlXyci4c/s400/IMG_0878.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586879024868048274" border="0" /></a><br />Majengo UPDATES!! March 21...Happy spring...raining out my Toronto window this morning, dark and grey, not exactly spring yet..but hey!<br /><br />Decided last week not to go over this month as i hoped. I've been over twice in the last 5 months and am going back in October...it is costly and better to save up here and get things done on this side....but still, am dreaming of being there....<br /><br />I will miss our 2nd Majengo Orphanage anniversary party on April 1 (fools day!), plus the four April dates I was supposed to receive the money my uncle lent, interest free, for a 6 months term to 4 VICOBAS micro-finance groups back in November. I met with them in February...all going exceptionally well. Almost all of the 80 People Living with HIV AIDS who borrowed money had reported a profit in their small businesses during the 3 months time between November to February. They did so well that they were able to register their own children into Secondary School, paying the expensive fees of $650. for the first year.<br />An exceptional feat!<br />But consequently, having spent their profits for school fees, they are back to where they started. They asked that the loan be extended for another 6 months. Why not! Since I can't get back until October/November, we extended their loans till that time. More time for them to regain their profits, and for me to be there personally. Great!<br /><br />Lots of great news from Majengo Orphanage thanks to Peter and Kissa keeping in touch regularly now, our communication issues more or less resolved, despite the difficulties with electrical blackouts, disrupted phone services, etc...<br /><br />HEALTH:<br />The 16 kids who got chickenpox in January are well now, with only one small boy suffering. All 77 live-in kids were tested for HIV AIDS on March 5 with only 2 positive! This is incredible considering that most of the kids lost their parents to this terrible disease.<br /><br />We have one little 5 year old girl, Vailet Alex who came to us in December. Her blood is weak. She is tired, listless..doctors at first treated for malaria which worked for a few weeks, but still the situation stays. They took her to the hospital in Kiratu, but discovered it could be a kidney issue where she will have to be taken to Arusha or Monduli, much bigger hospitals about 2 hours away for further treatment.<br />Our matron Glory has been away for three weeks now, as her older sister passed away suddenly at the age of 43. Glory thanks the staff and ICA for their wonderful support during this time. Martha, our Majengo treasurer took over the health and well being of the kids, sleeping every night at Majengo, assisted by Witness, our head cleaner. What i find wonderful here is how close the staff work together as a team. When one needs help the others pitch in willingly.<br /><br />Grayson, our teacher is getting married in June...ICA and Majengo staff offered a portion of their salary to help pay for this wedding...money for the church and party afterwards to be held at Majengo, and just as much to be paid to his fiance's family, as dowry for her hand!<br /><br />A November 2010 university study by Audrey Crocker from Texas focusing on why the kids from Majengo are winning top academic spots in all classes at Primary school discovered that, according to the staff, it was due to immediate medical access and treatment, followed by good food, loving attention, security and stability.<br /><br />CHILDREN'S RIGHTS workshop...Saturday, March 19th...our ICA lawyer, Glory conducted a full day workshop with all the live-in kids at Majengo to teach them of their rights: rights to good food, medical needs, education and attentive loving staff and people looking after them. That they should not be beaten; that they must learn to respect each other, and their teachers, and most of all to respect themselves. Back in December 2010, the the 49 new children brought in from corrupt shut down orphanages, clung together with the children from where they came , but within a month they had integrated with all the kids both from the 4 other shut down orphanages or with the 28 kids already living in Majengo.<br /><br />Even little Anna, our youngest child at Majengo is doing incredibly well. The police dropped her off in January. At 9 months of age she had the sick and weakened body of a seriously malnourished three month old - given three days to live. But Adija, our head cook, scooped her up and declared Baby Anna as her child, taking her home every night to her own family of 5 children. By day, Anna is the little queen of Majengo. Just four weeks later, she is now strong enough to sit up in the middle of a blanket surrounded by her adoring assembly of staff and children - the kids hooking her onto their backs roaring around with her, and she eats nonstop all day. Anna's parents are unavailable to look after her.<br /><br />Considering privacy rights for Children, we are not allowed to post publicly the history of these children or specifics of what happened to their parents. But basically, every child we have at Majengo is among the most vulnerable and poor in the community, each one totally alone in the world without anyone to look after them - no relatives, neighbours or family friends. But now they are no longer alone. They live as a huge family among 77 other kids with a staff of 18 and another 30 kids sleeping out but spending most days at Majengo with meals and pre schooling. One big happy family. Not the best, of course. But much better than living on the streets, passed from guardian to guardian, with little care, food, medical needs or educational.<br /><br />Thanks again, everyone out there donating regularly to support these children. Your generosity is making a huge difference! I wish you could see with your own eyes what your dollars are doing, and what just a few weeks of tender loving care can bring. When those new kids arrived in December, they were "scrounging like starved animals", eating anything they could get their hands on: leaves from the trees, mud and garbage from the road. They pushed and shoved at mealtimes, desperate for good food, or any food, eating sometimes 2 or 3 servings at a time!<br /><br />But now they have settled in. When Matt, Ian and I visited in January they were lining up at mealtime, quietly and in order, not stampeding the kitchen...happy, relaxed and confident now that they were finally home. This could not have been achieved but for the patience and direction of our staff. They work hard to create an atmosphere of love and respect amongst each other and the children - and for their environment. They get together with ICA staff and village leaders twice a month to report challenges, ideas, to clarify job descriptions and needs and decide what is working well, what needs to be helped. The atmosphere we are trying to create is one of respect, love, competence and transparency.<br /><br />Recently they agreed that Saturday mornings would be set aside for "compound cleanup", where all the staff and kids scour the grounds for garbage and things out of place..to keep their new home clean. Great idea~<br /><br />Back in February at a huge staff meeting we learned of everything needed at Majengo now that our numbers had catapulted from 28 to 77 live-in kids! Since then, staff and ICA have bought everything on the list: uniforms and shoes, sweaters, school bags, paper, pens, chool and sporting materials, cleanliness items like shampoo, vaseline, soaps, disinfectants, etc...all the new kitchen needs as they went from feeding 40 people 3x a day up to over 100 people!<br /><br />They have been busy: They finished building a security fence around our three rental houses to keep cows out! and the kids in!! They erected a huge 5,000 litre water reserve tank up onto a tower made of metal posts outside the main house....waiting now for electricity access which should have been hooked up when we paid for it in December.<br /><br />They had signs made for the highway: "THANK YOU FOR VISITING THE MAJENGO ORPHANAGE", with arrows pointing to the facility and opened a Tourist Information Centre in the ICA offices to inform and attract people to the orphanage to see for themselves what is happening here. Before, corrupt orphanages on the safari route easily lured in tourists by keeping children sick and poor. Now, we hope to encourage those same tourists to visit Majengo and contribute donations into our secured Contribution Box, thus helping those same kids they saw out on the safari route, now being cared for properly. This month we hope to build a small office outside the facility as an Information Centre.<br /><br />Our 2nd Anniversary party is coming up! April 1.<br /><br />Two years ago on March 08, 2009, we officially moved 28 children into our newly-renovated facility, from the mud-floored dark and leaking foyer I found them in one year before. And how we have grown! It is so very exciting, and deeply rewarding.<br /><br />Anyone wanting to help or hear more about Majengo, please email me at lynnconnell@sympatico.ca., or Jamie and Di at our Warren Pennsylvania US offices at majengo@mckissock.com.