The Time is Now!

 “Open your eyespeople, take a look around, catch the tears filling up all those cracks in theground…Turn off your televisions, leave your picture perfect neighborhoods, alotta folks out there ain’t doing so good. Too many of us left out in the cold,no invitations given, no welcome mats unrolled. But you can be the change youwant to see. Be the hope to those whose lives are far from easy, reach out andlend a hand, share everything you can, and be the change… be the change. Carrythe world on your shoulders for a little while. Put on someone else’s shoes andwalk a mile. Too many cups running over while so many are going dry, the grassain't always green on the other side. There’s still a lot of work to be done. Alot of wrongs to right a lot of battles to be won… We all talk about how itoutta be because we know that talk is cheap, but the time has come to let ouractions speak, its getting late, no time to waste, be the change you want tosee…. Be the change you want to see. Be the hope to those whose lives are farfrom easy, reach out and lend a hand, share everything you can, and be thechange… be the change.”

- Corey Smith

I have neverbeen one to make a blog post filled with depressing stories or pictures thatwill guilt trip my readers.. that is not the point of this blog nor do Ibelieve it is an effective method to use when trying to gain support from thepublic for a project. However, I read a quote that has a somewhat “guilt-trip”effect, and I read the quote for the first time many years ago, and have re-readit dozens of times since then… and I want to share it with all of you becauseit has been a constant reminder to me about how lucky I am, and I think wecould all use a reality check every once in a while.  “If you have food I your fridge, clothes on your back, aroof over your head, and a place to sleep at night, you are richer than 75% ofthe world. if you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and some spare changein your pocket, you are among the 8% of the world’s wealthy. If you woke upthis morning with more health than illness, you are more blessed than themillion people who will not survive this week. If you have never experiencedthe danger of battle, the agony of imprisonment or torture, or the horriblepangs of hunger and starvation, you are luckier than the 500 million people whoare alive and suffering. If you are able to read this, you are more fortunatethan the 3 billion people in the world who cannot read this at all… for theyhave never been taught to read, either because they couldn’t afford to go toschool or because someone took their rights away and they weren’t allowed toreceive an education or to learn."

Before I startedworking in Tanzania, this quote was simply words and statistics… when I readthem, yea they broke my heart and made me feel sad, but after a few minutes, Iwould move on with my day and go back to complaining about materialistic thingssuch as my weight, my appearance, or even about the cute guy I liked that didn’tlike me back… whatever it was that I was complaining about and that was occupy way too much space in my mind was more important to me than the billions of people outthere who were in dire need of love, support, and help. I have always caredabout people. Since I was very young I wanted to make a difference in thisworld. and I saw many of the aforementioned statistics every week when I wouldfeed the homeless in Austin. But the statistics regarding war, education,illness, and starvation didn’t become real for me until I came to Tanzania. Theregion that I am living in here in Tanzania is far from the worst of the worst.But at the same time, every single person that I come in contact with isfighting a battle that I know little to nothing about, or which I have neverexperienced myself. My babies here in Tanzania, who I have now dedicated myentire life to, and who call my mama and look to me for guidance and supporthave encountered more hardships in their short lives than I could ever imagine.I have too many orphaned children who are products of rape… other children who will not live the lifethey deserve to be able to live because they were born with HIV and arefighting for their life every day… children who were forced into childmarriages before they were 10 years old, and then were forced to have childrenwith their new husband, who was at least 50 years older then them, and had 15other wives living in his home. There are children in my village who are unableto go to school because they cannot afford to pay for both their HIV medicationas well as their education.. these children didn’t have any control over theircurrent situation. They didn’t have some lapse in judgment and make a poordecision that resulted in some major consequence… they were simply born intothis world and dealt this hand of cards… They are stuck in a vicious cycle ofpoverty and until someone comes along and reaches out their hand and decides topull them from it, the cycle will continue on for generations to come. And unfortunately, this is the case for billions of individuals in this world. I amwriting all of this for a reason… it is not to guilt trip anyone. But I knowfrom my own life and experience that when we have been fortunate enough to be borninto a family that can supply for us and pay for luxuries, and when we live ina developed country, and have access to all the things we could ever want orneed, it is easy to forget that not everyone has the things that we have… it iseasy to turn our heads and not see how many people need our help or how manyproblems there are, not only in the world, but in our own backyards. I workedat one of the poorest middle schools in Austin this past semester and met 7thgrade students who were pregnant… others who were living in a single bedroomwith 5 other family members, living on $14,000 a year… kids who had no one tohelp them with their homework because their caretaker was working two jobs totake care of them while their parents were incarcerated and in jail. Theseproblems are affecting so many individuals around us, but since that are notpersonally affecting our lives, we often forget that they exist, and or we don’tsee it as OUR problem… but it is our problem. This world is our world. it isour turn. Our responsibility to love our neighbors as ourselves…. Our turn tothink about someone besides ourselves, and to remember that if we were in theirshoes, we would hope that someone would want to help us and pull us out ofthese terrible situations and help us get a second chance at life. We cannot make all these problems go away over night. but we can do our part to invest in the lives of these children and show them that we believe in them and want to help build a better tomorrow for them...

The kids I amworking with here in Tanzania deserve the best and so much more but I cannotgive it to them on my own. They have taught me more about myself and about thislife and how to love and about the world than I have learned throughout my 22years of living.. They taught me things that my 12 years of private schoolingdidn’t teach me, or that I didn’t learn at an incredible university in America.they are bright, sweet, honest, individuals who want to go to school, and wantto learn to speak English, and learn about the world and ways that they canhelp others… they cannot truly help themselves and they are still thinking ofothers…  The amount of problems inthis world are overwhelming, and while it is important to stay optimistic andthink positively, at the end of the day, we must face reality and put our ownneeds aside and help out those in need.

