October 30, 2021 Inside Scoop Volume 1 Issue 6

November 5, 2021 / By
Where to begin? We will report on the Hand-in-Hand Global Walk for Water although we don’t have the final on the amount raised from our partner Bridges of Hope. Will also share a bit about our development of our own business plan and working with the three projects on the development of their business plans. And December is our one year anniversary and we will share the accomplishment of our first year in our next Newsletter which will come out around December 1, 2021. Most importantly though is to share some heartbreaking news that leaves us feeling helpless and shocked.Times in Africa have been challenging these last couple of months. Mama Dinah has been dealing with drought and then Covid right there in her own community. Hearing about people dying in isolation in a community that is tight knit is difficult to imagine. Her father died in August and last week her brother’s adult and relatively young son died suddenly leaving behind a two year old child. Two days later we heard from Mama Charity in Togo that her only biological child had been hospitalized with breathing problems and 2 days after that we received a text from Mama Charity that her daughter Manuela Wisdom was gone forever! Mama Charity was still in isolation. She hae been home from the hospital for about 3 weeks, recovering from Covid at home. She came very close to losing her own life to Covid. Now her daughter is gone, and you may recall from our last Newsletter that her sister recently died unexpectedly also. Honestly we cannot imagine the pain she is experiencing.
Manuela
Mama Dinah, tall man in back is her nephew
It is hard for us to think of anything else right now and yet we cannot focus only on our tears and sadness as there is so much good happening. Let’s talk about the Global Walk for Water. This will become an annual event likely in October centered around the Canadian Thanksgiving. It’s a good time for walking in most of the world and we all had so much fun and heard wonderful stories from around the globe. We have some photos to share of walks in the US, walks in labyrinths’, walks in the autumn leaves in Canada, and a short video of the Women of the Maasai Mara in Oloonkerine, Kenya doing their 6 km walk to the dugout to get water and walking home with their 25 liter containers on the backs. We had walkers and sponsors of walkers and several people who sponsored the African Project leaders for their walks. We had an older woman who is wheelchair bound and excited about supporting the need for water in the Kenyan project who asked her daughter to walk her and she unexpectedly died just 2 days before the walk was scheduled to begin. Her family honored her memory by acknowledging how the anticipation of the walk brought her joy and they donated money to make the fundraiser more successful.If you were a walker or a sponsor this year thank you. If not, we are already planning an even Bigger Global Walk event for this time next year. We had hoped to have final figures for the Global Walk for Water 2021 and given that there are still donations coming in, the final report will come in the next newsletter. The thermometer on our website will soon be growing taller!
Lucille and friends Global Walk for Water 2021Mama Dinah’s Community Water Walk, done daily and done in honour of Global Walk for Water Oct 2021
With Covid slowing down a bit in Canada, we had a live fundraiser in Edmonton Canada. The photos showed women smiling and laughing especially when Lucille brought some water containers much smaller than those in Africa, with the headbands like the women in Africa use to stabilize and support the water containers on their backs. We are limited on how many photos we can include in our newsletter and there are so many inspiring and fun photos and videos, check them out on our Facebook page. We are wanting creative ideas for raising funds both virtual and local around the globe so if you have ideas, we would love to hear from you. You can reach us at hope.whisperers@gmail.com.Business Plans: We are growing in leaps and bounds and we put our heads together to create a 5 year Hand-in-Hand business plan. The Project leaders in the three African communities were anxious and excited to develop their own business plans writing down their visions, their dreams for bringing thriving energy into their communities. And we had so much fun listening to them describe their dreams and how they wanted to accomplish them. We are taking notes and helping them fit the dreams into a business plan format. Mama Charity in Togo had dreams growing during our conversation with her. She started with 3 pillars of projects that would help her succeed in her Mission which is having orphaned children have a place to stay; become educated; and develop into responsible citizens who create opportunities for future generations. Her Vision is to create sustainable long term residential support to enhance the possibilities for children to become thriving professional adults with life and work skills.She has shared with us stories of one boy growing up and going for training to become a plumber and then coming back to help with plumbing work at the orphanage or the new school she built in Ghana that has recently opened on September 27, 2021. She is creating a true home and family for the orphans and tells us of a young man who is on his own with his own family and his 2 young children insist on coming home to the orphanage and family on holidays to see “Grandmum Charity”. Mama Charity envisions a whole village someday, dormitories, primary, secondary and trade schools, agribusiness, poultry farm. One place that the children belong so when in school and they are asked what tribe they are from or where they are from, they will have experienced their own tribe and feel pride and self confidence in who they are and where they are from.In future issues of the Newsletter we will share the hopes and dreams of each of the Project Leaders. We are close to having Sister Agnes on her way with her poultry project, lacking only the funds to purchase a vehicle for egg and broiler delivery to the local schools and hotels. The proceeds from her poultry business will be used to support children to go to secondary school and to professional schools for those who graduate and have aptitude for professional training.These are very exciting times for us. Please feel free to drop us a line at hope.whisperers@gmail.com. You can find previous issues of our Newsletters on our website at www.handinhand.space.
Walking a Labyrinth holding intention for water on Global Walk for Water 2021
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