<br /><br />On Saturday I ran out to the airport to wave off Ian Ashbaugh, his wife Becky and his parents from Pennsylvania as they fly over to Tanzania - Ian's third visit! They will spend a week at the orphanage helping to build the outdoor dining area and new office, spend time with the kids, maybe a little gardening, and then off on safari! I gave them a computer to pass along to Dr. John who treated me back in November with my shingle thing. He promises, along with Sister Monica at the Catholic Mission next to the orphanage, to take a big part in the ongoing medical health of the kids...<br /><br />So that's it!<br />have a great week....<br /><br />ps: I'm taking a 5 week course on Word Press blogging at CSI Centre for Social Innovation - I am sure we will see a great change in this blog, plus linking it all to Facebook, Twitter...and whatever, i am doing my best to leap into social networking..here goes!!<br /><br />...and plus plus...i am renovating the top two floors of my house in Toronto's Anex to create the MAJOR STREET B - a B and B but where you have the opportunity to make your own breakfast...anyone interested..please call me: 416-951-6528.Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-47421189010564217792011-03-05T13:58:00.000-08:002011-03-22T05:38:25.035-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aqCc49q91l4/TYiYOYZ_qOI/AAAAAAAAASA/Rb_doFpwkaY/s1600/victory%2Bkids%2Bmajengo.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 367px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aqCc49q91l4/TYiYOYZ_qOI/AAAAAAAAASA/Rb_doFpwkaY/s400/victory%2Bkids%2Bmajengo.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586882710590171362" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rwYtCbCTnMg/TYiYODELSgI/AAAAAAAAAR4/yDDJR8WZQ00/s1600/IMG_1216.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 316px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rwYtCbCTnMg/TYiYODELSgI/AAAAAAAAAR4/yDDJR8WZQ00/s400/IMG_1216.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586882704861514242" border="0" /></a><br />One month later...in cold rainy grey dark Toronto the good....<br />I am reading over my blogs of the last few months...got an email from a family member of a recently deceased director of one of the shut down corrupt orphanages imploring me to remove the name in my description of her brother's death, which i did. Now that he is gone, there is no point in naming him directly or dragging any of what happened up again, what was done was done. And i empathize with her, in that this man's children do not need to grow up and read directly of the deeds of their father.<br />Time to move on...and we all have.<br />I had no time to write of the last week in Tanzania before coming home...a great few days in Arusha where i met the director and scientist organizing the arrival of 40 international scientists coming from all over the world to inspect what they call Litolia, the feet of a mama, baba and toddler infused into rock near Ngoro Ngoro, a few hours away, reputedly 3 and a half million years old! These feet had been discovered 20 years ago, and for awhile had been uncovered and left to the elements, cracking and fading a little in some parts. Now, covered in moss they were about to be exposed to the best minds in the world to determine exactly how to perserve these feet. It was fascinating and so was this scientist I met at the Lush Garden Hotel.<br />Back to Mto Wa Mbu...working with Charles on our new brochure for Majengo to distribute to safari tourists at our new Majengo Visitor's Centre, he left the next day for Dar. The next morning beginning a typical day infused with frustration, my frustration, reminding me again and again, the merits of patience...ah....Up early to grab a bus up to Kiratu to the only bank which will spew money through my debit card, and WAIT! the machine is broken.. no money, then on to the ICA offices to meet with 4 Vicoba micro finance groups - the leaders of one are waiting outside under the shade of a tree..the door is padlocked, and after many calls and an hour later, we WAIT, Glory arrives with the key, her fiance had been sick and she'd taken him to the hospital. We get in but still with one group out of 4 represented, we WAIT...No one had told the other 3 groups to come, misunderstanding...we hold the meeting finally. My three canvas suitcases are not in the office as told. They were in the truck which went to the car wash, the bags thrown on the cement floor, and left there by accident...Kissa who is taking Charles' job has grabbed the all day bus to Moshi and back to pick up wired money arriving from the U.S., won't be back till nightfall, cancel meetings. But then...our last afternoon at Majengo:<br />We gather up all 77 kids and take pictures of them one by one in front of the grey stuccoed wall outside the main orphanage in groups: pre school live in kids, primary 1-2-3-4-5-7...all the live in kids, we take pictures of them alone and in groups, me with the camera and Peter sitting on a stool writing down their names and a description of their clothing: pinky shirt, Snoopie, uniform with shirt hanging out, one pink and one grey flip flop. Then we assemble them together with the staff behind and snap a few, make a little speech about working hard in school, and that we'll be coming back soon, and we love them so much, and we're shaking each little hand, or banging fists and some of us are crying and some of the kids too, little bodies racked with tears pressing up close to our legs, our tummies..it is heartbreaking to say goodbye.<br />That last night, dinner at Pambazuko the other Children's home with those kids who were rescued way back in 2009 from one of the 'bad' orphanages, the kids i first hung out with before discovering exactly what was going on...They are magnificent. Here we have a family group of 16 growing healthy kids who have been together for years, at first under the direction of corruption, and now at Pambazuko with a great mama and baba looking after them.<br /><br />WE did magic tricks...three little blackbirds..do you know that one? showing them explicitly how to do it for friends at school....and then teaching them the Bunny Hop which they loved! Great singing and dancing for a few hours, pack up and the next day take off to Arusha with Peter, Kissa, Glory and Hamidu our to buy stuff for Majengo: kitchen and cleaning, all the uniforms, sweaters, shoes...the 5,000 litre rubber water tower tank and metal poles to build the tower, two pumps one to give as a thank you gift to the Catholic Mission next door who run an infirmary for delivering babies and who have been without water for the last three months!! and one for Majengo. What else...down the list...the truck filled with goodies, I stay in Arusha with Peter and the others back to Mto Wa Mbu...we get 1,000 brochures copies for $1 brochure, insane... remind me to bring them over next time from Canada...<br />And the long trip home...9 hours to Amsterdam...8 more to Toronto.<br />On the plane a fascinating guy whose an international marketing person, and a determination to drop my prejudices and join Facebook...maybe Twitter, hey why not!!<br />Time to get serious. We need help!!<br />Have applied for my Canadian registered charitable status..should get the results within the year. Got to get out there, make presentations, form a Team Canada, get the word out and introduce Majengo to everyone out there who wants to help the little orphanage that grew and grew...<br />I am so proud of our staff in Africa...if not for them, those 47 new kids would never be integrated so well into Majengo. They were abused, dirty, sad scruffy little stragglers, starving, without medical attention and certainly without attention and love. Today thanks to our staff at the orphanage and at ICA, those kids have come together as one big beautiful family, all 77 who live on our premises.<br />It is the government's preference to locate children into the community's homes of family, relatives or friends and neighbours rather than in an orphanage setting, so many of the kids coming from the 5 shut down orphanages have been relocated into homes in the community, but who come to Majengo for all three meals and schooling five days a week.<br /><br />So far so incredibly good....<br />I write today three weeks after returning from Africa.<br /><br />Charles is still in Dar, his father suffering a series of strokes, I wish his family all my love.<br />Kissa has taken over his job in Mto Wa Mbu, with Peter and Glory at ICA working with our staff at Majengo, daily visits, shopping, financial accounting, one on one meetings with the children. Helping with cooking, cleaning, we have lost two of our Masai girls who have gone back to their villages, Mayunga and Raymond, our government leaders on the lookout to hire more staff.<br />Sixteen kids and Peter got the chickenpox..a few have had malaria since i came home, with visits to Sister Monica at the Catholic mission next door. All good. They've added a snack at 11am for the little ones, in preschool...fixed the broken table and bunk bed...expanded the outdoor kitchen, built the tower for the water reserve tank, still waiting for the electrical hook up which we paid for in December. Shelves have been built and installed in house one and two, a fence now surrounds the compound. Our three watchment have uniforms, boots and a set of bows and arrows, instead of the guns they originally asked for, and flashlights. Done. A tailor has sewed uniforms for all 114 kids, shoes have been bought, sweaters and school bags. What else?<br /><br />Money ran out to build the new Visitor's office outside Majengo and the outdoor dining room facility with the thatched roof and tables and benches for 100 people...waiting...