Women At Risk - their Vision of Success, and life in the meantime

I’ve written about the CRED partner Ellita Women At Risk (E-WAR) several times before – an incredibly inspiring and humbling organization based in Addis Ababa, that works with and for prostitutes, bringing the light of hope to ladies trapped in very dark places.

One of the items on my agenda in Ethiopia this time round is working with some of the senior management team of E-WAR on some project development and capacity building work, and also visiting another of their project bases in Nazret to consider the possibility of taking a team there next year.

So, that’s what I’ve been doing. And from it have come many thoughts, and conversations; dreaming, visioning – imagining what the world would need to look like to enable E-WAR to cease to exist.

And from that has come Women At Risk’s Vision of Success statement, which is so courageous in its hopefulness that I wanted to share it with you.

Success for Women At Risk will exist when they live in ‘a society where girls and women are free from the pressures and factors that force them into prostitution and increased risk of HIV infection, where the demand for prostitution from the male sex is no more, and where those who have been in prostitution are able to access the full range of services required to live a fulfilled life.’

Such an inspiring statement, and how amazing to be working with an organization that even dares to dream of such a day when this could be a possibility.

Unfortunately, we all know that due to the depravity and inhumanity of some of the human race, that day is a long long way off. And so in the meantime, this wonderful organization is spending each day giving of themselves over and again to show love, acceptance and support to women who feel as though they have lost everything.

And as a result, when you go to a Women At Risk office, you see scenes like I observed today – of young women sitting together, laughing, knitting, playing with their children, chatting, coming back from work placements to collect the children from the day-care provision, having hugs when they feel vulnerable, giving hugs to others. And you can’t always tell who are the workers and who are the clients, as they are such a close-knit group, who are so supportive of each other, and so accepting of each other, that they all just blend together – a beautiful mass of positive humanity.

We are hoping to have three teams coming out to work with Women At Risk next summer – let me know if you’d like to be part of it. And if that isn’t your thing but you’d like to show your love and support to them in a one-off or ongoing way then again let me know. With a vision statement like theirs, you can definitely be sure that any support you give is going to be used in a very positive, life-transforming way.

The ongoing question - what would Jesus do?

It's a question I wrestle with time and time again, and I just don't know the answer!

Walking through the streets of Addis, or Kampala, or Lilongwe, or Bristol, or London, past street kids, past the homeless and begging adults, as they come up to you with doleful eyes, putting hand to mouth to indicate their hunger - invariably I wonder: what would Jesus do? What should I do?

My default response is to say hello, so that I am at least acknowledging them, but then keep on walking, and ease my guilt with the knowledge that I am working with organisations that are local and are supporting the poor and marginalised in various ways.

But is that enough? Does that actually make an iota of difference to those individuals who are asking me for some help right there, right then. Asking for a little something to ease the hunger pangs.

What would Jesus do? What should I do? What would you do?

I wouldn't ever give money, as that could always be spent on the wrong things - but maybe I ought to make sure I've always got some food on me that I can give away? Or do I go with the reasoning that we can't feed them all so shouldn't feed any of them? Does it reinforce begging, by giving food to them on the streets? Certainly that is another argument I've heard to justify passing them by and giving to organisations instead. Would it cause arguments and fights, with the weakest losing out and the strongest winning? Would it bring disrepute to the streets, that the locals wouldn't like to see?

What would Jesus do?

Would he pass them by, or would he stop and sit with them, pray for them, heal their hurts, make 5 loaves of bread go far enough to feed them all? And if that is what Jesus might do, should I be doing more to try and get close to that level of response and that level of showing compassion in action?

If anyone knows the answer, or wants to send through thoughts and insights to help this muddled brain, then please do.

And in the meantime - well I guess I'll keep praying that God will show me the right way, and that He'll touch my heart and prompt me to act when the time is right, to the person that need its

Snapshots of Berhan Lehetsanat

Having blogged yesterday about one particular person related to Berhan Lehetsanat, it seems only fair to give a bit of background to the organization, and blow their trumpet on some of the other amazing work they are doing.

Berhan Lehetsanat is an Ethiopian NGO and the name is Amharic for Children of Light. Its focus is primarily on accessing education and health for disabled children, although it has branched out to assisting non-disabled children from disadvantaged backgrounds to also access education.

