Siaya is a town twenty miles from Lake Victoria, in Western Kenya.  I am in town to visit community groups that my CARE Kenya colleagues (Alex, Lucy, and Margaret) have been working with in the last six months.  The first group we visit named themselves Twelve Sisters, but they are quick to tell me they have fifteen members, as they have been growing.  Six months ago, these women started working together as a community savings and loans group.  The women meet twice a month, and at every meeting they contribute money to the group.  They are required to contribute 20 Kenyan shillings (about 30 cents) to the group’s social fund, and then they can choose the amount of money they want to contribute to the group’s pooled funds.   The pooled funds are lumped into shares, which cost 100 Kenyan shillings (about $1.50). 

At any meeting, group members can take out loans from the group’s pooled funds.  In April, Dada started an embroidery business.  Frances improved her poultry farm.  Alice paid the secondary school fees for her children.  The women repay their loans a month after they take them out, along with 10% interest. 

The social fund, however, is a different matter altogether.  The social fund grows every month, and if one of the women has a problem, the group votes on whether or not to use their social fund to help her.  Two months ago, Frances’ house caught on fire, and she lost many of her possessions.  Twelve Sisters voted to nearly deplete their social fund, giving Frances a way to start over.  Unlike the loan system, the social fund does not need to be repaid. 

Beatrice, the group’s president, tells me, “this box is a painkiller…before when we had problems we had nowhere to turn, but now we have a resource.”  While we only spent a day together, it was clear to see that Beatrice was a force to be reckoned with.  In addition to leading Twelve Sisters, Beatrice is a community educator on clean water.  Trained by CARE, Beatrice goes into rural villages armed with PUR water packets.  Donated by Proctor and Gamble, these packets purify 10 liters of water.  The packets cost 15 Kenyan shillings (20 cents), but thanks to Proctor and Gamble, Beatrice and other health workers can distribute samples for free when they conduct community trainings.

Beatrice shows me how she demonstrates the packets.  She empties the packet into a bucket of brown water that she collected from the nearby river.  As she sings a song about the process, Beatrice stirs the bucket for five minutes.  Then we wait.  Twenty minutes later, the water is miraculously clear.  Beatrice ties a white cloth around a second bucket and uses it to filter the sediment that floats on top of the translucent bucket.  “Now it is safe,” she says.  I must admit, I’m impressed. 

Alex and Margaret, who run CARE’s water and sanitation programs in Siaya, tell me that the funding from Proctor and Gamble will last two more years, and their clients are always asking for more PUR packets.  The mortality rate from water-borne diseases has dropped significantly in Siaya since CARE started the Safe Water System Project, and families are eager to use the PUR packets because the water looks and tastes better, and they see immediate improvements in their health.

Beatrice asked me what I was going to do when I got back to the United States.  I explained that my job is to tell stories to members of Congress, so they will support programs like Twelve Sisters and the Clean Water Project.  I hope to make good on my promise. 

There are two bills in Congress right now that could help women like Beatrice and groups like the Twelve Sisters.  The Microenterprise Empowerment and Job Creation Act (H.R. 2524), and Senator Paul Simon Water for the World Act (H.R. 3658).  Please call the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121 and ask for your member of Congress or click here to send him/her an e-mail in support of these life-saving pieces of legislation.

By: Suzanne Berman, Field Coordinator, CARE USA

I work with members of the US Congress and their constituents to improve our foreign assistance programs.  While much of CARE’s advocacy work involves the US government, our country office colleagues also engage in advocacy with foreign governments.  I got a taste of CARE’s global advocacy work last week when I was asked to join meetings between CARE, Emory University (a research partner), and the Kenyan Ministries of Education and Public Health and Sanitation in Kisumu, Kenya.  The goal of the meeting was to increase the government’s investment in successful hygiene and sanitation programs in rural schools. 

For the last six years, CARE and Emory University have worked on a program called SWASH +, which builds latrines and hand washing stations in schools.   At the moment, the program is only in the Nyganza province, in southwestern Kenya, but CARE hopes that the government will provide the resources to replicate it across the country.

Studies have found that having clean latrines has positive impacts on health and reduces absenteeism, particularly for girls.  CARE hopes that future research will prove that adequate sanitation also improves school performance.   

In US advocacy, we generally work toward one of three goals:  passing legislation, securing funding, or working with the administration to support policies.  Once the law is on the books or the budget is completed, we take implementation for granted.  We assume that the legislation will be carried out; the funding will arrive. 

In Kenya, the end goal of advocacy work is another matter entirely.  Here, the formal policies are comprehensive and support many development programs.  Education is legally free; all citizens have the right to water and sanitation.  But in reality, schools are not always functional; sanitation facilities are inadequate or absent.