<br /><br />Just came back from a great three days in Warren...thank you to Pam at the McKissock offices working with me all day Wednesday on our new brochure..thanks to Maxine, Nancy and Judy for editing back in Toronto. A great dinner in the basement of the Presbyterian church and afterwards a presentation with a few slides and Matt and I up there talking about Majengo, those folks planning a mission visit in 18 months with 15 or so members of the church. By then we should be in the throws of building our own brand new orphanage facility, as our leases run out in 2013 for the three houses we now use. Jamie, Ian, Matt and all the folks at Warren Majengo, what a great team. We're planning an Art Auction/Majengo catch up in June, followed by my giving a two day art workshop geared for absolute beginners all the way up to advanced painters...fun, easy, informative, fast moving...using all kinds of medium: paint, charcoal, pastel, paste, collage, coffee!! Hope to get lots of would be painters out there for that workshop..all proceeds to Majengo!<br />RE organized our budgets and wiring of money to ICA Tanzania...way more efficient, with monthly financial statements and narration of the kids due before monies are sent across. Much clearer and easier for Kissa there, and great for us to receive monthly updates. Ah...we move along slowly, but as my friend Nancy up here in Toronto said last week, the amount work achieved by everyone re Majengo in three short years is astonishing, considering the distance across continents, difficulty in communication, differences in cultures, language, perceptions, ideas, finances, illnesses, deaths...... Incredible!<br /><br />Ian is going back mid March, with his wife Becky, his parents and aunt, for a week of safari and another working with the kids at the orphanage. I am as aways tempted to go over! We are having our 2nd anniversary party over there on March 25, a huge triumph! especially with all our new kids and staff...and i am supposed to be there April 8 and 12 to pick up the loan money from the 4 micro finance groups...we shall see............<br /><br />Till then....thanks to Judy Steed I'm doing three presentations at the Central & in downtown Toronto in the next month, with kids from their youth group and at a couple of big adult groups. Open and available to talk to everyone, and anyone..please call me!<br />Or email: lynnconnell@sympatico.ca.<br /><br />Lots of love to you all....it is almost spring!<br />xxLynnLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-92220619969614883042011-02-03T23:07:00.000-08:002011-03-22T06:07:33.731-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-sDJK4cY4RFM/TYieAVRTy8I/AAAAAAAAASo/ZEHlr7AjcMo/s1600/IMG_1013.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 319px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-sDJK4cY4RFM/TYieAVRTy8I/AAAAAAAAASo/ZEHlr7AjcMo/s400/IMG_1013.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586889066300033986" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2z72NTy2Hkc/TYid_s3L8xI/AAAAAAAAASg/KypKVTIYwN4/s1600/IMG_0818.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 358px; height: 400px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2z72NTy2Hkc/TYid_s3L8xI/AAAAAAAAASg/KypKVTIYwN4/s400/IMG_0818.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586889055453049618" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-L6Axq-ENID4/TYid-3cVoxI/AAAAAAAAASY/hRvrUp1-OEE/s1600/IMG_0833.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-L6Axq-ENID4/TYid-3cVoxI/AAAAAAAAASY/hRvrUp1-OEE/s400/IMG_0833.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586889041113359122" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Mj5SWS-lZUs/TYid-vogq5I/AAAAAAAAASQ/PtG6aCDNAa8/s1600/IMG_1248.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 286px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Mj5SWS-lZUs/TYid-vogq5I/AAAAAAAAASQ/PtG6aCDNAa8/s400/IMG_1248.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586889039016930194" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KQOc2F82QJs/TYid-IIAL1I/AAAAAAAAASI/XPQo0yA0YNU/s1600/IMG_1248.JPG"><br /></a><br />JAMBO!! Expansion of Majengo Orphanage...<br />Jambo jambo jambo!! Finally i am able to get a moment to write to you, after an outstanding week with Matt and Ian here in Mto Wa Mbu visiting our Majengo Orphanage for the very first time to see for ourselves how it is since the government shut down 5 corrupt orphanages on the safari route and brought all 67 new kids to us the same day! Back home when this happened i had visions of uncontrollable mayham, and have to say I expected to see mobs of unruly kids with overworked staff worn down, all of them from the overloading of resources and facilitiles, spent and exhausted.<br />But I was wrong. That which I couldn't imagine possible to accomplish back home has been done here beautifully, and done well. And, it should be noted, without without our 'help' and 'assistance', thanks hugely to our local ICA group on the ground steerheaded by project coordinator supreme Charles Luoga, and his team of Peter, Glory, Kissa and Hamidu, the local village leaders Mayunga and Raymond and of course our wonderful Majengo staff.<br /><br />What a relief and thrill to see for ourselves that first day visiting Majengo, to find the whole place filled with children, laughing, playing football and games of catch, throwing the frizbies, with little groups crouched down in circles taking turns at a game tossing pebbles into a rectangular system of little holes dug into the ground - like checkers. Some swinging up and down on swings or whirling around with hula hoops, or just hanging out in groups together, the older boys lounging under a tree acting cool and giggling girls dancing about, strolling along, holding hands, whispering amongst themselves. And the staff...greeting us, hugely smiling with warm welcomes and happy that we were there, shaking hands, introducing us to new staff, hugging hellos... Grayson, one of our teachers who has been with us from the beginning..hugging him with all my might whispering in his ear "oh my God, how has it been for you, are you okay?" both of us laughing and crying at the same time...the three Masai girls fresh out of fourth form secondary school examinations, huddling together as young girls do, gossiping and fixing their hair, some turning away as we approach, so painfully shy, and all of them, so beautiful...<br />I had been so worried back home.<br />We'd gone from a manageable, well-organized group of 28 kids living in, with another 20 or so living out, to a total now of 114 children - 75 living on site with 40 more kids living outwith relatives or friends, supported by Majengo. It is unfathomable to me how this group of people pulled it off, but they did, and did well. We held a huge staff meeting the very next day under a group of trees at the back of the compound while the children bedded down for their afternoon naps; we've added 8 new staff to our numbers, totalling 16 people: Killo and Martha, our sec and treas. who oversee everything, 4 cooks, 2 main cleaners assisted by 3 aforementioned Masai girls we've been supporting through secondary school for the last four years (thanks! Peg and Marion!), our 2 pre-school teachers Grayson and Glory, and 3 watchmen. We sat around in a huge circle, with Raymond, the village chairman solemnly opening this meeting with a one minute silent remembrance of two of our first founding donors, Tom Eberhardt and his wife Elinor from Minnesota who were killed last month while flying their small plane to a family New Years reunion in Texas. Then everyone spoke, one by one, describing how it was for them when these new kids arrived...<br /><br />They'd been waiting and ready since November.<br />Back then, Jamie Bee from Warren and I made a trip over to help rent, renovate and refurbish two additional houses for the new kids we'd heard might come from a couple of orphanages on the main safari route. Maybe 20 kids we were told, and at that time we thought that was a lot. We had no idea what to expect. Glory, our teacher describes it like being a soldier standing ready and waiting for war to begin, waiting and waiting, but for weeks nothing happened.<br />And then all of a sudden, between Xmas and New Years, within a two-day period and without a moment's notice, a fleet of government trucks pulled up and poured 67 new kids onto our doorstep, filthy and dirty covered barely in tattered rags, poor, sick and hungry, a few carrying scarf-wrapped bundles of clothing, a crumpled photograph, a pen, a pencil, but most came empty-handed.<br /><br />One thing was for sure, every one of these little kids were scared to death not knowing what in earth was happening to them.<br /><br />The operation had been done swiftly in the early morning, the government health and legal officials sweeping in with official documents, rounding up the kids, and bringing them to Majengo. Guardians of each child were informed of the relocation by local government leaders, but lied to by former directors of the five shut down orphanages who incited them with rumours that their kids were being held in an unsafe place without food and proper care. The next day a large group of guardians descended on Majengo to take back their kids. Police were brought in with government social workers checking identification of guardians and children to verify that each child was indeed a vulnerable orphan in need of assistance, and not a director's relative padding the numbers in his orphanage to better lure in tourists.