The past three days Natalie and I have had the privilege of meeting some of the staff and beneficiaries of BL and through a few stories of those we met, I hope I can begin to do justice to their incredible work.

One of their main programmes is Community Based Rehabilitation (CBR), and within this they run community awareness and outreach events based around the coffee ceremony, challenge attitudes and misconceptions, and liaise with parents of disabled children to discuss the options available to the children.

This in itself is a massively important part of the work; we met with a group of CBR workers today who were saying that the biggest challenge to the families of disabled children is the negative attitude of the wider community, who , particularly in Orthodox areas, usually consider the disability to be a punishment from God and so tend to outcast the whole family.

Bearing this in mind imagine how hard it was for the mum of Maharat, an 8 yr old girl we met who has cerebral palsy, epilepsy, and intellectual disability. Three diagnoses, and therefore potentially three punishments? Not surprisingly when BL met Maharat, she hadn’t been outside very much, and as mum had never had any assistance or professional input, Maharat just lay on a bed, or on the floor. Yes she was loved very much, but mum had no idea how to care for her.

Thanks to BL’s support and input, Maharat has received physio, a suitable wheelchair, and an ongoing supply of nappies to help mum deal with the incontinence. Maharat is also now on medication for her epilepsy, and mum has had training from the physio regarding ongoing care, muscle stretches, and exercises. BL installed a ramp at the local school, gave training to the teachers regarding inclusive education and provided other resources so that Maharat was enabled to attend school.

When we visited Maharat and her mum, it was a very happy visit. They live in a very small, poor home, but it is a home and the love oozes out of it. Maharat was sitting on the bed, and with mum’s help she showed me how she could walk across the room. The wheelchair isn’t used much now as the distance to school is short enough that Maharat can walk there with the help of two people. She was laughing and smiling, and had great fun taking selfies on my phone!

Without BL the picture would have been very different, and Maharat’s story on its own is testimony to the great work BL are doing.

Another girl we met was Yenenesh Rasa. She is 6yrs old, and was born with a club foot. She lives with her farming family in a rural area some 10 – 12 miles outside of Hawassa. Thatched roof and mud walls type house, there is no electricity, no running water, and her parents are illiterate. So not surprising that they didn’t know that the corrective procedure for club foot is really quite straightforward, and instead Yenenesh spent her first 3 years crawling round on a deformed foot, and deforming it, and the shin bones, further as she grew.

Thankfully, when Yenenesh was about 3 years old, a BL CBR field officer came to the area. Mum was brave enough to take her daughter to see the BL worker, who immediately confirmed that treatment was available, albeit in Addis for the surgery side of things.

Berhan Lehetsanat covered the cost of transport to Addis, the surgery, and has provided the orthotic appliances and physio treatment that Yenenesh required. It took 7 hospital stays to get all the deformities sorted out, but when we visited today we were greeted by a shy but independently-walking 6 year old. BL to the rescue once again!

I think that gives a good idea of the impact Berhan Lehetsanat is having. I could give more stories as retold to us today at the CBR workers meeting but instead I’ll briefly mention some of the other things they are doing:

-       teacher training and support regarding inclusive education, for student teachers at the training college, and for qualified teachers at inset sessions

-       provision of materials, resources and adaptations to school buildings to make the schools accessible, including Braille books, resources for intellectually disabled, other learning materials for visually impaired

-       provision of orthotics and physio for children following surgery, plus other appliances for children of various disabilities eg glasses for visually impaired, wheelchairs and specialized seating, hearing aids etc

-       provision of Alternative Based Education centres for children grades 1 – 3 who can’t attend school as the nearest one is so far away.  BL have set up 7 of these ABE’s and the government are so impressed they are now taking them over and upgrading them all into full primary schools as the need has been so clearly demonstrated

-       Income generation Activites for adults – this is in recognition of the fact that poverty in itself is a massive factor in curtailing the rehab of the children, and so to empower the mothers is crucial. In all there are about 2500 women enrolled in the various BL microfinance schemes

-       Functional adult literacy for parents – again to help empower the parents and better equip them to gain independence.

And there’s more, but I think this gives a fairly comprehensive overview for now. A really inspiring organization, run and staffed by people who are passionate about their work, and the issues of disability and inclusivity.

