May 31st, 2023
We have been back home in Africa a couple of weeks now and it always stuns us at how beautiful it all is, both the scenery and the people.
We were excited to see our big girl, Maria, and her little buddy Joeli. Maria is eight years old now and we think one of the sweetest humans on the planet! She loves the babies, is learning three different languages, loves to sing, loves every volunteer, is gorgeous in pink and makes straight As in school, almost.
Our granddaughter, Hope Taylor, graduated from OC in May and brought her roommates to Neema Village. They were able to participate in a Gift/Days For Girls project out in one of our furtherest Maasai villages. It was a perfect pink day for everyone!
Our Neema Village program for young girls is called Gift, which means “Girls Informed For Tomorrow.” A group of volunteers sat around the dinner table at Neema one night and dreamed up the Gift program.
Anna and Angel are certified instructors for the Days For Girls program which works to keep girls in school. Together with our GIFT program it is changing the lives of these young girls. They took volunteers out to the village and had a lot of fun teaching and doing a craft with the girls. Marquisette had designed a bracelet that keeps count of the days of the months for the girls. if we can keep them from getting pregnant before age 18 they will have a chance of a better life for themselves and their children.
About 150 girls showed up and they were each given a colorful bag with feminine, washable pads that they can carry to school. Many Maasai girls do not get to go to school and if they get to go, they are usually finished by around 12 or 14 when they are married off for the family’s bride price.
Much like this sweet little fourteen year old momma pictured above who came in to Neema this month with her new baby. Baby Moses was extremely malnourished, weighing only about three and half lbs at two weeks. This momma at age seven had been badly burned when her dress caught fire at the family cook fire in her home. She lost some fingers and her breasts were so badly burned she had no milk for the baby.
The baby is all skin and bones but with our round the clock nanny care he will soon be fat and happy.
After a warm bath and clean clothes baby Moses looked much better. He took a bottle and went right to sleep. The nannies have him on an every two hour feeding schedule. He will be a big healthy boy someday and his momma has agreed to come in from the village often to see him before she takes him back home.
Another new baby this month is Shadrack whose mom brought him to the police station and left him. She has the sickness and said, “life is just too hard and I can’t go on.” Kim asked her to come to Neema with the baby and we would try to help her but she walked out without even looking back at her sweet baby boy.
One of our Bibis, grandmothers, came in for a week of Save The Mothers training. She had a blinding cataract.
Neema helped her with the surgery and now she cannot stop blessing Neema Village for her beautiful clear eye.
Daniel, our Mothering Center guard, is finally out of the hospital and back out at his village. He had a blocked colon and had emergency surgery to remove part of his colon, a horrible surgery which is usually a death sentence here. Kim took volunteers out to Joshua’s village to take him home and a large crowd of family and friends came out to welcome him home and thank Neema Village for helping save the life of this young man.
Elijah, the young boy who was almost starved when nurse Ally saw him in the village was brought into town to see how we could help him.
This is Elijah after a few weeks of TLC. Amazing, isn’t it. Doesn’t look like the same boy. Thank you Ally for seeing him and not being able to leave him without trying to do something to help him. i’m pretty sure it is what Jesus would have done.
Elijah’s mother is very poor and did not have enough food for her family. She has been set up in a MAP rice business which will hopefully support the family so Elijah can continue to have good food when he goes home.
There have been a lot of baptisms at Neema this year as MAP moms have made decisions to become Jesus followers and one of them was a sweet volunteer from Colorado. Ella Carroll, we are so happy and proud of you.
It is still a full house at Neema Village with 67 babies in house. Two adoptions are pending and four little ones are going into foster care and boarding school soon. Remember Neema does not do adoptions. You have to live in Tanzania for three years to adopt and Social Welfare handles all adoptions so don’t let some shyster lawyer tell you differently.
The babies are warm and happy thanks to you who love and support this work.
James 1:27 “True religion is to care of the widows and orphans…”
Bless you for being a part of that.
Michael and Dorris Fortson