The Kenyan ministry officials who joined us in Kisumu were supportive of SWASH +, but Kenya is changing rapidly, and the future of social programs is uncertain.  The country has a new constitution.  National elections will take place in the next year.  After the post-election violence in 2007-2008, Kenyans are unclear as to what will come next.

Yet after debriefing on our advocacy strategy, my CARE Kenya colleagues realized that the tools we need to advocate for effective programs are similar across cultural contexts.  Before starting a program like SWASH +, we need to determine key stakeholders in the community and the government.  We need to conduct research that determines the effectiveness of programs, and we need to package that research in way that is clear, succinct, and useful to policy makers.  Finally, we need to engage stakeholders throughout the process and to consider them as critical partners. 

To find out more about SWASH +, go to www.swashplus.org.

To support programs like SWASH +, call the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121, ask to speak to your member of Congress, and tell him/her to support the Senator Paul Simon Water for the World Act (H.R. 3658). 

Last week, I participated in a discussion panel following the release of Population Action International’s latest film, Weathering Change: Stories about climate and family from women around the world (www.weatheringchange.org). The film highlights the ways in which women struggle to care for their families and how climate change is impacting their lives. PAI asked me to share CARE’s perspective on climate change and how women are often disproportionately vulnerable to climate impacts.

Yet, though I work on the issue day in and day out and was asked to join the panel as a quote-unquote “expert,” more than anything, the film gave me perspective. I couldn’t help but ask – after watching these women tell their stories and seeing images of their daily struggle to care for their families – how aware is the average American of what life is like in a developing country? For a woman? In the face of climate change?

We struggle to keep up with email, to run errands in the hours outside of work. We get frustrated when there’s traffic or some hiccup on public transportation. But when we need food, it’s at the grocery store. Bountiful, fresh produce seems to magically appear on the shelves in countless varieties. Water – perfectly potable water – is available 24 hours a day, steps from where we sit, right out of the tap.

For Aregash, Radhika, Aurea, and Odelia, and countless other women, it isn’t that simple. Radhika sows seeds by hand. And then she hopes against all hope that the rains come as they have in years past. But they don’t, so her harvest isn’t what it used to be – or needs to be. Odelia waits for the water truck to come to the ramshackle community in which she and her family live on the outskirts of Lima so she can get what she can carry back to her family’s house. But it still isn’t enough. While we bathe under a gush of water, she washes her four boys with as little as possible so she has enough for cooking and drinking.

Aregash wonders how long she and her husband will be able to feed their family. Their harvests aren’t what they were in her father’s days. The land just isn’t fruitful, she says, but that’s the only way they have to raise their children. Aurea watches as the snowcaps that provide water to her family slowly shrink. She’s not worried about herself, but she wonders what her children will do when they grow up. Each of these women – like women worldwide – worries about her children.

Life for these women is hard – physically, mentally, emotionally. One of the most striking images in the film is of two women hauling large jugs of water on their backs. They’re stooped under the weight of gallons. We later see Radhika blink back tears as she talks about doing all that she can to care for her children and try to make their lives better than hers has been. Her husband has had to leave the village to find additional work, leaving her in charge of the cattle, the fields, and growing vegetables, in addition to caring for the children and running the household.

The day of the event, I posted on my Facebook page that I was speaking about women and climate change. I explained why women are disproportionately impacted – because they don’t often have equal access to rights, resources and power and because they are often left in charge of the tasks that are sensitive to changes in the climate. In response, one person commented that she hadn’t ever thought about it that way but that it makes sense…. When we help people connect the dots, they understand the day to day struggle for these women and why it’s important not only to tackle climate change but also to empower these women. To enable them to make decisions in their lives – whether it’s when to have children or how to distribute the family’s budget – and to give them the hand up they might need to face climate change impacts.

That Facebook exchange made me ask, How many people haven’t ever thought about it this way? How do we get that message out? Educating Americans, raising awareness among our friends and family, sharing stories like the ones in Weathering Change are direly needed in the US right now. The political climate (no pun intended) keeps us from passing the legislation we so desperately need to set in motion real reductions in our emissions. But it also highlights how much we need to share these stories, educate Americans, and particularly women, about the plight and struggle of fellow women and the threat that climate change poses. Not in 10 years but today.

Maybe one conversation at a time, we can shift attitudes, turn the tide. So will you start talking?

Tonya Rawe is a Senior Policy Advocate with CARE and advocates on climate change and the linkage between food security and climate change. To learn more about CARE’s work on climate change, visit www.careclimatechange.org.