I have spent thepast two years of my life building my nonprofit organization, NeemaInternational with the hopes of being able to fundraise enough money to build anew home for the 84 Tuleeni Orphans. While this is still our goal, and we are making incredible progress on the orphanage, we have a long way to go, and these children are not getting any younger... so there issomething else that we must focus our attention on as well.. and it is the onething that truly sets this orphanage apart from the others, and that is thechildren’s education. Mama Faraji cares more about these children’s educationthan anything else in the world and has dedicated the past 30 years of herlife, starting when she was 23 years old, helping orphaned children, andsending them to school with the hopes that they will be able to build a successfulfuture for themselves by using their education and knowledge as a foundation. Mama has done an incredible job making sure that every year, all 84of our children are enrolled in school, even if it means, that we cut down on food or clothing or electricity... she has never failed in getting these kids to school.. but she is exhausted and needs our help. Aside from fundraising for the neworphanage, I have been working on finding sponsors for the children forschooling, so that I can eventually move all of them from public governmentschools, to private English medium schools, where they will receive the besteducation available in the region. We have been successful in transferring acouple dozen of our children to private schooling, but there are still too manyin public schools, where the teacher to student ratio in each classroom is 1:70vs private schooling where it is 1:25. I have started volunteering in themornings again, at one of the local primary schools where I have taught in thepast, and been teaching English, and helping these teachers manage classroomswith 70 students… 

I have been working very hard with mama the past week ongetting all of the children's school records and information in order. We have7 children that are 7 or 8 years old, who are all attending the localgovernment school, Mrapanga, where I have been teaching, and where Mama Faraji is the vice principal. It isnice having them there, because Mama can keep an eye on them, but we haveultimately decided that it would be in their best interest to be attending aprivate primary school instead of a government school. I am very excited aboutthis switch, but in order for it to happen, we need to find these childrensponsors for school. These 7 children are all either currently in Class 1 orClass 2, which is the grade level. Children start primary school at age 7 andfinish at age 14, after completing class 7. The school year begins in Januaryand ends in October or November. Children completing class 7 this year willtake a national exam in November for entrance into Secondary School. We have 8children completing class 7 this year, and I will be tutoring them daily,starting in August, in order to prepare them for their exam. Last year, NeemaInternational teamed up with another organization called Toto Aid, which is aneducation based nonprofit that offers scholarships to Notre Dame or EdmondRice, which are two of the very best private boarding schools in Kilimanjaroregion-- These schools are very expensive but have success rates that are notto be believed. Toto Aid seeks out academically gifted orphans and pays forthem to attend these schools, if they gain admittance to them following theirnational exams. We currently have three children attending these schools underToto Aid sponsorship, and had another 8 lined up for the upcoming year. I justfound out that Toto Aid will not be able to take on any new students this year,due to funding. They are holding a fundraiser in the upcoming months, whichwill hopefully be successful, for they do such an incredible job with thestudents they sponsor. However, in the meantime, I am now going to have to findother sponsors for these students for secondary school, since I cannot rely onToto Aid to pay for them this year. Between these 8 children who I would liketo have the opportunity to attend a private secondary school, along with the 7youngsters who I am trying to transfer to private primary schools, we are inneed of 15 sponsors before January. I am still continuing to fundraise for thenew orphanage, but I have heard from individuals who have already donatedtowards construction, that they would be interested in paying for a child to goto school as well, and so I thought there might be more people out there whomay have the same interest…. I have visited the private schools where ourchildren would be attending school if they find a sponsor, and the schools areAMAZING. I am currently sponsoring two children for private schooling on myown, and am so pleased with my kids’ progress in school. I also have a fewfriends who have taken on kids to sponsor as well and we all agree there is nogreater gift that you can give a child than the gift of education. I will behappy to give anyone information regarding school fees if they are interestedin sponsoring a child. You can get agroup of ten people together and put your money together told sponsor a singlechild… you will be changing these kids lives first hand, and they will be soexcited.

Between themoney needed to finish the construction for the new orphanage and the uphillbattle of trying to find these kids sponsors, it has been hard for me to stayrelaxed and positive… I have quotes all over my room and my house here inAfrica, words that are inspiring and uplifting, especially in difficult times.They remind me that self-confidence can work wonders and mutual confidence canwork miracles. “Believe that you might be that light for someone else”, “believethat you can make a difference” “believe in taking a stand” etc and these wordshave helped to encourage me, but I want to badly to give these children thebest life that one can have, but cannot do it alone. No matter how hard I try,I cannot come up with the money alone…at the end of the day, it is up to thepublic to join me in the project and to be the change…

we have also been crazy busy sewing iPad cases to sell in order to raise money for construction and schooling.... each case has been named after one of the orphans and will include a picture of that child and his or her story inside the case, which you will receive in the mail when you order yours! See all the cases at www.facebook.com/neemaintl 

The start to better work, or a better life, or a better future lies simply in our belief that it is possible. I believe it is possible. And I heard it said that when you have picked a dream that is bigger than yourself, that truly reflects the ideals that you cherish and that can positively affect others, then you will always have another reason for carrying on…. And no matter what kind of challenges lie before you, if somebody believes in you and you believe in your dream, it can happen…

I BELIEVE IN MY DREAM AND I BELIEVE IT CAN HAPPEN…. DO YOU???

Please, try and believe in me, and help me make this dream a reality. Donate today to www.neemainternational.org to be the change that we all wish to see in this world. every penny counts. 

love always, 

Neema