This week in Dar has been a busy one for well, kids: Two-footed and four-footed.
Nineteen members of our new Smart Girls Club and four adults crammed into a van for an art field trip, with a break in-between art centers for ice cream. Fatuma and I conceived the idea for the club last June to help our older girls stay safe physically and sexually, make smart decisions and explore career opportunities.
The club began in August with Fatuma, school secretary Faridha and teacher Eva as leaders. The girls meet Thursdays in their snappy blue T-shirts with the red HIV ribbon and yellow lettering. They have colorful composition books to write in, thanks to Portland, OR friend Amy Minato's girls' group.
Smart Girls' parents and grandmas report the girls' attitudes, behavior and school grades have improved. And after their first fieldtrip to the nearby Temeke Hospital, some girls are aspiring to become doctors! Our goal is to offer alternatives to becoming teen moms and/or HIV patients.
This week, the girls visited Makutano House of arts and crafts to discover the many types of arts and how it is sold for a profit. We also dropped into the Tinga Tinga Art Co-Op, where the naive, colorful style of the late artis John Tinga is continued by family members and others. The girls each took home a sign with their names lettered on them
If any of you former scout leaders out there have suggestions for this group (so successful the boys are now demaning one!), please pass them on to us!
Saturday found Eric and I rumbling through dusty streets and crowded markets to the goat and cow auction. Here, a distant relative of Fatuma's helped us buy five goats with money earned by 5th graders at Sweden's International School of Goteborg Region. We bought a male and four females, three of whom are already pregnant.
Not surprisingly, my husband and I were the only wazungo (white foreigners) there. And boy did the folks get a kick out of this mzungo trying to tug these critters toward the pickup! These animals come from Singida, a more temperate central Tanzanian region, and must take anitib iotics periodically to prevent them from falling prey to diseases here.
By the time we jolted over miles of dirt paths to find our new shamba (3/4-acre farm), the goats were settling in to their new shelter of wood, wire and tin. They will graze openly with a goatherd watching them, and eventually - once the herd increases - will supply meat for our orphans, hopefully with some left over to sell.
More about the farm later. Below, enjoy photos of both Smart Girls and goats!
BIBI JANN's GRANDMA-2-GRANDMA Support For Tanzanian AIDS Orphans and the Grandmothers Raising Them
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GETTING THE GOATS HOME
Leading the goats to the pickup truck wasn't easy!
The goats are now at home on the bibi farm, with wide open spaces to graze on.
This where the bibis will raise animals and crow cassava to feed their grandchildren and to sell. Fatuma, Dickson and Jann are in front, with pen to left, unfinished farmhouse in middle and neighbor's nyd watle house in rear right.
SMART GIRLS FIELD TRIP
Smart Girls Club on a field trip to art center to explore career opportunities.
We picnicked...
...And then we went for ice cream.
Emil of Unique Batiks told the girls about his designs.
The girls learned how the primitive Tinga Tinga painting style began.
Can you believe we got 23 people into this van?
ISGR 4th Graders Donate
These students in Goteborg, Sweden raised over $500 for the new Bibi Jann Farm!
DISCOVERING NEW YORK...
St. Patrick's Cathedral
An NYC cop in Times Square
Hors d' voueres at the mayor's Gracie Mansion
Rooftop garden - imagine! with social workers Lysa and Katharine at the4 Grandparent Apts. in the Bronx.
HALLOWEEN
Jann applies makeup
A well-decorated yard
Fatuma and son-in-law Tom in air-filled clown suit
Candy break
Sorting the loot
Fatuma, Jann's son Keith Hess at Eugene Waldorf School
Snow Fun
Tom captures the first sled ride
Ready to go...
Oops!
Warming up inside the lodge
Cuddled up to a carved critter
A cup of cocoa helps
Renee gifts Fatuma with a souvenir snow globe so she can have snow in Tanzania
Fatuma's first visit to American grocery, shopping for Tanzanian fare
...But we can't find the Tanzanian aisle!
Kitchen is more elaborate than what Fatuma is used to
Girls watch Fatuma make chipati
Son-in-law Tom has his hands washed
Chloe, Eva like eating with their fingers
...And so do Japanese visitors Miho, Ruli
Fatuma finds the Oregon Coast more rugged than Tanzania's
A new way to dry hands!
Fatuma, Jeanne, Suzanne enjoy Horn of Africa restaurant
Meeting a sturgeon
Watching barge navigate the dam through the lock
Salmon migrating upstream will die after spawining
Multnomah Falls from afar
FANCY FOOTWASH
Fatuma, Jann and Renee soak their tootsies in warm water while rollers kneads their backs.
...While catching it on camera
...Sparkle on the toes
...Plus a manicure
...Resulting in fancy footwork
...After a day in school
...Including cafeteria lunch
GETTING A GRIP ON AMERICA
Nine-year-old Chloe, Jann's granddaughter, teaches the teaches about local currency.
...And it inhabitants
Pirate-themed kids' concert
..Some of whom dress better
Fatuma with the Heathman Hotel doorman and Miho, the Japanese girl visiting my daughter's home.
And its gadgets
Testing the $3,500 Brookstone massage chair
Even moving stairs!
Mall escalator
But kids are the same everywhere
Chloe, Eva, Alexa and Miho have fun at Gramma's tumbling dominoes
2 comments:
How exciting to be goat-owners! Your description of the buying adventure painted a vivid picture of the event...I enjoyed every word.
The Smart Girls Club is a great idea. The field trip sounded wonderful. Do you have any more field trips planned? Is there a way to help sponsor a field trip?
Kathy
Yes, anyone can sponsor a Smart Girls Club fieldtrip. Just make a donation and tell us how you'd like it used!
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