<br /><br />Eventually our numbers decreased from the initial 67 kids down to a more manageable number of 43 live in new children adding to the 28 we already have, plus 40 kids living out. The whole thing adds up to 114 little kids for which we are responsible, between the ages of 9 months and 14 years - the most vulnerable and destitute of the lot.<br />While I am at it, we learned a few days later that the government's preference and intention is to always support orphaned children within their own community in homes of relatives and neighbours, and only in the most dire cases with kids with no one in the world to support them, will they license children into an orphanage setting. Consequently 40 of the children initially brought to us were taken back into their community, with an arrangement that we donors of the Majengo orpananage, would do our best to support them and their families with basic needs: food, medicine, uniforms and educational costs.<br />Story after story that bright sunny afternoon, each one fascinating in itself, and all recollected with knowing nodding of heads and great communal hilarity - easy to laugh at in retrospect - of the immense onslaught of filth and dirt, desperation, confusion, exhaustion and behavioural problems experienced in those first days - these new children stampeding the kitchen at mealtime, pushing and shoving to get at food and gobbling down great amounts of it, coming back for seconds and thirds, pretending it was their first time. In between meals, they ate everything we were told: leaves off the trees, flowers and even mud and garbage off the road - so impoverished and starved were they from the diet of their former homes. Our cooks went crazy at the beginning. Hadija and Nuruanna assisted by everyone who could help: our sec and treasurer, the cleaners and teachers and even our ICA staff raced over to help - the men pushing up their sleeves and working alongside the women, shockingly for African custom, men doing 'woman's work'! We hired two more cooks, Saumu and Mariam, along with everyone clocking 12 hour days, chopping, cooking and feeding over 100 people at each meal, three times a day, every day!<br />Ordering food was impossible getting the right amounts...the daily run became an hourly event, racing off to the market buying more and more rice, maise, cooking oil, flour in bulk, our carefully planned budget ricocheying (sp) out of control, with regular visits to the ICA office asking for more and more money....and how to plan menus? These new kids had never tasted meat, chicken, vegetables, fruit, eggs ever at their former orphanages, their diet consisting of porriage gruel and corn, now blown away by new foods and tastes, lots of them, consistently, and three meals a day.<br /><br />And how about the heaps and mounds of washing...endless lines of t shirts, pants, skirts, underwear, blouses, shirts and uniforms pegged up together alongside three households of billowing sheets and towels blowing hot under the bright African sun. Let alone scrubbing years of filth off the kids, and keeping the houses and grounds clean. Hats off to Witness and Janet, our 2 main cleaners and Tatu, Aziza and Mwanahamisi, the three Masai girls brought in to help with the crisis. The work was, and is endless...<br /><br />On top of it all, these new kids hadn't been given a chance to learn right from wrong, or taught responsibility and respect for properties. Things were being broken, beds, tables with kids jumping up and hanging from the shower spout pulling it down, toilets with cracked pipes spewing a misty haze of water across freshly-washed bathroom floors. One of the boys leaping from one bunk bed to the next crashing down into an accordian of rumpled sheets, matresses and broken splintered timber. Sec Killo in charge of maintenance throwing his arms in the air. Freshly, planted trees and flowers yanked from carefully-tended raised beds, to the immense frustration of very helpful German volunteers Berndt and his wife Rosie who'd come for a few hours and stayed now for 3 months, toiling each morning adding special lovin and hugs to the kids. Agh!! they describe over beers at the Carwash...they too throwing their arms in the air...oh, the mayhem!<br />But everyone couldn't stop talking about the great changes they'd seen in the children in such a short four weeks - scrubbed clean and shining, they were flourishing. Bright open happy smiling faces. They lined up at mealtime quietly awaiting their turn, confident now that there would be enough for everyone. Our youngest, little Anna, at 9 months, so weakened by lack of food and care she had the body of a very sick, on-the-verge-of-death three month infant. Today, even scarily small and frail, she smiles easily in the arms of her new mama our cook Hadija, with the strength to sit by herself.<br /><br />Every staff person began their talk with heart-felt thanks to God and all the donors out there who have given them this opportunity to work at this incredible place, never complaining about the burden of all this extra work. Big thanks always to the ongoing support of our families and friends across the United States, Canada, Sweden, Germany, Australia. Know that your generous donations through the years have enabled these children who stand up in class with: "thank you for giving us a chance". Matt gifted a nice bonus to each staff member for their hard work, reiterating our requirements for each one of them: absolute and complete honesty, competence in their jobs, hard working and above all, they had to love these kids as their own.<br /><br />We made a list of needs: Saidi our watchman asking for uniforms, shoes, flashlights and 30 bows and arrows for his two new security guards, Laiza and Maulidi; our cooks a long list of monster pots for cooking rice, maize, ugali, 6 water jugs, chipati frying pans, basins and pails for washing up, utensils for 100 people, plates, bowls, spoons...spatulas, wooden sticks..the list is endless. Our cleaners need mops, brooms, boxes of detergent, soap, aprons, rubber gloves, even gum boots...field trips and parties four times a year with goats, special food with an eye for both Christian and Muslim celebrations, our food costs tripling, medical visits to the hospital for malaria and HIV AIDS tests, an outbreak of chicken pox with 16 little smiling faces covered in spots...and good, ongoing medical care thanks to a great relationship with Sister Monica and the Catholic mission with regulaar visits to their infirmary right next door...<br /><br />The list continues, with Grayson and Glory asking for primary and pre school text books, exercise books for all 114 kids, pencils, pens, reems of paper, bicycles, tricycles and sports things for the playground..ah what else...a 5,000 litre water reserve tower and tank, kitchen scales, an outdoor dining area for 100 people, with metal poles holding up a thatched grass roof, tables and benches, shelving for 8 bedrooms, bulk food storage, and office and a kitchen expansion....plus a TV, DVD player for Walt Disney, and radios....later...<br /><br />We have no electricity as of yet, we paid for the hookup in December for all three houses, but so far they are operating in pitch darkness every night after 7pm, getting 77 kids ready for bed by flashlight...and yet we are assured as always, it will come, just be patient, wait!<br />Ah...patience...wait, just wait....for us A type North Americans not so easy....<br />Why? why can't they just do it? What is the problem? But always it is, wait, just wait....<br />Ah....om...whatever it takes to relieve the stress, and yet...one week into Africa and my nasty November case of shingles begin to itch, just a little, Monday...I get to the doctor yesterday morning just within the 72 hour limit for anti virals...this time it is very mild, only a few rosters making their way along my nervous system and dancing, as they say in Africa, always in waiting if you have had chickenpox to erupt into a full fledged very painful bout, but thanks to Dr. John i have fended it off this time...breathe.....<br /><br />It is over access to money, always, over money and the lack of it here. Not there hopefully, here. If you don't bring it over in US dollars...you can't depend on your ATM card to work..it may, or it may not. And mine works only at one bank in the whole of Tanzania and always a challenge to get to that bank - one branch of which is mobile. So when i am desperate, which is a constant, we race from village to village to catch this truck on banking days, to withdraw yet another bundle of Tanzanian shillings. I never have enough and always need more. We transfer from Canada or America easily to our ICA Moshi headquarters account, but it can take a week, and then a few days to get it down into Mto Wa Mbu Majengo, and always, when i am here in times of transition, or crisis, I need it now!! Hence the dancing shingles, not good for my system - so next time I will come prepared!<br />Oh my gawd!! day two of writing this..<br />Yesterday steaming happily along and wham!! the electricity crashed. Blackout!!!<br />I lost a whack of writing, it is so very frustrating...but you just sit quietly, if you can, and breatheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...