March 2017 Newsletter

Ellen Ballard, Gary Householder, Renee Kinnard and John Willingham arrived in Oyugis, Kenya on March 13, 2017. Ellen and Renee assisted at the Mary Ballard Medical Clinic and Gary, a retired teacher, helped out at our Rainbow School at Amani. John spent a great deal of time in planning meetings. We all saw firsthand how well our work there is going. Tom Juma (Director of Amani), Kennedy Oguta (Director of the Baker Co-op) and Jacob Tinidi (Nurse) are doing an excellent job.

Progress at Amani
Amani should be open for guests at the beginning of June. Plumbing and electrical work has been finished in the kitchen, dining hall and four rooms (now you can even take a shower!), and four more rooms are almost finished. While we were there, the building exterior and eight rooms were given a fresh coat of paint. We also purchased a refrigerator and some cooking utensils for the kitchen. The renovated Hall is now open for guests and hosted a meeting of about 80 people during our stay.

Our goal for Amani is to complete all 13 rooms and purchase a stove for the kitchen.

Mary Ballard Medical Clinic
With our purchase of a microscope, dryer and reagents, the clinic lab is now complete and Nancy, our lab technician, can perform many of the tests needed by patients. We also did some plumbing and electrical work for the clinic during our visit. Jacob Tinidi, our nurse, is currently attending midwife school so he can deliver babies for the community. He will complete his course in August.>> Our goal for the clinic is to purchase Jacob a motorbike so he can see patients in their homes, as well as deliver babies for women who can’t travel to the clinic. We also want to add another water tank to ensure the clinic has ample water during the dry seasons.

Farmers
The farmers are late planting this season due to lack of rain, but are hoping the rains begin soon so they can produce a good crop. Thanks to our irrigation system, we were able to plant our seed corn, which is doing well and now being cultivated. At our two farm stores, we now have corn grinders, which let our farmers have their corn ground into meal at a reduced price. We are currently adding more inventory to both stores.>> Our goal for the farmers is to increase the inventory at our stores so they can purchase all their farming needs.

How you can help
We are so excited by the progress witnessed during our March trip! Please help us raise $5,000 to help Amani, the Medical Clinic and the Farming Co-op achieve self-sufficiency. They are getting so close!Your generous contributions have helped the Amani community come this far on the road to building a self-sustaining community, and your continued support will help them fully achieve this goal.

The mission of Hearts for Kenya is to help the people of the Amani community to become self-sufficient, a goal that we’re realizing more and more every year. Every one of our projects are now able to bring in funds that help in continuing that work, allowing Hearts for Kenya – and the people of Oyugis – to accomplish more every year.

THANK YOU. You are truly helping change the lives of the Amani people.