Blog from Climate Change Conference Bonn

By Raja Jarrah, CARE’s Senior Advisor on REDD
June 16, 2011

The metaphor of forests being the lungs of the earth has been often used. Scientists hate that metaphor but it works for most of us. Among the many functions of forests, they recycle the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and emit oxygen. Yet tropical forests are disappearing at an alarming rate – not only emitting more greenhouse gases in the process (as trees burn or decompose), but also reducing their capacity to absorb carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from other sources.

The scheme called REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation) was invented to address this problem. It is fraught with technical and political challenges – how to measure forests properly, how to stop their loss, how to protect the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities who depend on forests, and how to pay for it. These details have preoccupied negotiators and their advisers since REDD was agreed in Bali in 2007. And they are very important, because we have to make sure that saving forests is done in a way that respects the rights of the people who depend on them, particularly those whose voice is seldom heard, like women and indigenous peoples.

Yet while there has been some progress in working out these details, it seems that we have lost the sense of urgency. We are spending ages designing a complex system of rules that will end up only saving some of the world’s forests – those in countries that have the wherewithal to comply with those rules. Yet it is within our power to completely halt the loss of forests if we want to – arguably the quickest reduction in emissions that we can make. To make this happen, we must: make it a global goal that we all work towards; put the money behind this commitment; and curb the demand from our industrialized society for biofuels, animal feed, and beef, the three main reasons that tropical forests are converted to agricultural land.

Every day we are putting more carbon into the atmosphere. We turn the carbon that is locked underground in fossil fuels into carbon that is freely circulating in the atmosphere – forever. REDD alone will not stop runaway climate change, though it can achieve results fast, and give time for the transition to a low carbon culture to take place. So REDD only makes sense if urgent action is taken to reduce emissions as quickly as possible in all other sectors at the same time. Returning to the analogy of forests as lungs – what’s the point in treating lung disease if the patient will not promise to quit smoking?

So what is missing from the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) process? Two straightforward commitments to remind us why we are doing all this: a binding commitment to ambitious emissions reductions from all countries; and a vision to reduce deforestation to zero in ten years. The rest is just necessary detail.

By Sophie Kramer, President, Yale College Council for CARE

The pivotal problem of the 21st century is the oppression of women. This is the theme of Nicholas Kristof’s book Half the Sky and was the focus of his lecture at Yale University on April 5. Mr. Kristof, a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the New York Times, spoke to an audience of more than 500 Yale students, faculty, and members of the New Haven community. The event was organized by CARE’s chapter at Yale and was followed by a dinner with Mr. Kristof and members of Yale’s College Council for CARE.

Sex trafficking, disparities in education, and poor maternal health are among the litany of problems Mr. Kristof described as facing women around the world today. He recounted the stories of women he has met in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East who have suffered or been barred from opportunities on the basis of their gender. Yet, he was careful to pronounce that these stories are not only of tragedy but also of opportunity. When Mr. Kristof’s column triggered a stream of donations to a school in India, girls were given access to education and years later a positive ripple effect can be seen throughout the community. A woman in Africa was abandoned by her family in the desert after she developed a fistula following childbirth. She crawled for days to the home of a missionary who brought her to a hospital, and today she is a nurse at this facility after benefiting from its training and education programs.

Mr. Kristof spoke not only to inform his audience but also with a call for engagement. Students can engage in local needs, and men should pay attention as well because “missing women isn’t just a women’s issue.” To those who might ask him why they should care about global poverty and the empowerment of women, Mr. Kristof’s response is that we have won the lottery of life, and we must use our voice to help the most voiceless people in the world. He also maintains that it brings us perspective and boosts our own happiness to engage in a largesr cause.

On March 8, CARE kicked off its 2011 Conference and International Women's Day Celebration in Washington D.C. with a tribute concert by recording artists India.Arie, Michael Franti, American Idol alum Crystal Bowersox, Sarah Darling, and, in an exclusive U.S. premier performance, Idan Raichel.

Breakfast and Welcome Plenary

CARE's annual conference opened on March 9 to a packed Washington Hilton ballroom of 1,100 advocates from across the country.The room was charged with excitement for a stellar line-up of influential speakers and issue experts including CARE President and CEO Helene Gayle, Melinda Gates, Mrs. Laura W. Bush, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah and Ambassador Melanne Verveer.In addition, CARE staff from nearly 40 countries—from Egypt to Afghanistan—participated in the conference and shared their unique in-country perspectives.

Dr. Gayle began the breakfast plenary by welcoming the youngest participant,10-year-old Maya, who sold eggs from her chickens to raise money to attend the conference, and the oldest participant, 90-year-old Eileen Meader.This year's conference had record-breaking participation with 1,100 advocates from 49 states.

''We know that empowering women is the single most effective means we have of fighting poverty,'' said Dr. Gayle. ''Today is about working towards a world that acknowledges the power and potential of women as a matter of fact: a world in which the only limit for a woman is the reach of her dreams and how far she's willing to go to make them reality.''

