Yale Secondary Ethiopia UNION trip on CTV News!

I just heard that CTV News did a feature on the Yale Secondary students before they left for Ethiopia! I don't know how long it will stay online for, but at least for now, watch it here!

The students were also in the Abbotsford Times newspaper before they left. I'm so proud of them - they are such good "kids". Not really kids, they are 16-18, but that they've taken the initiative to experience a part of the world that most would neglect, and their desire to translate their experiences into their lives and community back home, before they'd even taken off... they've got a sincere maturity beyond their years! ... I know that they will live out their words! :)

Palm Springs. Disneyland. Mexico. 

For some, spring break means a break from the rain and a step into a fun-filled, warm holiday. 

But five Yale Secondary students are hoping to change their own lives by travelling with Run For Water to learn first-hand about the needs in Ethiopia, Africa. Students will be studying culture, history and geography of Ethiopia as well as delving into the water crisis in the Bonke region. 

"I know I am living in a bubble," Grade 12 Yale student Tanya Drouillard says with a smile. 

"It is a great bubble, one that keeps me safe and happy, but I also know there is another world to learn from with people just as equal as I am. "I look forward to experiencing a culture completely different than ours." 

Stan Wiebe, a social studies and history teacher at Yale, was an integral spoke in the wheel that started the Abbotsford Run for Water in 2008. The 5K, 10K and half marathon have raised over a quarter of a million dollars for clean water systems in the Derashe and Bonke regions of Ethiopia. The Run for Water partners with Hope International, a non-profit organization that has workers on the ground in these regions of Ethiopia. 

Wiebe says, "The trip is part of Run For Water's expanding education program. I'm expecting a life-changing experience for leaders and students alike. It's critical that we in North America understand something about the lives of our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world. I want to learn as much as I can about Ethiopians' day-to-day lives." 

The students will visit Addis Ababa, the capital, and then head out to the more rural life, including some of the villages that now have clean water thanks to the Run for Water contributions to Hope International. 

"I want to see first-hand what Run For Water has contributed to," Wiebe says. "I want to see a completed water project. I know that our work with Run For Water has a real impact - it will be neat to see a bit of that impact with my own eyes." 

For Ken Baerg and Randall Mark, co-founders of the Run for Water, this is a dream come true.
"These students will never be the same," Baerg says. "We have always wanted to take our experience of travelling to the villages and somehow share it with the classrooms in Abbotsford." 

Mark agrees. "These students will be posting their own Blogs on our website, [www.runforwater.ca] and speaking to classes when they return. 

Hearing it first hand from a peer will have an amazing impact on more Canadian students. We couldn't be happier that this trip has come together." 

Grade 12 Yale student and history buff Curtis Uhryn can't wait to be in the airplane flying to Ethiopia. "I haven't seen much of the world, and I really don't know what to expect," says Uhryn. 

"I hope I can convey my feeling for the seriousness of the crisis in Ethiopia when I return and speak to other students. I may major in international relations or development in university, so seeing another culture will be helpful for me. This isn't just a trip for fun. I can't wait to go." 

Tori Wong, another Grade 12 Yale student interested in international relations, looks forward to learning from the Ethiopian people. 

"A lot of people would think [the Ethiopian people] could only learn from us," she says. 

"What I could learn from them will be extremely valuable. I know a lot of families cannot send their kids to school because they have to walk for their water. We will get to see some villages that have been helped by Run for Water, and others that are in the process [of digging trenches]. It will be interesting to contrast the villages at different stages in the water crisis." 

She also looks forward to seeing how the villagers have set goals in their economy after the water is in place. 

Drouillard agrees. She is a co-founder for the Yale Environmental Club and believes "throwing a band aid on a problem is never a solution. Hope International believes in building relationships and life-long connections with the villages." 

Other Yale students Kristen Dey and Maddi Gibs will join Drouillard, Uhryn and Wong. Wiebe's wife Renita, and Run for Water board member Jana Ratzlaff will also make the trip. 

Wong's insight sums up how all the participants seem to feel about the trip to Ethiopia. "I hope to see what I learn in Ethiopia translate into how I live my life here."

© Copyright (c) Abbotsford Times

I'm home!