<br /><br />Just posted the above part..hope you can read it..and thanks to everyone out there sending me emails...sorry for the quick responses and hope you have a moment to sit back and read a bit of this.. Where was I with yesterday's lost writing..?<br />Reflecting, this was an incredible week, an exuberent little group of us this time: Matt, myself and Ian, his second time and one of the main movers and shakers at Warren Majengo Foundation, a big bear of a man encompassing a very gentle soul, comforting, quiet, watchful and listening, savouring early morning walks with an eye to the opening skies, a big heart skipping with each exotic bird sweeping across the horizon, and always his Nikon ready. I can't wait to see the photos he will bring back home - a great little group, Matt, Ian and I, a steady flow of laughs, provoking discussions, observations, and lots of bantering with me taking the brunt I might add, all in good fun, thanks to the 'boy's club' of Matt, Ian and Charles - Africa is a man's world still...disconserting to me that around a table of all men and me, I was invariably the last one served, the last one to whom the waitress comes around at the end of the meal, to pour hot water over sticky fingers...no offence, but, when in Rome...ladies last!<br /><br />The meeting with the heads of government, last Friday, with Matt, Ian and I, Charles along with Mayunga and Raymond, our two local political leaders who have helped us immensely in the day to day running of the orphanage, bumping along in his Land Cruiser with driver Abdul into Monduri district, the seat of govermental officials. Representing the president of Tanzania was District Commissioner Jowika Kasunga, along with his District Executive Dirctor, the Chairman council officer, the Community development chairman and their government social worker Dennis who has since moved into Mto Wa Mbu specifically assigned to work with the children at Majengo.<br />Kasaunga welcomed and thanked us for taking on the responsibility of the children coming out of the 5 shut down orphanages, confirming the government's position to work with us at Majengo, to validate this orphanage as the only governmentally approved orphanage in the entire district, and to put his stamp of approval on how we were looking after the children. It is a great honour to our staff and ICA that we have been given this responsibility, after much inspection and official visits from this government. My turn next to describe how Majengo started in March 2008, visiting 52 little orphaned kids squeezed into a damp and dark mud- floored foyer, leaking and without furniture with one lone teacher in charge of this makeshift daycare. The kids had been gathered and brought there by neighbours around Majengo district; some had been living on dusty roads, begging food along the way, without a place to call home. Farmer's wives volunteered time and a bit of food for noonday meals - basically the only meal those kids could count on all day. Back then, along with ICA, we made a commitment to help, went home and thanks to all of you out there in Canada, raised $25,000 to renovate and furnish a nearby building with bunk beds, tables, benches, and school desks.<br />One year later i got a call from Matt McKissock from Warren, Penn to rent our family cottage, we got talking about Majengo and incredibly a few months later, he and two friends flew over to to see for themselves...and miraculously, two weeks later, Matt joined Majengo with a resounding commitment to fund our operational costs for one year.<br />Now, it was Matt's turn to speak..<br />Well, you have to know i love this guy...we've known each other for two years now, and not only has he opened Warren Majengo Foundation to fund our operating costs, he is frightenly smart, a person of his word, ethical, humble (his friend ian would have something to say about that!), self-depreciating, an incredibly creative businessman, passionately committed to Majengo, very funny with great wit and smart alec comebacks, this guy is a magician too!<br />Both he and Ian enchanted and entranced with juggling and magic tricks, disappearing coins and yellow silk handkerchiefs everywhere we went, attracting mobs of kids and adults alike, awestruck.<br />Fast forward and skipping back to our government meeting far away from the land of mystical magic, Matt takes the floor scrolling through his IPAD and landing onto a picture of his two children, Jacqueline and Jake. As we sat their wondering what he was up to by introducing his kids, who, he said, have everything in the world they need, maybe not what they want, but what they need, that he hoped and intended to provide these 114 children of Majengo the same opportunities as he would his own children - not just now, but over the long run, through primary and secondary school, and even on to university or trade schools depending on each child's ability and direction. To look after them as best we can, to provide them their basic needs, with good nutritional food, a good clean healthy place in which to call home staffed by people who genuinely care about them, with regular medical checkups and treatment, with all the things needed educationally to help them excel in this world..these children who have seen enough in their short lives, lived through such horror, and abandonment, loss, starvation, abuse..now it is our utmost intention to give them a chance at a life.<br />I can't possibly reiterate what Matt said that day but i would have killed to have had his talk on video. The government leaders sat in rapt silence listening, and at the end the head of the Monduri government, Mr. Kasunga, admitted to being speechless, with vitually little he could say to come close to the sparkling eloquence of our dear Matt. Oh. as I am writing this with all honesty, I know that Matt will read it someday, and in the back of my mind I do wish he were here for me to flash back a witty smart alec remark of my own to catapult him back to reality. But secretly, between you and me, this guy shone brilliantly that day.<br /><br />We shook to the government's confirmed ownership of the Majengo orphanage, to their promise to assist in any way they can, and with a firm commitment on both sides to make this work in whatever way possible, finalizing it all in sweet African collaboration: "We are together".<br /><br />And lastly, the workshop that would determine in merciless black and white exactly what we were up against - budget day Saturday. We gathered upstairs at the Zanzibar that hot sunny day, each one of us armed with reems of paper, estimates, our calculators, with lap tops ready on excel. Hour by tedious slow hour, beginning with food. How many kg. of rice in one bag, how many bags per week, per month...and on it went, for maize, flour, sugar, cooking oil, vegetables, fruit, meat, fish, eggs each item discussed and meticulously entered into the ledger, monthly, annually. Uniforms, sweaters, shoes, sports shoes, flip flops, girl's special underwear, playclothes; the array of kitchen and cleaning needs, the cleanliness list of disinfectant, soaps, toothpaste and brushes, how and how often..medical, house visits, travel, parties and field trips, education needs, salaries, communication, breakdowns, maintenance, whatever. Monthly, yearly, contingency.<br />Simply put. WE NEED HELP!! Our budget has easily doubled, more so. I have applied to the Canadian government for Charitable NGO status, Majengo Canada, with all my legal fees generously covered by Brian Iler, of Iler Campbell Law Firm...thanks Brian! We are reaching out further now, to family, friends and their families and friends, corporations, foundations, anyone willing to help us make the dreams of these 114 children come true.<br />Majengo website: <a href="http://www.majengo.org/">http://www.majengo.org/</a><br />This blog...emails or phone calls to Warren Majengo Foundation or me when i get back to Canada, so incredibly gratefully received.<br />I dont' know what else to say. But that we are determined not to let this slip...it will happen, and we can do it, but we need your help!<br />Matt came up with a great idea to open a Visitor's Information Centre in Mto Wa Mbu, to invite safari tourists to visit Majengo, this time set up with a metal contribution box equiped with 3 padlocks: one for ICA, one for the village govt, and one for Majengo. We hope, that while before safari tourists unknowingly poured thousands of dollars into the pockets of corrupt orphanage directors, that money will now be directed to help those same children, but this time each penny going straight into the Majengo coffers for the needs of the children.<br /><br />Budget day. I am a basket case by the time it was over, my brain stretched and exploding.<br />And still we weren't finished.<br />Day after day we worked with the details. How about an English teacher, how much does this cost? The outdoor dining area, the water reserve tank, text books? Uniforms for the watchmen? What is necessary, now? What can wait? Endless figuring, on and on, detail after excruciating detail, changing, crunched up wads of discarded numbers, adding up the whole thing again, starting over...<br />We drive Matt and Ian to the airport.<br />En route we meet Doris and Joseph, our Tanzanian ICA directors for a last stop goodbye dinner, cementing our relationship between the donors in Canada and the U.S., ICA Tanzania, the village government leaders and the orphanage. Abdul rushes them off to the airport....