''In many places around the world, myths hold back half of society,'' explained Dr. Gayle.''Myths yank girls out of school.Myths cause hunger.Myths mean that women don't get the health care they need.Myths kill.''

CARE unveiled a unique report, ''The Top 10 Myths about Women & the Heroes Who Bust Them,'' in honor of the 100^th anniversary of International Women's Day.

''Change comes when people stand up, speak out, and refuse to accept things as they are.Myths come tumbling down because women in the most unlikely places see their own promise, even when others doubt it, and dare to fulfill their potential, no matter what stands in their way,'' added Dr. Gayle

Dr. Gayle motivated the crowd as they headed into a day of training on CARE's three priority issues: keeping the foreign aid budget intact, empowering girls through education and financial opportunities for women.Helene noted the timeliness of advocates' efforts on Capitol Hill as budget talks remain front and center among members of Congress.

Following Dr. Gayle's remarks, Ambassador Melanne Verveer thanked the advocates and CARE Country Directors for all their tireless work and for advocating on behalf of poor women and girls everywhere.Ambassador Verveer fully supports CARE's mission to empower women as she has witnessed the resiliency and the strength of women across the world to be the ''agents of change'' in their communities.

''No country can get ahead by leaving half of their population behind,'' said Ambassador Verveer.''Women and girls are the world's greatest untapped resource, and investing in them is one of the most powerful forces for international development.''Ambassador Verveer acknowledged the importance of CARE's work in girls' education and access to financial tools for women as significant ways to alleviate poverty.

Legislative Issue Trainings

Following the breakfast plenary, participants met with their lobby groups and began to learn about CARE's legislative priority issues.Maya, the 10-year-old who sold chicken eggs to raise money to attend the conference, sat with a group of advocates from Maine.Among them was another young girl named Kiran.Maya and Kiran met at last year's conference and became fast friends.They both advocated against child marriage and have since become pen pals.This year, excited to be together again, they both decided to focus on education.

''My favorite part [of the conference] is learning about issues and meeting with members of Congress,'' explained Kiran.She said she likes talking to her representative because ''it makes me feel like I'm important.''

Luncheon Plenary

Luncheon keynote speaker Melinda Gates, co-chair and trustee of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, was met with a standing ovation when Dr. Gayle introduced her to a packed ballroom. Gates addressed the 1,100 CARE advocates and supporters on the importance of investing in women and girls in developing countries.

"We're not just haggling over a line item in the budget," Gates told the crowd when discussing critical foreign assistance funding. "We're talking about saving millions and millions of lives."

In preparation for the more than 300 planned Hill visits the following day, she urged the advocates to share amazing stories of humanitarian aid and the lifesaving impact it has had in developing countries with their members of Congress.

USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah closed the luncheon session by stressing the importance of sustainable development.''The best way that we can serve our interests in the developing world is to create the conditions where our assistance is no longer necessary,'' explained Dr. Shah.

He praised CARE's achievements and our deep connection to the communities in which we work.Dr. Shah also encouraged CARE's advocates to push their representatives to oppose cuts to the foreign assistance budget.

Our assistance is not just a line in a budget, it is a reflection of who we are as a country,'' said Dr. Shah. He added that significant cuts to foreign aid would ''effectively end six decades of bipartisan tradition of U.S. leadership in global development.''

  The Girls Matter break out session was one of the most lively gatherings at the conference. With a room packed to the brim, students and Girl Scouts sat on the floor to hear CARE's Basic and Girls' Education Unit Director Sarah Bouchie, USAID Senior Gender Advisor Caren Grown and Girl Scouts of America Senior Vice President Laurie Westley talk about one of the most fundamental elements for global development: the education of girls.When you put a girl in school ''you tell the entire community that she is worth it, and hopefully while she is there she can help to… start to change some of the perceptions about what girls should achieve and how girls and boys should be treated'' said Bouchie.

I Am Powerful Dinner

Chloe Bobar grew up in the small New Hampshire town of Charlestown and graduated from Fall Mountain Regional High School in June 2010.

Instead of heading straight to college, she decided to take a year off and is currently a Fellow with Global Citizen Year (GCY). GCY is a non-profit organization working to build a movement of young Americans who engage in a transformative "bridge year" between high school and college.

Currently, there are 33 GCY Fellows in Brazil, Ecuador, Guatemala and Senegal.

CARE is proud to partner with GCY and is hosting Chloe in Ecuador as she works with CARE's "Building a Health Maternity" program.

Read more about Chloe and her work and see pictures of her home and neighborhood.

Stay tuned for more stories as Chloe continues her personal journey and CARE works to increase access to maternal health in Ecuador!