I’ve been out of internet range for the last 10 or 11 days – it feels like a dream world ago, but I’ve had the privilege of spending the last week and a half with our 2011 Ethiopia UNION Team…

5 young, thoughtful & enthusiastic Grade 11 & 12 students and 3 dedicated leaders of Run For Water, including the students’ history/geography teacher. They were a fantastic team! As always, it’s just a little sad at the end of a UNION trip – I’ll miss them! I really liked this team – they were all so positive & supportive, grateful, and eager to learn and be put to the task of thinking & talking their experiences through, and putting their passion, creativity, and energy into future action. So, I’m happy to send them off back home to keep working out together as a tight-knit team what this trip will mean for them and for their futures. Run For Water will be pushing towards their $300,000 fundraising goal for clean water projects in Ethiopia this year. And for the students, looking ahead to finishing the last months (or year) of high school, they’ve got the world as their oyster, bright and promising futures and all the possibilities in the world ahead of them – something that they realized through the trip is an amazing privilege. The next 5-10 years will be very formative years for them, and I’m glad really glad that they chose to have this UNION experience as an early part of that journey from high school to the rest of their adult lives. I have a feeling they will all be movers and shakers in their lives as well as their communities.

For now, a couple along-the-journey pictures, until I get the more story-ful photos sorted out. But anyways, we did spend a lot of time on the road – luckily we were in good company. :)

From the capital city, up and down mountains and through the countryside, to HOPE’s project camp site in Southern Ethiopia and six rural villages in the area in various stages of development, we bumped and bounced along by jeep for more than 1500 km to enter into the world of poverty and development in Ethiopia.

 

 

And for all the bumps in the road (literally, and figuratively - from early mornings and long travels, to blazing sun and high altitudes, to lots of patience for African time, to spiders, to a plague of coughs and sore throats that spread through the team, and so on!), I think that we really did come to know, learn, and understand some of the needs in urban and rural areas – and possibilities for changes that meet those needs, sustainably.

In our debrief time while still miles away from home, our team has been reflecting on our experiences to bring out stories to share that really capture what they most want to share. So that is what I will do as well… soon! But until then, here’s at least  a little taste of the students really wanted to bring home:

•  Clean water is a privilege for us…  We haven’t done anything to earn it or deserve it, and it is nothing to take for granted or feel entitled to. That people work SO hard, for dirty water, is injustice.

• Poverty is common… it's not just the “unfortunate few” that experience the misfortune of having less than others…Poverty is real and insufficiency & daily struggle is the situation of many, many, many people

• Development that enables people to look beyond just surviving today brings freedom and hope to be able to aspire for the future

• To address poverty, women have to be involved!

It’s been an packed-full, exhausting but also energizing-because-so-inspiring 10 days. It’s one thing to know need exists and projects exist. It’s another to see them firsthand and hear from communities and families that are really, and joyfully & incredibly actually moving from poverty towards a better future with the resources to help themselves. And to see young people take it in and make sense of it in a personal way… that is just pretty darn awesome. 

I am – really – awed by HOPE’s work in Ethiopia, and to be connected with the truly amazing local staff and ongoing projects there! I’ll share more stories and pictures soon! 

xoxo

Rainbow

UNION & Building Family Ties

My UNION team’s arrived! They are a fabulous bunch – the students are some of the sweetest, good-natured, and looking-out-for-each-other teenagers! They all just got in last night, and we’ve had a very full first day… Combined with some of my experiences last week, here’s a little update!

So last week, I had the privilege last week of visiting HOPE’s programming for HIV/AIDS in Addis through a local NGO called Save Lives Ethiopia. As I manage the donor support program for this programming from the Canadian side, it was good to get a chance to see it on the ground.

Here’s Frehiwot, the big-hearted and down-to-earth director of Save Lives Ethiopia (SaLE).

 

I got to meet some of her staff and see the comprehensive programming for combating the spread of HIV and supporting children who have been orphaned by AIDS. Here’s Katamah, the lab technician who does testing (VCT) for HIV. 

SaLE does Voluntary Counselling and Testing at the center and also have “mobile” VCT in a van in the communities – it’s hugely important for people to be able to get safe, non-judgmental, secret, confidential testing and counselling so they can get further help if needed. The cost of a test is about 50 birr (about $3) but SaLE provides testing for anyone who wants it free of charge.

Baylenish, the programs coordinator, with some of the books and resources for helping people understand HIV/AIDS and change behaviours that make them vulnerable to infection. 