My prayers go out to them all, that they will be blessed in their work and in their lives, as they are a blessing to others, and my prayers go out to all the beneficiaries and their families, as they continue to rebuild lives that now have hope were once there was despair.

He moved me to tears!

I’m writing this from Ethiopia where I have been since Monday morning. Apologies that I haven’t blogged before now – there just hasn’t quite been the time, or reliable internet, but I’ve got a few stories stored up so will try and get them posted in the next few days.

Today’s blog is about the headteacher, or director as they call them here, of a high school that we visited, and an anecdote he gave which moved me to tears.

I’m spending a few days with an organization called Berhan Lehatsanet (BL) who are an Ethiopian NGO that focuses on activities that help disabled children access health care and education. I’ll go into more detail about them another day, but today we visited the Hawassa office which is about 300km south of Addis, and heard about some of their programmes

One in particular focuses on enabling better education for women and girls, not just those that have disabilities, but also those who are hampered from completing their education for other reasons.

The programme came about after the office workers discovered that there is a worryingly high drop-out rate amongst teenage girls, accompanied by poor results for many others. On further investigation, it was found that reasons for this include – early childhood marriages, abduction and trafficking, rape, harmful cultural practices amongst other things.

So, a programme has been developed that does a few things:

One is that it gives extra tutorial time to the girls, which results in them getting better grades. This in turn is encouraging news to their families, as well as themselves and increases the chances of them continuing with their education. The teachers have had training on the value of this and are so positive about the extra tutorial programme that they will teach it, even if funding isn’t available to cover their extra hours

But many of the reasons for drop-out are beyond the girls control, and better grades alone can’t solve the problem. Enter the educator champions – one per community – who is a well-known, respected and admired member in that particular community. These champions are equipped to raise awareness about education in the community, and the value of all students being able to continue to the end of high school at least. They also address, in a culturally sensitive way, the various reasons that girls are dropping out, and challenge individuals to reconsider their attitudes. Brilliant!

So, that’s the background to today’s visit to Tulla High School – a school that is regarded as a model school regarding inclusivity. Whilst there we met the director, Tizazu Bandaw, and he told us how inclusivity is carried out in the school. Various ways – ramps to classrooms, provision of suitable materials, training for teachers (90% of them have had training in working with disabled children and ensuring inclusivity), and the tutorial programme for the girls. As a result the drop-out rate has dropped significantly, and the percentage of girls passing their end of years has increased from 35% to 72% in 3 years. Last year’s figures are expected to be even higher, in the region of 95%. All very impressive and really encouraging to hear how universal access to education is being pursued so passionately.

And then he told me a story about two girls in particular, and the true depth of that passion for full access became even clearer.

In February, two year 11 girl students reported to the director that they were going to have to leave school as they were being forced into marriage. Both girls were upset, as they very much wanted to complete their education, at least to the end of year 12 which is the final year before going on to university. One of the girls was being forced to marry a guy just a few years older than herself, the other was marrying a man about 15 years older.

At this point the director could have commiserated, but said that it is a family issue and not for him to get involved with. But in this case Tizazu took a different course of action. He went and visited each of the men in turn, and over time he won their respect and discussed with them the benefits of the girls staying in education – increased financial potential for the girls to get good jobs, the girls would make better wives and mothers, and they would feel more fulfilled etc. He didn’t rail against culture, or tradition, or outlaw the guys in any way; instead he just helped the men to understand how there could be ways of bringing education into the marriage place, and not having to have one or the other.

Having got the hesitant agreement of the guys, he then went to each of the girls’ families, and had similar conversations. As a result of gaining the approval of families, each of the guys then felt that they had the blessing from the older generation to allow their wife-to-be to continue with their education.

And so in the year 11 class now there are two students who come to school in the morning with the blessing of their husband, and who are looking forward with hope to completing their secondary education and going on to university. All thanks to Tizazu, who believes so strongly in education for all that he will go above and beyond to try and make that happen.

The thing that brought the tears to my eyes was partly the story itself, but also the fact that it was being told by a man. So often we are told that it is men who are the problem behind the gender inequalities in life – but how often do we hear about the men who are fighting in the corner of the girls? How many stories tackling equality for women and girls have a man at the centre of them as the hero? Yes, there are some, but not many and it was so good to meet one of those heroes today.

Here’s to all the guys out there standing up for equality, in whatever field – may they be blessed today.