<br />And I head back to Arusha...4 days now, a bit of a holiday away from Mto Wa Mbu and the mind-numbing budgets... off to a new hotel, the Lush Garden, wonderfully quiet, clean and not at all expensive, a little European in its way with spanking white duvet covers, tiled bathrooms with strong hot showers, a pharmacy, hairdresser, restaurants and shops across the street and right next door this brilliant internet cafe...bliss!!!<br />And now i bid adieu!<br />It is strange writing this thing...you have no idea out there who might be reading it, maybe no one! but it gives me great comfort to share my thoughts and ideas, and especially the summary of last week...the ongoing saga of the little orphanage that grew and grew...Majengo, in Swahili this means "a building up"....<br />and thanks to all of you who have helped make that happen...<br /><br />big hugs....till again.....Lynn<br />ps...i'm heading back home by the weekend...give me a call!Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-56731165800795816332011-01-24T09:20:00.000-08:002011-03-22T06:13:43.985-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_3v4VGQSpHk/TYigczq1gMI/AAAAAAAAATQ/xv1SO9Lf04k/s1600/IMG_1190.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 368px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_3v4VGQSpHk/TYigczq1gMI/AAAAAAAAATQ/xv1SO9Lf04k/s400/IMG_1190.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586891754519756994" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-jvvDBepLy1k/TYigd4BCC_I/AAAAAAAAATg/yVzjrCjYPKI/s1600/IMG_0983.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 274px; height: 400px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-jvvDBepLy1k/TYigd4BCC_I/AAAAAAAAATg/yVzjrCjYPKI/s400/IMG_0983.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586891772866464754" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZaODbb72pUQ/TYigdfOjYqI/AAAAAAAAATY/wHh_e7GX4As/s1600/IMG_1192.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 354px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZaODbb72pUQ/TYigdfOjYqI/AAAAAAAAATY/wHh_e7GX4As/s400/IMG_1192.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586891766212289186" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IJ_5vozxVA4/TYigcd39JRI/AAAAAAAAATI/4LXcezW0l44/s1600/IMG_1031.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IJ_5vozxVA4/TYigcd39JRI/AAAAAAAAATI/4LXcezW0l44/s400/IMG_1031.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586891748669203730" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LboXrVIuwIA/TYigb__mkaI/AAAAAAAAATA/rY03HvHmmeE/s1600/IMG_0967.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LboXrVIuwIA/TYigb__mkaI/AAAAAAAAATA/rY03HvHmmeE/s400/IMG_0967.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586891740648214946" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Hi everyone!! a freezing cold day in icy grey Toronto as I squeeze the last few things into my bag. Packed and ready to go!<br />Very exciting..<br />Three huge black duffel bags with wheels, $15. at Kensington market a total find! Maxine and i for two days...first of all at the Goodwill on 'half price' Friday! Max at one end and me at the other the cart in between, we had a blast! Incredible kid's clothing, great quality and so cheap, unbelievable. Four big garbage bags later we are out of there, back home, rolling and packing. Oh and the other great thing, my good friend Sylvia Safdie's son Dov owner of American Apparel shipped 250 t shirts up last week, printed on the back MAJENGO...packed.<br />You get two bags under 50lbs. I have three...with one overweight, but it's worth it..88 little kids over there with almost no clothing! we are desperate...!!<br />The other great thing..i've spent all week back and forth with Jeff at McKissock on the email, writing, gathering bios, photos, newspaper clippings and today, finally! Got them into my lawyer up here as our MAJENGO CANADA Charitable Registration application..yeah!! we have a board of 5 amazing people...all ready to go once we get approved..keep your fingers crossed. If i get it, we will be able to offer tax receipts on every dollar donated - a huge benefit to us, and to you!<br /><br />Sister Sue from the Catholic mission just called to tell me they have a few thousand dollars collected for me when i get back....and a safe and wonderful bon voyage! Yes!!<br /><br />Meeting Matt and Ian at the airport at 2...this is a huge trip for all of us..short..with Matt and Ian only one week, but what a week it will be...<br />Meeting Doris, director head of ICA Tanzania for breakfast Wed am to iron out both of our responsibilities and finances for the orphanage, with Charles...and on to Mto Wa Mbu. Meetings set up with the government people..got to get our numbers down. They brought 60 children to us a few weeks ago...but we can realistically only look after 40 new kids as well as our 28, well. We've want a GREAT orphanage, not a big one! Some of those kids were brought down to MtoWaMbu from cities and villages hours away to pad the director's pockets...some weren't orphans..and others have guardians living hours away who should be taken back to their home towns, and put into orphanages there. It makes sense.<br />We are now looking after 117 children....88 living in, and the rest out, but being supported by us with educational needs, uniforms, medicine, etc....too much!!<br /><br />So government meetings...but right away off to Majengo to be with the kids...to see for ourselves how it is, how these new kids are coping...they have been abused for years by corrupt directors, malnutrition...poor health...but a few months down the road i know they will improve. I'm told these kids are so very happy! Huge smiles on their faces...love being together with all the other children of the orphanages, 5 of them, that were shut down. And what about our first kids..the 28 living in with us for almost 2 years! How are they adjusting with the 'invasion'...oh it will be amazing...<br />And our staff..how are they, cooking and cleaning for 100 people now every meal...3 x a day! With three houses, not one. I can't imagine.<br />And school..how many at our pre school now? We have Glory and Grayson teaching, but do we need a fewmore teachers? How many going to primary down the road. What are their needs: uniforms, sweaters, shoes..school bags for 100 kids! Shocking!<br />But we will do it...<br />I am thrilled Matt could take the time off work...that Ian is coming to shoot wondeful pictures of the kids..their new houses..<br />I can't wait to see Charles, and Peter...everyone there...so much to see, and learn and talk about..and finally, budget time....up until now, $41,000 annually for about 55 kids and 12 staff...and now...double that? we shall see! And oh, we paid for electricity in all three houses a few weeks ago...will there be light?<br />Got to run..a few minutes to go....<br />Next time..from hot sunny Tanzania....<br />Take care...talk soon....xxLynnLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-13056761597941037292011-01-11T10:58:00.000-08:002011-03-22T06:26:17.960-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iaRR5Pdhv4I/TYijc0FQggI/AAAAAAAAAUQ/_6zEPugsCBg/s1600/IMG_1170.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 292px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iaRR5Pdhv4I/TYijc0FQggI/AAAAAAAAAUQ/_6zEPugsCBg/s400/IMG_1170.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586895053165462018" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hiPVdHBXFVk/TYijcV-5b2I/AAAAAAAAAUI/t_T7JpB2iL8/s1600/IMG_1260.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 278px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hiPVdHBXFVk/TYijcV-5b2I/AAAAAAAAAUI/t_T7JpB2iL8/s400/IMG_1260.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586895045085720418" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5BpxpPZpE4s/TYijb3tpa9I/AAAAAAAAAUA/lP45RbFxX0o/s1600/IMG_1274.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5BpxpPZpE4s/TYijb3tpa9I/AAAAAAAAAUA/lP45RbFxX0o/s400/IMG_1274.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586895036960304082" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9axVGTvreOc/TYihovXhSaI/AAAAAAAAAT4/aZQetHxDZRY/s1600/IMG_1321.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 172px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9axVGTvreOc/TYihovXhSaI/AAAAAAAAAT4/aZQetHxDZRY/s400/IMG_1321.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586893059035056546" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x0qumiNaA0g/TYihoDiU6YI/AAAAAAAAATw/ljhgWxXn7GE/s1600/IMG_1074.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 301px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x0qumiNaA0g/TYihoDiU6YI/AAAAAAAAATw/ljhgWxXn7GE/s400/IMG_1074.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586893047269222786" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-M9b6MIp7cVs/TYihnhuzcoI/AAAAAAAAATo/1aEVukhkcng/s1600/IMG_1248.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 286px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-M9b6MIp7cVs/TYihnhuzcoI/AAAAAAAAATo/1aEVukhkcng/s400/IMG_1248.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5586893038194750082" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_ElzXUn1nmSk/TSyxDLhjuuI/AAAAAAAAAQA/TgZ-8r8ZsTk/s1600/new%2Bkids%252C%2B2010.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_ElzXUn1nmSk/TSyxDLhjuuI/AAAAAAAAAQA/TgZ-8r8ZsTk/s320/new%2Bkids%252C%2B2010.