 They have prevention education programs for youth and adults, and even peer education program for women who are sex workers (for lack of other means of survival) – sex workers reaching out to other sex workers about how to reduce risk of infection. The work that they are doing from education, to prevention, to testing and counselling, to care and support… is really amazing work.

What was most touching to see, though, is the care and support program for children orphaned by AIDS. Millions of people have died from AIDS in Ethiopia, and many have left children behind. Just in the four sub-cities where SaLE works, there are an estimated 5,000 children orphaned by AIDS. SaLE is able to support 411 of these children through HOPE International Development Agency’s Building Family Ties program, which links compassionate people in Canada with these children through monthly support. 

With this support, these children are provided tuition and school materials to have access to education, monthly food support, medical care, psychological & social support in their homes to help them through the trauma of losing their parents, and support and training for their guardians – grandmothers, aunts, uncles, or neighbours where possible.

I got to meet a few families last week.

This family is struggling, as the grandmother taking care of her two orphaned grandchildren is in ill health herself – if she passes away, the children will have no one to take care of them. :( But the children still do look forward to the future – Metasebia, who is in Grade 9, hopes to make it to university and to study political science. Tewodoros wants to be a soccer player – hence his beloved Manchester poster. It was nice to see Frehiwot jump in and remind him that it’s no problem for him to dream to be a soccer player, but he can’t forget his academics – that is important too! Tewodoros agreed. :)

I later had the chance to meet Abel and his surviving mom – I also had a special mission for this visit. I had received an envelop FULL of letters and cards for Abel – they were made (with love!) by kids at New Life Community Church in Burnaby, BC, which has been supporting Abel through the Building Family Ties program for a number of years. 

So, with this opportunity to visit, I brought the cards with me and was able to give them to Abel myself, with the message that there are many kids in Canada just like him, who care about him very much and want him to grow up with hope and a future. It was a very happy visit.

Then today, I got to see this program again, through the fresh eyes of our UNION team. That itself was really great – the team getting a chance to learn very personally about the challenges of urban poverty and HIV/AIDS. Here’s the team in Frehiwot’s office as she explains to them about the children support program.

And we split up into two groups to each visit on family with supported orphan children. Visiting families in the urban slums has its ups and downs… we DON’T want to make a “zoo” of poverty, but the small glimpse of their realities, is, I think, a valuable exchange… we were very thankful for the invitation into their homes and I think it is something that the team will really take home with them. My half of the group had a very positive meeting, with Mero and Melat, two very lovely girls who live with their grandma. I remember both of them from preparing their annual progress updates at Christmas. We had a great time talking with the girls and their lively grandma, hearing their stories, and even having Mero even showed off her Ethiopian dancing for us! We’ve got a bit of it on video, but the internet is too slow now to upload it. One of the Yale Secondary students on our team was actually the same age as one of the girls, which was pretty special! Anyhow, it was so great to see the girls’ enthusiasm and confidence for themselves and their future. Melat hopes to be a teacher, and Mero – a doctor/scientist so she can take revenge on HIV/AIDS by finding a cure! Go girls go! :)

The other team had a more somber visit with a family that’s clearly struggling, as an aunt is taking care of 5 children, only two of whom are being supported by SaLE (resources haven’t allowed all the kids to be in the program). We had a bit of a debrief together after the visit today, and I’m sure we’ll be doing lots more talking in the coming days.

We are heading down to the South tomorrow to see development in the rural context – clean water, especially, and agriculture and income generation. It’s an 8 hour drive down from Addis! I don’t think I’ll have internet again until we come back a week later… we’ll even be spending two days camping in the field with HOPE’s project staff! I’ll try to write some blogs to be posted later…

Til then, much love, and hope you enjoyed this post especially! If you want to find out more about the Building Family Ties program, and how you can support AIDS orphaned children here in Addis, ask me! I’d be happy to tell you more! 

xoxo

Rainbow

UPEACE Reunions

One of the great things about UPEACE… you can go almost anywhere in the world and not be a stranger! I got to connect with two very dear friends who are here in Addis - Golda and Tigist! 