 

Harriet – one amazing lady

I’ve done several blogs over the past couple of years about various insights and experiences of the Acholi Quarters, and somewhere within most of them, I’ll have mentioned Harriet.

But it’s occurred to me that I’ve never actually blogged properly about Harriet herself; and as we approach the International Women’s Day, it seems appropriate timing to put that right.

Harriet, like so many others living in Acholi Quarters in Kampala, fled from the north when she was just a young teenager. The Lords Resistance Army were abducting teenagers to be used as child soldiers, or to become child ‘wives’ to the adult soldiers, and it thus wasn’t safe for the likes of Harriet to stay in the area. So she left, with her family, and they eventually made it to Acholi Quarters, 340km to the south, in Kampala.

She has lived there ever since, and for most of her time she earned little bits of money breaking up rocks in the quarry.  The amount people tend to earn there is about 1000 shillings, or 25p per day, so you can imagine the poor conditions that she and her family have had to endure.

For many people, just getting through each day is as much as they can manage – life is about surviving, and there is no forward planning or thinking beyond where the next meal will come from.

But Harriet isn’t like that. She and some friends learnt about making paper beads and associated jewelry items, and they set up a co-operative to work together in making and selling their products. Initially they used to go to markets to sell their products, with just small amounts being sold via John Njendahayo and the various teams that he hosts through CRED, Link and beyond. But over the years the international teams market has grown and now the ladies sell almost exclusively to teams.

Harriet is the head of the co-operative, and it has been my privilege to watch her grow in confidence and organizational skills over the past few years. Whilst she may be head, she does not in any way use that position to her advantage, and all the ladies work together in many ways – supporting each other, looking out for each other’s children, taking turns at making the porridge when teams come and do the education sessions for the children…….

Everything is done selflessly, and Harriet is wonderful at looking for the best in people, and putting others before herself in many ways. She really is an inspirational lady.

One example of this is with a young lad who comes from a fairly dysfunctional family within Acholi Quarters, but who was having some much needed medical treatment that had been funded by an external donor. The first stage of the treatment involved taking the lad to the hospital in town for some tests. Harriet, not confident that the mum would manage to get there and back without money etc going astray, took a day out of her work to go with them and ensure that all the right questions were asked, the right paperwork picked up, and the right prescriptions collected.  Having returned to Acholi Quarters, Harriet has visited the family every day to make sure that the lad gets the right medicines at the right time, and she even takes him some food to make sure that they aren’t taken on an empty stomach.

At other times Harriet will be found taking school fees from the Acholi education fund to the local school to pay for one of the children to be able to go to school. This might be top-up fees, or the entire amount, but prior to taking the money to the school Harriet will have been working with the relevant families in a social-work type capacity, to ensure a degree of responsibility is placed on the family to play their part in supporting the child in school, and that they don’t just assume a culture of dependency and start frittering away any money earned on illegal alcohol etc.

Another thing Harriet does is to liaise with the ladies to sort out the bead orders, and source a range of items so that everyone gets a chance to sell some of their goods rather than just a few getting all the market; and then to distribute the money to those whose items have been sold – no small matter when we are talking of hundreds of thousands of shillings of goods being sold (£1 = 4,000 shillings).

There is so much more that Harriet gets up to in the background – quietly, humbly, and with a smile on her face and a laugh in her voice.  There is no pretentiousness; she lives in a single room, with her two children, and any other waifs and strays that are in need at the time. No running water, no electricity, no sanitation – Harriet might be head of the co-operative but she lives in simplicity along with the rest of the group, and she is the first to give rather than receive.

International Women’s Day is on March 8^th, which also happens to be the day that Harriet is due to give birth to her 3^rd child. The father of the child was killed by the police 6 months ago, due to a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and this baby is all Harriet will have left of the man that she loved.

Does that make her bitter? No. It doesn’t seem to have slowed her down either! To my mind Harriet epitomizes all that is best about humanity, and women, and I pray that she will know many blessings over the coming weeks and months, as she has been such an incredible blessing to so many.

Introducing Butterfly Space, our newest CRED partner

I’m sitting in the sunshine, at a lovely little guesthouse in Mzuzu town, from where I will catch the bus to Lilongwe tomorrow so that I can do the final part of the risk assessment for the CRED Malawi team trip that is taking place in July.