As I write my final blog entry, I am somewhere over Canada. I have been traveling for close to 24 hours. The past two weeks have been some of the longest, most heart wrenching and most beautiful days I have ever experienced. I am coming back a changed person. The things I have seen I will never forget. I have a fire in my belly that’s consuming me and I want to tackle the world.

It’s going to be a bit of culture shock, coming back home. Just being in the Paris airport felt a bit off. It was clean, bright and modern, full of glass and leather lounging chairs. The people there smell like expensive, flowery colognes, not of body odor and dirt. Not like the death smell of Kibera.

Kibera, the second largest slum in Africa, is something that cannot be put into words. It is literally growing to encircle the city of Nairobi. Like seeing children rummage in a dump, Kibera is an image that will continue to haunt me. CARE’s office in Kibera is right in the heart of the community. You have to walk to get there, and by the time you do, your cuffs are covered in mud and filth and other things you don’t want to think about. There is no garbage collection in Kibera. There is no sewage system. After a few minutes in Kibera you just breathe through your mouth and act like the toddlers running barefoot about you—just pretend it’s not there. If you think about it, you’ll get sick. There are several times I think I will.

Seeing the CARE sign indicating our offices fills me with pride. One of the reasons I was so drawn to CARE in the first place was its approach to development. They focus on empowering people—particularly women and girls—to lift themselves out of poverty. They work in the community and are led by the community members themselves; some 95 percent of our country staff is from their country they are working in. They know the language, the culture. They grew up in these areas. The beneficiaries are their neighbors. Each CARE person I meet immediately becomes my personal hero. This is not just their job. It is their purpose for being.

Take Emmah for example. She runs CARE’s Sweeting Justice Program in Kibera. Many women in Kibera aren’t even aware they have rights, much less that they can get recourse for any violations of those rights. Emmah works with women in Kibera to help them move forward both legally and personally from the violence they experience on a daily basis.

Before working in Kibera, Emmah spent three years at Dadaab, a refugee camp of some 300,000 people, the largest in the world. It’s meant to hold 90,000. She says Kibera is worse. In Dadaab, there was some sort of governance, some sort of infrastructure. There is nothing in Kibera. I see that first hand at 4:30 pm, when the mud streets of Kibera swell with rushing people. Outsiders rushing to get out before dark. Insiders rushing to lock themselves in. There are no streetlights in Kibera and once it becomes dark, it is a free for all. Rape, violence, theft. Although Emmah works every single day in this community, there is a look of anxiety in her eyes as the time approaches for us to leave. We need to get out of here, she says. Now.

I ask her how she continues to work in such conditions every day. Doesn’t she get burnt out? Feel like it’s hopeless? She looks me straight in the eye and tells me if she helps just one person, it’s worth it. Then she can push forward, because of one person.

But there is a lot more than just one person that Emmah and the rest of the CARE Kibera staff has helped. I have the incredible honor of meeting three of them, Ruth, Violet and Agnes. They are part of the Sweeting Justice program.  During the election violence of 2007, life in Kibera was a complete madhouse. They were all raped by multiple men, men who they could not identify in the darkness. As a result, each of their husbands left them; it’s a shame to be married to a violated woman.

At first I feel awkward, as Emmah goes back and forth translating for us. I wish there wasn’t a language barrier. These women are sharing the most intimate details of their lives with us, complete strangers. I ask Emmah to tell them how grateful we are to hear their stories, that we want to know so we can tell others, and hopefully prevent things like this from happening in the future. They tell us about how CARE has helped them; through counseling, by educating them on their rights, by training them in the group savings and loans model so that their dreams of running a grocery stand could come true. How they feel, even after all that happened to them, there is a reason to move forward, a reason to keep going. It’s interesting to listen to them because it’s obvious they are in different places of recovery. Ruth sits at the end, shy, speaking mostly to her hands, whispering her answers. Agnes responds emboldened, looks me directly in the eye, smiling when she talks about her future. They say having the support system that CARE has provided has been critical. Before they would have suffered in silence, alone. There is a strength in numbers. They are three of the strongest and bravest women I have yet to meet. At the end of the interview, they ask Sarah and I a few questions. Women to women, they say, what is your advice for moving forward? And I realize then that while our circumstances have put in completely different places, at the end of the day, we are all women. There is power in your voice, I tell them. Don’t forget that. I certainly won’t.

We walk down the road to the Local Links supported HIV Youth program. Local Links is a CARE program that focuses on OVCs (Orphans and Vulnerable Children). They do this through targeting their caretakers via Group Savings and Loans programs, Early Childhood development programs, and HIV/AIDS education programs. In Kenya, 6.4 percent of people are HIV positive. In Kibera, that number more than doubles to 14 percent.