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5561014308086987490" border="0" /></a><br />Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!<br /><br />To those who have generously donated toward the huge expansion of our Majengo Orphanage...!!!!! With your help, we have raised $8, 685. up here in Canada over the last few weeks, and I can't thank you enough for supporting us at this very critical time.<br /><br />As I have written the last few blog posts, the Tanzania government shut down 5 corrupt orphanages on the safari route through the middle of our village, three weeks ago, and dropped off 60 new kids to be added to our orphanage! In many cases these kids have been badly abused, neglected and intentionally kept sick and poor in order to lure in more tourist dollars.<br /><br />We now add these 60 new live in kids to our current 28 children - between the ages of 9 months and 13 years - totaling 88 living in children we now look after. (plus an additional 20 children living-out with relatives, assisted by us either with educational needs, food, medicine, etc. ) Totalling well over 100 children! Plus staff!<br /><br />Your contribution will go a long way to helping pay for:<br />Food, shoes, uniforms, medicine, educational fees, basic needs....!!<br /><br />This is an emergency....<br />And a triumph too, that the Government of Tanzania closed down 5 corrupt orphanages on the safari route., and entrusted those kids to us.<br />Preparations:<br />We opened and renovated two new houses next to our main facility, in October.<br />We built 17 bunk beds per house, with new sheets, blankets, mosquito nets and mattresses.<br />We've moved 25 kids into each house...both with a mama matron.<br />We're operating out of one outdoor kitchen, with 4 cooks, creating 300 meals a day.<br />4 cleaners, to wash sheets, clothing, houses and kids.<br />2 teachers dealing with with 43 preschoolers.<br />A secretary and treasurer who pull it all together, pitch in and do everything.<br />2 security guards.<br /><br />This has become a massive undertaking, and scares me to death!<br />TODAY’S UPDATE:<br />I am going over with Matt (see below) for a couple of weeks, leaving January 24th.<br />I’m in touch with Majengo everyday, they have hired 4 new people to keep up with the unbelievable demand of work, especially cooking and cleaning for 88 children, 14 staff day after day, week after week!! I can't imagine!<br />We will work on budgets, who and how many kids are going to what schools? Measuring uniforms. Shoes. General clothing.. How many in our in-house pre school?<br />Do we have to hire more teachers?<br />Pictures, bios, histories of the new kids.<br />I toss around all night worrying about this, but from them, I'm told that they are coping!<br />That the kids are happy, with huge smiles on their faces!<br />But it must be crazy.<br />I'm dying to get over there and see it for myself.<br /><br />BACKGROUND:<br />In March 2007 I was taken to see 52 little kids, all orphaned by HIV AIDS, on a mud floor foyer, one small window, no furniture, leaking roof with pools of water here and there.<br />One teacher, Grayson.<br />The neighbours pulled this daycare together, bringing in bits of food for lunch, the women cooking over a fire in the back yard. One outdoor toilet, a hole in the ground.<br />Together with local NGO, ICA TANZANIA, we decided to take this on.<br />We found an unfinished house down the road to fix up.<br /><br />In 2007-8, thanks to the 250 people who helped out, we raised $25,000 to renovate and furnish this house - we have it for 4 years, rent free.<br />So engrossed to get Magengo up and running, I wasn’t thinking, staff, food, education, medicine, upkeep!<br />Operating costs!<br />Matt McKissock of Warren, Pennsylvania called to rent our cottage that summer three days before I was leaving for Africa.<br />He was fascinated. What are you doing? How many kids? Tell me more!!<br />With the cottage contract, I sent pictures of the children we hoped to help.<br />He fired back a cheque for $500.<br />Over that weekend, he became obsessed. He couldn’t get those kids out of his mind.<br />On Monday, he called three times: what were the operating costs??<br />I had no idea.<br />We didn’t know how many kids, how much staff, cost of food, uniforms, shoes...I would know when I got over there.<br />He kept calling. Tuesday, Wednesday. Could I come down to Pennsylvania. No.<br />Who was this guy?<br />Finally. I told him, if you are so interested in Africa....why don’t you come and see for yourself!!! Right! I left for Tanzania Wednesday night.<br /><br />One month later, he arrived with two friends, for one week, with 8 duffle bags stuffed with everything we asked for: computers, clothes, shoes, school materials, maps, ABC charts.<br />They met the kids, played, sang, and did juggling tricks, got to know the staff, village leaders, our ICA local organizers....and made a movie.<br />Matt went home and made a commitment.<br />To raise funds with family and friends, to cover our operating costs!!<br /><br />When I got that email, I bawled my eyes out!<br />$41,000 a year! 28 kids living in; 25 living out but coming to our pre school with breakfast, lunch and dinner. At that time 10 staff. And these wonderful people were committed to supporting us fully, not just now, but for the years to come.<br /><br />WE demand four things from our staff: to love the children, 100% honesty, competence and to be hard working. We pay them well, and support their own children’s education.<br />Up until now things have been running smoothly.<br />But with 60 new kids!!<br />It is a HUGE DEAL, Our budget will double this year.<br /><br />I have promised Matt that I will help...and again, for those of you who sent checks, I thank youy so much!! Every bit counts, believe me! I am in the process of applying for Charitable Registration in Canada. So that soon I hope to be able to offer tax receipts.<br />But until then, I can not.<br /><br />For anyone who wants to help out, please send checks payable to:<br />Lynn Connell, 284 Major St. Toronto, ONt, Canada M5S 2L6<br /><br />and in the United States, where they CAN provide tax receipts:<br />The Warren Majengo Foundation, 218 Liberty Street, Warren, Pennsylvania. 16365.<br /><br />TEAM MAGENGO:<br />Majengo is a hands on operation in Tanzania...There are no ‘middle men’.<br />Every cent we raise here goes straight to the children..<br /><br />I am putting together a group of people here in Canada who would like to get more intimately involved: to get the word out, to help with fundraising, to help organize speaking engagements, to involve their families and friends. WE need all the help we can get!! Please call me if you are interested! It is the most important and worthwhile work I have ever been lucky enough to be part of.<br /><br />I wish you all the very best in the new year...and again, thank you so much for helping to change the lives of these 88 little people...truly...I wish you could come over to visit yourself!<br />And if you can...please call me!! 416-951-6528.<br /><br />Please pass this along to friends....if I could do a slide show presentation at any of your organizations, groups, friends, let me know!!!<br /><br />XxxLynn<br />The picture above is of the new kids who just arrived from the corrupt orphanages.<br />How different they look from pictures we have posted of our 28 live in kids who have been with us for 2 and a half years...thank you again!<br /><br />And on a very sad and sober note...<br />I've just learned that TomEberhardt and his wife Elenor and their dog, while flying in their small plane from Minnesota to Texas the day before new years..to visit family...went down in a farmer's field, with all killed. I am devastated...<br /><br />Tom and Elenor gave us $6,000 right at the beginning to rebuild and renovate our orphanage facility....he belonged to the Rotary Club...keeping them in touch with everything we have been doing...even the night before the crash, he stood up at a meeting andtold them ofour expansion, the government shut downs...<br />He had promised to finance our new facility to be built by 2013....a commitment he made to Charles and I on one of his visits up here toToronto...how terribly sad...<br />Tom and Elinor will be in my heart forever..such wonderful people and i extend my deepest wishes to their family and friends....I am so so sorry......Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-2557039742132213932010-12-27T11:33:00.000-08:002011-03-05T13:48:07.273-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_ElzXUn1nmSk/TRqF5BvRvNI/AAAAAAAAAPg/B4z8z9odAAc/s1600/kids%2B2010.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_ElzXUn1nmSk/TRqF5BvRvNI/AAAAAAAAAPg/B4z8z9odAAc/s320/kids%2B2010.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5555900305080696018" border="0" /></a><br />TODAY'S UPDATE and THANK YOU LETTER!!<br />thank you, thank you, thank you!!!<br />for your generous donation toward the expansion of our Majengo Orphanage...!!!!!<br />I was blown away!!<br /><br />Your money will go a long way to helping with the 60 new kids which have been added to our already 28 living in, plus staff! Total 100!<br />Food, shoes, uniforms, medicine, education, basic needs....!!<br /><br />This is an emergency....<br />And a triumph too, that the Government of Tanzania closed down 5 corrupt orphanages on the safari route.<br />And entrusted those kids to us.