Until now my time in Malawi has been spent at Nkhata Bay, on the shores of Lake Malawi, visiting the project that will be the focus of the team trip: Butterfly Space, our newest CRED partner. And what a wonderful partner they are turning out to be – let me tell you more.

Butterfly Space started out as a backpacker-type of accommodation, set on the edge of Nkhata Bay town, and with its land running right down to the water’s edge of Lake Malawi, so that it boasts its own little beach. It still offers accommodation, and indeed that is where the team will be staying, but Butterfly is so much more than just accommodation now.

Two Brits who both now have Malawian residency run it: Josie manages the accommodation and sustainability side of things, and Alice is the driving force / passion / spirit behind all the community-based projects that spill out of Butterfly and into the surrounding town and villages and communities. And it is Alice who has been such an inspiration to be with these past couple of days.

Monday mornings sees Alice getting into the Butterfly truck and setting off on a one-hour drive around a well-worn route, picking up a variable number of disabled children and young adults who are out waiting for her. There are 30 registered in the Butterfly disabled group, although rarely more than 15 of them come – quite enough in the back of one pick up!

The route has been worked out not just to be efficient and logical, but also to ensure that some of the more able bodied are collected before the less able-bodied, so that the former can support the latter in the back of the truck. There are no nicely supportive car seats, or other specially designed travelling aids in Malawi – if you can’t sit up for yourself you have to rely on family and friends to hold you up, or else you stay lying down.

Once back at Butterfly Space, the group do some little activities – maybe a craft, or some stories, or singing etc – and whenever possible they will be joined by the members of the ‘Little Leapers’ homeschool group who meet at Butterfly Space each morning. Through this, prejudice and stigma against disability is being gradually broken down, and the disabled group get the chance to share an activity with the able bodied rather than being always ostracized.

The session finishes with a simple meal, and then the drive round starts again as everyone is dropped home. For many of the children, this is the only real time that they get to go out, so even just sitting in the truck with the wind and sun on their faces is a treat.

On another afternoon, Alice will accompany the prison chaplain into the local prison to help lead a Bible study for the in-mates followed by a creative session – art, or creative writing, or music etc. The prisoners testify to what a special time this is for them – to be able to work through some of their feelings and issues in creative form, but Alice is sure that she gets more out of it than any of them, as God is always so present at the meetings.

Yesterday afternoon, I’d been out visiting the school that the team are going to work at, and when I got back to Butterfly I found a group of ladies all sitting around the big table honing their tailoring skills with the Butterfly sewing machines. For these ladies to be able to develop such a useful life skill is wonderful – it is leading to income generation opportunities for them, and empowering them to be so much more self-sufficient. Some of the ladies are widows, some are raising grandchildren, and some are HIV+ve and so need sound nutrition to ensure the medication works well.  The combination of access to an opportunity to earn money, plus the dignity of having a skilled job, of being empowered, of being able to afford food and so gain health benefits, of being able to feed the family – so many ripple effects from Alice and Butterfly having the vision to set up the ladies group – God can take the little we offer and turn it into something big every time if we will just trust it to Him as Alice has done with this.

Other projects on the books at Butterfly include a vocational training centre for the disabled, a youth group for the local young people, a nursery school that has accessible prices for those who can’t afford mainstream prices and links with several primary schools that are serving communities living in rural poverty.

And then there are the placements that Alice coordinates for an ongoing stream of young adults who come to spend weeks or months at Butterfly Space – as part of a gap year, or a sabbatical from work etc- developing their own skills, learning about themselves, using their professional qualifications, discovering their calling….living out the strapline that CRED applies to its own work of ‘transformation through participation’.  Butterfly and CRED are clearly on the same page!

That’s just a snapshot of a very impressive and inspirational place in Malawi, run by a very incredible and amazing young woman. If asked about her motivation – Alice would say she is just doing what feels right, just trying to be do her bit to make the world a better place.

Me – I’d say she is living out Matthew 26 in a wonderful, self-less, Christ-centred way. And I’d say she is demonstrating in no uncertain terms how to love God with all your heart, strength and soul, and to love you neighbours as you love yourself.

Oh, and did I mention she also has a wonderful Malawian husband and two gorgeous girls age 2 and 7, so she is fitting in wife and mother as well!!!! Definitely a lady worth praying for – that she will be blessed as she is a blessing to others.