Today, a group of teenagers are watching a video on HIV stigmas and myths. The myths around the disease run deep in Kenya. HIV is seen as a curse in many places in Kibera, and in Kenya in general, with the result that many people seek the counseling of witch doctors. Pastors sometimes use the bible verse "The wages of sin are death," which they use to condemn HIV positive people. CARE in Kibera works with positive pastors to have them do outreach in the community and debunk myths.

This particular youth group was formed by a now 29-year old woman named Irene. When she found out her status her aunt made her use different utensils to eat. She formed the group to help teens come to terms with their status and spread the truth around living with the disease. CARE provides educational support and materials to groups like Irene’s; the video we watch and discuss was produced by Local Links. There are lots of questions, a lot of confusion remains around a disease that is so prevalent.

Our last visit of the day is to a Group Savings and Loan program. The women share their successes, their challenges. A total of seven million Kenyan shillings (approximately $87,000 USD) have been saved since the program in Kibera started in 2004. Three groups have grown to more than 400 groups, each including up to 12 women. The women own hair salons, grocery stands. They are proud of the independence; their income has earned the respect of their husbands, their neighbors. Their lives are still difficult, some days are a struggle. But they can afford to feed their families, and this is in and of itself an accomplishment in Kibera.

My time in Kenya has come to an end. I am leaving Africa with a different perspective than the one with which I arrived. I feel blessed and humbled to have had this experience and am so indebted to my many CARE colleagues both in the US and in Kenya for encouraging this experience. I have seen the challenges that we face, and I have seen the solutions that CARE is providing. My trip may be ending but my journey is just beginning. And to my kindred country, for welcoming me so graciously and showing me all your beauty and heartache, I say “Asante Sana!”

At this point in my visit, exactly a week in, I’m starting to think that Kenya is sitting on a gold mine. Not literally; I know conflict over natural resources is a consistent issue for the continent. I’m talking about another type of untapped wealth. Kenya has some of the most talented people I’ve ever met.

When I attended the CARE National Conference back in May, still just a hopeful CARE employee (in May I was still interviewing, I landed my dream job in June, in November I’m writing you from Kenya), I was struck by something Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said during her keynote speech: “Talent is universal. Opportunity is not.”  Something about being in Nairobi makes this statement turn on repeat in my head.

At our debriefing a few days before, along with Peninah, I meet Priest. When Auma talks about the successes of partnership within in the Sports for Social Change Network, she talks about Priest. He is, by all ways and means, the SSCN Poster Child.

Born and raised in Korogocho, a slum in Nairobi, Priest discovered boxing after being bullied by his school mates. But instead of talking about his ability to knock out his opponents, Priest focuses on the things boxing has given him you can’t see in his sprite, muscular frame. His inner strength. His confidence. His ability to walk away.

Box Girls started when, while at a boxing match, he overheard some girls behind him say they wish they could box. He turned around and told them they could. They showed up a few days later and asked Priest to train them. They wanted to be able to defend themselves in the dangerous neighborhoods and slums they called home.

What started with a few girls has turned into a few hundred. Three of Priest’s girls have gone on to represent Kenya in the Olympics. One girl, Liz, is captain of the national team. But what started as a means of self defense has evolved into a means of empowerment. The Box Girls are physically strong, even the young ones have wiry muscles, but much of their strength is of the internal type. Boxing has given them the confidence and self esteem to want more for themselves and their lives. Each practice session, like Safe Spaces, includes life skills messaging where the girls talk about important and challenging issues. And there are many of them.

When I first meet the Box Girls, they (as all Kenyans seem to do) greet me with a song and a dance. They are smiling and happy and proud of their skills. In Korogocho, they are called champs. Boys and men alike peek into the windows of the practice room, crowding to see the girls that are boxers. Wishing they were one of them. It is obviously another CARE success story. Using community leaders to create change. But later that afternoon I see firsthand why a Box Girl’s smile is such a transformation. Why CARE’s partnership with Box Girls and Priest is such a success. I visit the place where many Box Girls come from. It’s the Nairobi landfill.

By the time a girl joins the Box Girls, Priest has made sure she is no longer living in what they call “the dump.” But many of them started there. During our debrief with CARE staff, after a few references, I interrupted Priest to ask, “What do you mean, the dump?” He told me, “A dump. Like a garbage dump.” Even when he told me that, there was something in me that felt like he was making it up. It couldn’t be that bad. Even in a country that struggles with poverty as much as Kenya, I was positive no one could actually live in a garbage dump. What kind of place would let that happen? Live in a dump, eat from a dump? I wasn’t sure if it was the time change or what, but sometimes during my conversations with people I became convinced that this was all a big movie. That some crazy director decided to write a horror film about poverty and so he made up a big scene about living in a landfill. I was positive it couldn’t be that bad.