Golda's now working with the UPEACE Africa programme, managing a university partnership program, which brings Masters students from partner universities in Congo, Rwanda, Uganda, and a couple others I think. They have a 2.5 month training program in Addis (including English for academic writing, curriculum development), and then go to UPEACE in Costa Rica for one year to study in whichever area they are doing their master’s in – peace education, gender, international law, media, etc… and they create university-level curricula as a thesis equivalent, which they then teach when they return to their home universities in the Great Lakes region. Essentially what Tigist did… what an exciting, practical, valuable program!  And Golda, being African from Cameroon, having taught English as a second language for 3 years, being a Peace Education graduate, and having worked with UPEACE for the last 3 years… is the perfect fit for the job. I love it! And she’s planning for a Peace Education leadership training conference here in Addis for local teachers later this year… wheels spinning for how I might get on board with a poverty & development focus…!

And, Tigist, who, since graduating from UPEACE in Gender and Peacebuilding, has been teaching at the Addis Ababa University for courses on gender and on peace education, and also working with a women’s rights and advocacy NGO (with a pre-UPEACE background in law). Now she’s started her PhD, with a focus on forgiveness in Ethiopia after a history of cruel regimes… having done my thesis on the post-conflict reconciliation & peacebuilding in Sierra Leone, it was really interesting to hear about her research.

UPEACE reunions are always inspiring and exciting finding out what each other are up to! 

(For UPEACE'rs following my blog, I haven’t had a chance to meet Myriam yet..but hopefully we’ll get to connect somehow before I head home!)

 

xoxo

Rainbow

ps My next post is about HOPE programs... that IS why I'm here! 

Great Ethiopian Run!

Yesterday, I had the fun opportunity to join a women's edition of the Great Ethiopian Run in Addis with Meriem, one of the HOPE staff. As a women-specific event, the run was a platform to promote some womens' development issues, like within the Millennium Development Goals.

 

It was fun.. not a bad way to see Addis! And, just before the run, a crowd-cheering appearance from Haile, the fastest man on the planet! He's Ethiopian, and has set records for almost every distance there is... he can run 20K in about the same time I can run 10! Rightfully a favourite celebrity here in Ethiopia! He also mentioned that he ran 30K that morning before showing up at the event..!



A little pre-race aerobics

And, we're off - 9000 pink-clad women!

The competitive side of me wanted to make like Haile and run as fast as I could... but we walked, except for the last 50m or so from the finish line! But, that's ok.. it was a fun way to experience Addis, along with the lively singers, shouters, dancers, merry-makers that laughed and cheered their way to the finish line.

Professional runners warming up early before the race:

 

And getting their trophies and cash winnings from Haile!

I didn't catch what their time was, but I'm sure they were fast - they are world-class, record-holding athletes as well! I wonder if they were some of the Vancouver Sun Run winners!

Well, we did well too - earned ourselves our participation medals!

:)


until my next post.. ! xo

Some sights and sounds of Addis Ababa

I'm singing a song maybe called Addis Ababa in my head as I'm writing this post... all I know is the chorus, which goes, Addis Ababa! Addis Ababa!

Anyways, just a few sights and sounds here. Addis is a city under construction... there is construction everywhere - buildings, roads, hotels, shopping centers...

 Buildings going up everywhere! Here's the "view" from my 6th floor hotel room window..

... all with wooden scaffolding!


It's hard to capture the bustle and vibe of the city - taxis and car-filled streets, taxi guys shouting out the places they are going and tapping on the roof pull over and let people out or more people jump on, pedestrians weaving through traffic and hopping medians to cross highways,  load-laden donkeys, international organization offices and country embassies on every corner, especially as African Union is based in Addis, and progressive messages about development, social issues, women's rights, etc..

Not tons, but here's a couple pictures! 

Streets and taxis... listening for them calling Bole Bole Bole Bole to get me home! I haven't navigated them on my own..

from the inside

Donkeys ! :)

I missed most of March 8 on the plane, but it was the 100th International Women's Day... lots of celebration here! :)  And perfect timing for my next post's event...

My UNION team is arriving this evening - I've got a couple other things to do today before then, but I'll try to get a few posts up before they get in! :)

xo

Rainbow

Greetings from Addis! :)

Greetings from Addis Ababa, the capital city of Ethiopia! Or, as I might say with a feeble attempt at Amharic, tenast’ell’n ! 

