February 2007

2007 Update

This update follows our recent visit to Bahir Dar, Ethiopia in January 2007.

In the year leading up to our visit the contributions from you have been overwhelming. Over 400 football shirts, books, pens, children’s clothes, seeds, sewing materials, a wheel chair and £2,500. We had planned to send it all via DHL but a price tag of £4,000 encouraged us to take as much as we could with us and the rest will go on future visits.

In this update we will report on our recent trip as well as update you on the people we introduced previously. Not all our news is good but much of it shows that through your contributions people’s lives are changing for the better.

From the extra money sent throughout last year, totalling £1,000, 4 additional houses were built, one roof was replaced, 6 sewing machines were bought, one family had electricity connected, two families were connected to the mains water supply and several children had their school fees paid.

In the summer of 2006 Bahir Dar was subjected to heavy rains and serious flooding. Thankfully all the houses we had built last year stood up to the test, but many of the older houses didn’t so the need for new houses was even greater this year.

One of the victims of the flooding was Geremew. Last year we had a well dug for her so she could make and sell beer. Sadly in the heavy rains the well flooded and became contaminated by sewage etc and finally collapsed, along with her livelihood. We looked at ways of rebuilding the well but feared that, because of where she lives on low lying land, the flooding may be a regular occurrence. We finally decided to build a stone lined well with a wall above the surface. We had hoped to have had this completed before we left but the well digging man Negero is very busy at present so we left money for this to be completed.

During the Christmas celebrations there was a terrible bus crash killing 6 people. Tragically two of those killed, a mother and young boy, were part of a family who you had a house built for last year. The burden now falls on the grandmother to raise the remaining 3 children.

Walking to the orphanage one morning Angela was suddenly jumped upon by a very enthusiastic and excited young lady. This turned out to be Sinlayehu. Last years funds allowed her to receive medication and extra milk as she had been diagnosed with TB. This year we saw a very fit and healthy young lady selling sugar beet and thereby supporting herself and her child.

Finally, Gashow passed his sewing course with flying colours. Your funding allowed him to have a sewing machine and start up on his own. He positions himself every day under a tree mending clothes. He is attending school in the afternoon and due to his heavy workload he has employed an apprentice to help out.

The owner of the house in which Gashow sleeps is moving away. Because of this we have secured a container for him where he can work from and live. He currently has a two mile walk to and from work and for a boy with Polio this is no easy journey, but regardless he does it morning and night and always with the biggest smile on his face.