It was worse.

Hamilton is a young, friendly guy. He’s incredibly articulate and smart. I would have never guessed that he grew up in a landfill. When he was a kid, he ate there, occasionally finding pieces of scrap metal to sell. When leaving the area, you can see stalls selling various scavenged item. One stall sold dirty, used underwear, obviously pulled from the garbage. Hamilton was needed to show us around, to point out to us where the Box Girls came from. Like many of the slums in Nairobi, political tensions are real, and if you go without an insider, you can face real danger. We didn’t even actually go to the dump, just stood on the edge. The glimpse I got was enough to turn my stomach.

Like Priest and Peninah, Hamilton got out. And then turned right back around. He’s now working at the Korogocho dump, encouraging kids through his soccer program. He’s a partner with the Sports for Social Change network. His program has been such a success that he actually took Kenya to the Homeless World Cup with some of the adults from his area as coach. They came in fifth place out of 48 teams. They were the top team in Africa. Seeing the glint in his eyes as he shares his story, his passion is tangible. He cares for these kids more than anything. He just wants them to have a chance at opportunity. A chance for something more.

While Priest and Auma are talking with the journalist, my role becomes crowd control. The dump kids start to swarm the cameras, fascinated by foreigners. So that the interview goes smoothly, I distract them back to me, taking their picture, showing them their faces. Their shy demeanors are immediately dropped and I am in the middle of a massive embrace. One little girl wearing a dirty Barbie t-shirt wraps her tiny arms around my legs and doesn’t let go for nearly an hour. These are the children Hamilton works with. Part of me is heartbroken; one kid is knawing on a computer chip he found on the ground. They are playing in garbage. They are barefeet and filthy.  I will later develop a nasty cold after spending hours hugging them and wiping their faces. They are walking germ factories. But the other part of me is filled with joy. They are beautiful; such typical kids. Crowding me to get my attention. Laughing and prodding and poking each other. They could be from anywhere. They are smart and bright and smiling. I am blessed to meet them. I feel light inside, like they are emitting some sort of physical joy that is transferred to me. I am crouched down so I am at their height. When my knees start to cramp and I stand to shake out the knots in my legs, I’m brought back. I’m standing in the midst of a garbage pile. And these children call it their home.

The images that I see today will remain with me forever. How is this okay? “Talent is universal. Opportunity is not.” I am convinced more than ever that the work that CARE is doing, investing in people like Priest and Hamilton, investing in organizations like Box Girls and Safe Spaces, is critical. Kenya is jam packed with talent, with bright, smart girls and boys that could be on the path to careers as astrophysicists, teachers, world class athletes. What they lack is the opportunity. CARE is giving them that.

I will not forget these faces. I will not forget their stories. I know even more now than ever how critical the work and people of CARE are. And I will tell others.

I go home, covered in dirt, in a smell that won’t wash off. Today is a day that I will look back and say, “That is the day I was changed forever.”

I wake up my second day in Kisumu, feeling slightly like time and space have become somehow irrelevant. I’m seven hours ahead of everyone I know and love (soon to be eight due to Daylight Savings), sleeping under a mosquito net and feeling the creepy crawly tug of jetlag grabbing at my heels. And as I soon find out, Kenyans have their own sense of time and space all together. A 10-minute drive takes 45, an 8 am pickup means give or take an hour, a mile could actually be five. You get what I mean. It’s all extremely well intentioned however, and actually fits perfectly in with their “Hakuna Matata” attitude, so I quickly adjust, accepting that Kenya works on its own operating system.

Our first stop is an hour drive outside the city. We pass the equator along the way, oddly enough sponsored by the local Lions club. Everything in Kenya is branded. Coca Cola, Bic, Safaricom. I see it on security gates, cars, housing complexes in the city, tin stalls in the rural areas.  In so many ways, it seems everything is for sale.

We pull up to the Malanga Health Center and are greeted by the two nurses that manage the center, Paul Malawa and Alice Nangumba. There is a sense of pride with which they show me their modest facilities, describing in detail the purpose of each room. What interests me the most is the way they compare and contrast everything as before CARE and after CARE. And it’s not in a “Somebody’s-here-from-CARE-we-should-talk-them-up-type-of-way.” Like their sense of time (or lack thereof), Kenyans also are known for their frankness.

The results are tangible. Mosquito nets for the maternity recovery ward. Medical equipment that helps the staff determine PMTCT risks (prevention of mother to child transmission). Clean water systems to replace the rusted tank that sits in the front yard, the previous source of water. New maternal delivery beds (previously mothers had to give birth on wooden benches). Even chairs for patients and a clock for the nurses to determine the timing between contractions. CARE’s contributions seem to be everywhere.