I haven’t had the chance to see tons of the city, but tidbits here and there as I’ve been meeting with HOPE International Development Agency’s staff, hearing a bit more from them about our work here in Ethiopia, and visiting some of our programs in Addis. It’s been great – getting the staffs’ perspectives of HOPE’s projects in the South with clean water, agriculture, and microfinance and income generation that we’ll get to see as a UNION team soon. My team’s not here yet, they are arriving on Monday – I’ve got a few days here for meetings, project visits, etc. 

Hmm... apparently I haven't taken very many pictures in Addis... I guess between the hotel and the office and the luxury of being chauffeured from A to B,  I haven't actually been out and about much! I'll be out today doing some shopping for HOPE's Film Premiere & Dinner event today, and meeting some friends tomorrow, so I'll have some more pictures soon!  I'm also doing a 5K run with one of the HOPE staff on Sunday morning, which will be fun. It's such high altitude here that I'm winded already just walking up to my 6th floor hotel room though, so we'll see how that goes! 

Anyways,  here's one picture with Bereket and Meriem, two of the HOPE staff in Addis, having a nice hand-on Ethiopian dinner with injera (a big, light pancake-like bread) and a chickpea saucy stew and roasted lamb. 

Bereket's had 25 years+ experience of working with clean water projects in the country, with a number of international / local organizations through the years. He's been with HOPE since 2004 or 2005, and talking about some of the differences, his take was that HOPE’s approach to community-led, community-“done”, and therefore, essentially community-owned development has been the most successful and sustainable. Not that it’s a contest, but effective development has to be sustainable and its great to know that HOPE’s work is working and working well!

xo

Rainbow

U.N.I.O.N in Ethiopia

What's UNION? It's Understanding Needs In Other Nations, and it's HOPE International Development Agency's educational program for volunteers to go overseas and to live and learn with people in the developing world. It's also my job :)

I'd love to share more, but seeing as I need to be on a plane in about 3 minutes, I'll have to cut and paste from our website. We are taking a group of high school students from Abbotsford, BC, and a few board members of an awesome event called Run For Water, to experience life in Ethiopia and to learn, among other things, how clean water is transforming the lives of families and communities in Southern Ethiopia.

More to come... but final boarding call means I should probably get on board!

xo

Yale Secondary School Ethiopia Team

We are excited to send a special UNION team to Ethiopia in March 2011. Senior students from Yale Secondary School in Abbotsford, BC will participate along with Stan Wiebe, Renita Wiebe, and Jana Ratzlaff – all dedicated and passionate advocates for clean water in Ethiopia. Stan, Renita, and Jana, as well as many of the students, are actively involved in the Abbotsford-based Run For Water, an annual community event that raises substantial funds for HOPE International Development Agency’s projects for clean water in Ethiopia. Together, the team will learn first-hand about needs and development as they journey from our privileged society to experience life alongside struggling communities in Ethiopia.
Prior to their overseas travel, the team will explore the causes of hunger and poverty, the need for community development, the practice of crossing cultural boundaries, and the Amharic language. They will share with their friends, family, and community about their goals and what they hope to see, learn, and understand from this unique experience.
In Ethiopia, the team will first visit HOPE International Development Agency’s programs for children orphaned by HIV/AIDS in Addis Ababa. They will learn first-hand about the effects of the disease in a country where AIDS is responsible for 30 percent of all adult deaths, and see the life-changing impact that support for education, food, and basic care is making in the lives of children who have lost one or both of their parents.
The team will also travel to Southern Ethiopia to witness the living conditions of rural communities without access to clean water. They will discover how the gift of clean water can change lives and see how water plays a foundational role for nearly every development issue the communities face: health, education, financial security, peace, human rights, and gender equality.
In taking this journey to Ethiopia, and by engaging their home community of Abbotsford, the team is committed to making a difference for Ethiopian communities in need.

Profiles of students from the Ethiopia Yale Secondary School Team

       
     _{Tori Wong          Tanya Drouillard          Kristen Dey              Madi Gibbs             Curtis Uhryn}       

I'm going to Ethiopia!

I'm not ready... and neither is my blog... but I'm off!! :D  Where?

... ETHIOPIA, in East Africa!  I'll be in Ethiopia for the next 2.5 weeks - a quick little trip but hopefully very full of goodness.

Come join me! You can sign up your email to receive my blog updates on the little box on the side --->

I will share more soon. Realistically I don't know how much internet I'm going to have for most of the time I am away... but maybe at least at the airport before I take off I can tell you a bit more about what this trip's all about!


More soon!

xo

Rainbow