<br />Preparations:<br />We opened and renovated two new houses next to our main facility, in October. <br />WE built 17 bunk beds per house, with new sheets, blankets, mosquito nets and mattresses.<br />WE have 25 kids per house...with a mama matron in each.<br />With one outdoor kitchen, 4 cooks, creating 300 meals a day.<br />4 cleaners, to wash sheets, clothing, houses and kids.<br />2 teachers with 43 preschoolers.<br />A secretary and treasurer who pull it all together, pitch in and do everything.<br />2 security guards.<br /><br />This has become a massive undertaking, and scares me to death!<br /><br />UP UNTIL NOW:<br />a bit of background....<br /><br />In 2007-8, I raised $25,000 to renovate and furnish our original Majengo facility, thanks to the 250 people who helped out!<br /><br />So engrossed to get Magengo up and running, I wasn’t thinking, staff, food, education, medicine, upkeep! Operating costs!<br />Matt McKissock of Warren, Pennsylvania called to rent our cottage that summer three days before I was leaving for Africa.<br />He was fascinated. What are you doing? How many kids? Tell me more!!<br />With the cottage contract, I sent pictures of the children we hoped to help.<br />He fired back a cheque for $500.<br />Over that weekend, he became obsessed. He couldn’t get those kids out of his mind.<br />On Monday, he called three times: what were the operating costs??<br />I had no idea.<br />We didn’t know how many kids, how much staff, cost of food, uniforms, shoes...I would know when I got over there.<br />He kept calling. Tuesday, Wednesday. Could I come down to Pennsylvania. No.<br /><br />Who was this guy?<br /><br />Finally. I told him, if you are so interested in Africa....why don’t you come and see for yourself!!! Right!<br /><br />I left for Tanzania that Wednesday night.<br /><br />One month later, he arrived with two friends, for one week, with 8 duffle bags stuffed with everything we asked for: computers, clothes,shoes,school materials.<br />He met the kids, played, sang, and did juggling tricks, met the staff, village leaders, my ICA local organizers....and made a movie.<br />He went home and made a commitment.<br />To raise funds with family and friends, to pay for our operating costs!! And these wonderful people were committed to supporting us fully, not just now, but for the years to come. With the intention of supporting all these kids all the way through, secondary school, high school, even university. To really make a difference, to change the lives radically of hundreds of children. Who now have a chance.<br /><br />It was a miracle. <br /><br />When I got that email, I bawled my eyes out!<br />$41,000 a year! 28 kids living in; 25 living out but coming to our pre school with breakfast, lunch and dinner. At that time 10 staff.<br /><br /><br />WE demand four things from our staff: to love the children, 100% honesty, competence and hard working. We pay them well, and support their own children’s education.<br />Up until now things have been running smoothly.<br /><br />But with 60 new kids!!<br />It is a HUGE DEAL, that the government has closed down corruption and entrusted us with those children.<br />But our budget will double this year.<br /><br />I have promised Matt that I will help...<br />I am in the process of applying for Charitable Registration. So that soon I hope to be able to offer tax receipts. But until then, I can not.<br /><br />TEAM MAGENGO:<br />Majengo is a hands on operation in Tanzania...There are no ‘middle men’.<br />Every cent we raise here goes straight to the children..<br />I am putting together a group of people here in Canada who would like to get more intimately involved: to get the word out, to help with fundraising, to help organize speaking engagements, to involve their families and friends. WE need all the help we can get!! Please call me if you are interested! It is the most important and worthwhile work I have ever been lucky enough to be part of.<br /><br />I wish you all the very best in the new year...and again, thank you so much for helping to change the lives of these 88 little people...truly...I wish you could come over to visit yourself!<br />And if you can...please call me!!<br /><br />XxxLynn<br />IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO DONATE, in CANADA: cheques payable to<br />Lynn Connell<br />284 Major St. Toronto. Ont. M5S 2L6, Canada.<br /><br />In USA where you will get a tax receipt!cheques payable to<br />Majengo Foundation<br />218 Liberty St., Warren, Pennsylvania. USA 16365<br /><br />BLOG: I am in touch with Majengo every week...and post updates on my blog....<br />lynnconnell.blogspot.com.Lynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35054816.post-46130860073182052122010-12-27T11:27:00.000-08:002010-12-29T12:52:21.801-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_ElzXUn1nmSk/TRuepNXiSAI/AAAAAAAAAPw/WonaAzbmRh8/s1600/P1090738.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_ElzXUn1nmSk/TRuepNXiSAI/AAAAAAAAAPw/WonaAzbmRh8/s320/P1090738.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5556208996091840514" border="0" /></a><br /><br />BIG THANKS!!!!<br />Thanks to the many people who responded to my last fundraising quest!<br /><br />You are helping to change the lives of 118 little kids.. all orphaned by HIV AIDS…day by day….with their basic needs: food, medicine, education, clothing, uniforms, staff, shoes….<br /><br />WE have raised almost $5, in two weeks with more promised…<br />Remember: every bit counts….<br /><br />BEFORE: with 28 live in and 25 live out but fully-cared-for by us…$41,000 yr.<br />NOW: with 60 new kids, 6 new staff….we have skyrocked to $90,000!!<br /><br />Yes…please read on…we need your help!!<br />If you missed it, here is my fundraising request!!!<br /><br />Hi everyone..!!!<br />Most of you know I have been working in Tanzania for the last five years...with HIV AIDS prevention, orphanages Masai girls education and micro financing.<br /><br />I am writing to you to ask for support at this giving time of year. WE have an orphanage called MAJENGO (building up) running beautifully, thanks to a lot of your help over the years.<br /><br />It is a success story and one that I am very happy to be part of...but now, because of its success, we have been asked to take on more kids.<br /><br />56 more kids, age 4 to 15, all orphaned by HIV AIDS...<br />It is a huge complement, and a challenge...<br /><br />We need money for basics: sheets,, towels, mosquito nets...food, medicine...education, uniforms, shoes.<br />Please read on if you would like to know more...<br />Have a lovely few weeks, and Happy New Year..<br />xxLynn<br /><br /><br />Government stops corruption on safari route!! <br /><br />Government asks MAJENGO ORPHANAGE to take on 56 new kids!<br />Yesterday, the government walked in and shut down 5 corrupt orphanages along the safari route!<br />These were set up as businesses by corrupt directors hauling in hundreds of dollars weekly from unsuspecting tourists.<br />Two of these directors had criminal records, had been imprisoned with charges of rape and sexual abuse. <br />Children were kept poor and sick, undernourished, some dripping with HIVAIDS liaisons without medical care.<br />Safari truck drivers were paid to bring in the tourists.<br /><br />MAJENGO ORPHANAGE opened March 2008 in the village of MtoWa Mbu,Tanzania, not on the safari route! NO CORRUPTION!!<br />We found 52 children, orphaned by HIVAIDS on a mud floor collected by neighbours and friends, set up as a day care and renovated a home..<br />Big thanks to the help of many of you!<br />Majengo supports 51 kids – food, clothing, medical, education - with a preschool and staff of 10 - beautifully<br />Up until now Matt McKissock, family and friends, through the Warren Majengo Foundation, in Pennsylvania amazingly supports our yearly budget of $41,000.<br /><br />Thank you so much!<br /><br />56 new kids arrived yesterday from the corrupt safari orphanages!!<br />We moved them into two newly-renovated homes next to Majengo - 24 kids to a house, 2 to a bed.<br />I am told they are really happy!! Three good meals a day...a safe beautiful environment, with people who love them.<br />Our needs have become huge. We need clothing, medical needs, food!<br />Now!!<br /><br />I’m hoping to raise $20,000 before VALENTINES DAY!<br /><br />I am in the process of setting up a registered charity in Canada, which takes up to a year, so I can’t offer you a tax receipt sorry!<br />What I can offer my absolute promise that 100% of all donations will go straight to supporting these children.<br /><br />Team Majengo!<br />I invite you become an intimate hard working part of Majengo....<br />We are all volunteers; every cent we raise goes straight to the care of the children – there are no middle people…<br />I would like to put together a group of very interested people to help me..with contacts…setting up speaking events (small groups or large, it is all important!), fundraising….<br />Please let me know if you are interested, this has become for me the most important and rewarding project I have worked on...<br /><br />Please help!<br />In Canada:<br />Cheques payable to<br />Lynn Connell<br />284 Major Street,Toronto, Ont. M5S 2L6<br /><br />Or for US donations: Where you CAN receive a tax receipt!<br />Checks payable to Warren Majengo Foundation,<br />218 Liberty St. Warren, Penn. 16365. USA<br /><br /><br />thank you!!<br />xxLynnLynn Connellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07590169365589289292noreply@blogger.com0