But the thing that I hear again and again, is what CARE has given that can’t be seen. CARE has built capacity. Capacity is one of those words, that as a member of the communications team, we try not to use. Media view it as to “wonky,” the public gets confused by it. But the truth is whatever you call it, capacity building is what we do. And it’s what we do best. We’re not handing out fish; we’re teaching people how to fish. Capacity building is the entire approach behind CARE’s work:  educating and investing in the community leaders and practitioners that are on the ground really making the changes. It’s strengthening competencies so that Paul and Alice can be more effective in their work. It’s job training, education, utilizing community networks and resources. And it’s serving as a true partner to the Malanga Health Center. “There has been no particular NGO that has been around consistently in this facility,” Alice told me. “It’s only CARE.”

We walk over to the Comprehensive Care Unit. We pass a rusted bicycle, aka the old emergency obstetrics transport vehicle.  Easel paper covers the walls remind clients of the pillars of safe motherhood, the top ten diseases. We pass a chalkboard that serves as the mortality record. In June of this year, there were 2 births and 8 deaths, two of which were under five.

The Care Unit is packed with visitors. Noah, the only paid counselor on staff, says he sometimes sees up to 50 clients a day, usually on the days the Anti-Retroviral Therapy medicines arrive. Trained volunteers known as peer educators spend much of their day helping other clients. As clients themselves, they are too well aware of the health challenges that face their community. Paul tells me about how common “deserters” are. Deserters are clients that find out their status and then disappear; the stigma of having HIV is too high. Peer educators track them down, trying their best to convince them that taking their medicine is best for both their own health as well as preventing the spread of the disease to their partners. Sometimes they succeed. Sometimes they don’t. It’s a tough conversation to have. I will learn at my next stop how CARE is using some exceptionally creative ways to approach such a challenging subject.

Our next stop is just a few miles down the road. It’s a program I’ve wanted to see for some time. Kenyans are a people meant for performance. It’s not uncommon to hear singing while walking down the streets; meetings are often started with a dance and a song. So it only makes sense that when talking about some of these more complicated issues—family planning, domestic violence—Kenyans would choose to express themselves through drama. The Participatory Education Theater group uses an interactive style of theatre to engage its audiences in critical discussions. And it seems to be working.

A group of 40 or 50 people has gathered at the local Chief’s homestead, waiting for the performance to begin. Men, women and children alike are sitting in the grass, laughing with their neighbors, catching up since they’ve last met. Several of the women are members of the House of Nannies, a CARE group that supports caretakers of HIV/AIDS orphans. One such caretaker walks over with a curious boy named Obama. There are lots of Obamas here. And lots of Clintons, Rhoda of CARE Siaya tells me. Kenyans tend to name their children after important visitors. If I’m lucky and I meet a woman who gives birth in the next week or so, there may be a “Niki” running around too.

After awhile the performance begins. It’s all in Kiswahili so CARE staff lean over occasionally to translate. The first performance is on balancing religious beliefs and family planning. A mother approaches her husband with her very sick child. She wants to go to the hospital. The father refuses, saying they will pray. The child later dies and a fight ensues. During the course of the performance, the audience jumps in with suggestions, both men and women expressing their views on what the parents should do. A deeply religious people, Kenyans often have a hard time reconciling where prayer needs to be accompanied with medical interventions. Performances like these allow the community to discuss and accept that such interventions don’t have to go against their religious beliefs. 

After the performance, a CARE staffer facilitates a discussion. Some of the opinions expressed are long-held, deep-rooted. It’s amazing to be able to witness such frank dialogue between men and women. Other performances address the rights of children and birth spacing. The dialogue goes on and on. Auscar, who facilitates several of the discussions, tells me they have to cut off the dialogue at some point. They could sit and discuss these issues for hours. People are truly engaged. I may not speak Kiswahili, but the animated hand gestures, the facial expressions and the back and forth conversations are proof enough for me. This is a forum for conversation that is working.

It starts to rain and five or six of us crowd in the CARE truck for a debrief. Kenyans love the debrief. How do you feel? What did you think? What could we have done better? They are innately curious and we spend an hour or so discussing a range of topics. They are open and honest and I finally get to ask some of the questions that are still lingering from my car ride with Refa. And they ask me questions back. It’s an intimate exchange and I feel like I have learned immensely in my short time with them.

As Refa prepares to drive me to the airport, Rhoda pulls out a small gift from the Siaya office. It’s a beautiful traditional wrap that Kenyan women wear. Along with the CARE logo, it reads the slogan of the Village Savings and Loans Group, “Grow Together.”  I am deeply touched and give each of my new friends a sincere and heartfelt hug. I have experienced so much, and my trip has just begun. I can’t wait to see what else awaits me.