At long last Husna has her new leg! Many thanks to Ken Place for funding this.  So many other people have helped Husna recently. Thank you to volunteer Katie McCarthy for adjusting Husna’s spine and Luke Glaude for helping to get the first leg remade correctly. Thank to  Jo Place to researching sources for colostomy bags and finding Osteomates. Thanks to Ashley Washburn and Andy and  for getting the bags here. Thanks to Ken Russo and Jonathan Santi, Tanner Pulsifer for connecting us to the Stealth Belt. Next month Husna will receive a new belt to help keep her bags in place so she never has to miss school again.

If you’ve been to Baobab in the last three years then you already know and love George Zakaria. He manages the health of our HIV+ kids, counsels outreach clients, farms and does  about a dozen other odd jobs.   He is Terri’s right hand and always knows where her phone, and often her mind, are when she doesn’t. He’s empathic and wise and the kids adore him. George has lived with HIV for 13 years and has thrived despite so many obstacles. He recently celebrated one year sober, which was a joyful day for all of us.   Recently a friend of his, Melissa Byers of Canada, assisted by a different friend, Caroline Larsen of Denmark, did something amazing. They donated $2000 (1500/500) to build George’s parents and his orphaned nephews a house. For several years George’s parents have been squatting on the property of a pretty mean woman. One night about two years ago George told me his life story until the wee hours of the morning, clearing up lots of lies and secrets he had told to protect himself.  I have held it close to my heart since then, sharing bits and pieces with people, but it’s a story that deserves a fair telling.  For fans of Joseph Campbell, it’s a true hero’s journey. But this essay focuses less on George and more on his family and how it came to pass that they were so desperately in need of help. Thank you Melissa. Thank you Caroline.  You’ve helped a family in an extraordinary way, by giving them what most of us take for granted, a roof over their heads.

1980 Portrait of a happy family in the Nyaturu tribe.  George’s father Zakaria  was a relatively wealthy man. He had four wives and 8 kids. Each wife lived in her own dirt house on his compound and they helped each other. Cows are central to Nyaturu existence and he had many, which meant prestige. In 1983 just after George’s sister Neema was born his mother Magdalena, lay dying of an unknown stomach problem. George’s father assessed his wealth and decided that he should take her to a doctor rather than a traditional healer. It turned out that she required a colostomy. The operation cost a lot of money, so cows were sold. They had no money for colostomy bags and to this day she uses rags to protect her stoma.  In 1984 she became pregnant with her seventh child. She was told that she couldn’t deliver normally so she was flown to a hospital a few hundred miles away and George was born by C section, named after the white doctor who performed this miracle, the same one who had led the stomach surgery. C sections were a rarity in Tanzania then so this had to have cost a LOT of cows. George was her first son, her last born.

1994  Magdalena was shunned by her co- wives because of her health condition and the toll it had taken on their social standing. Zakaria’s wealth was disappearing. He was drinking and resentful. George sided with his mother, but her desperate situation upset him so he ran away a lot and lived on the street. George’s sister Miriam was 19 years old with two children and no arms because they’d been burned off when she’d fallen into a fire during an epileptic seizure.  She had stayed in the hospital for months healing. Five years prior she had graduated at the top of her 7^th grade class and earned a full scholarship to prestigious high school, but couldn’t take the position she’d been offered because she had been impregnated by her seventh grade teacher.  Then, Magdalena lost her third child. She was overcome by grief. A month later she decided that she had to escape the curse that was chasing her and one night,  when George came back after a few weeks on the street, she took her armless daughter, the two kids, and George and just began walking. She had no idea where she was going. She carried her 4 year old grandson on her back and George and Miriam took turns holding the baby. They walked until they dropped about 150 km later in a town called Igunga. They lived in a field for weeks until they got shelter from a pastor.

1996 Miriam was the breadwinner and life was pretty good. She was the town’s most famous beggar and definitely the smartest. She wouldn’t let anyone mistreat her. She challenged anyone who mocked her and proved her intelligence by writing with a pen held in her mouth. Bus drivers gave her free rides to bigger towns so that she could make more money.   She saved 50,000 shillings (less than $50 in today’s money, a fortune then) which bought a small plot and a mud house. They bought a cow and a plow. Magdalena farmed and sold donuts. Neighbors who had no money paid her in rice.  She did very well for herself but her son was lost to her. George was on the street, smoking pot and drinking, coming home only occasionally. He spent a lot of time at a shelter several hours away where one of the teachers saw his potential and took him under her wing.  One day the teacher brought him home to see his family. Miriam was overjoyed. Her brother was back, and he lovingly fed her again and helped wash her face and her feet. She begged him to stay but Magdalena knew that this was George’s only chance at and education and she urged him to go back with the teacher.

1999 George completed the fourth grade. He was 14 years old. He missed his family terribly as he had no word from them for over two years. He went home to find that Miriam had died during another seizure.  Magdalena was left with the two young boys and George’s sister Neema had come to help. George decided to quit school and stayed home for about a year to help farm.  Before George had arrived home, Magdalena found a woman curled up in the street, emaciated. She had been kicked out by her parents and left to die on the street. Magdalena carried her home on her back and fed her. She nursed her back to health but never told her family that the woman was HIV+ for fear of stigma. By the time George came back from the shelter, the woman looked reasonably healthy and George slept with her. A few months later the woman died and people began talking. George got sick and didn’t respond to any medicine so a nurse urged his mother to get him tested. George didn’t really understand what HIV was or the implications, but his mother did and she was wrecked. She had just lost her fourth child and believed that she was responsible for the imminent death of the fifth.  In those days there were no drugs and HIV was a death sentence. She was scared each time he got sick. He hated the pressure and he was mad at her for not being open about the woman’s status, so he left.

2000 George hit the streets again. People liked him so he got lucky breaks and stayed with people for months at a time, but he was restless and moved from town to town chasing odd jobs.  Meanwhile, unbeknownst to George, his father Zakaria went to Igunga to visit his long lost wife. He still had 20 cows and some land, but he sold it all to go to live with Magdalena. He converted to Christianity and stopped drinking. They lived there for two years together with the boys and then the rains had stopped. There was no food. There were no jobs so they had to sell their farm and in 2003 moved to Arusha. Zakaria knew people from his days selling cows. He got a job as a security guard. It enabled them to rent a room for a few dollars a month and get by for a year or two.

2005  After many twists and turns that belong in a different essay, George wound up in Bagamoyo at a different street boy shelter and was trying to finish primary school at age 20. He fell in love with a girl, but had a deadly secret and knew that he couldn’t hurt her. Just before he was set to graduate the shelter was shut down and the boys scattered in different directions.  A representative from the shelter contacted me, Terri, and urged me to find a young boy named George, HIV+ in need of medication. I dispatched the Baobab boys to go look for their friend, but he was nowhere to be found.

2008 Pascal shows up at the Baobab Home with George…….several years after he was sent to find him! At this time Steve and Mdoe, young HIV+ brothers were living at Baobab.  George was a brilliant big brother. He was helpful with Steve and Mdoe but it was hard on him emotionally because he hadn’t grappled with his own demons yet.  I got mad at him for a lie that Steven told and George got fed up. He stole money and ran away, first to Singida where he learned his father and mother are now reunited.  His mother had assumed that he had died. George found his parents in dire straits, squatting on the property of a woman who mistreated them. George’s mother was going to the dump every day to see what she could salvage. Zakaria was too old to keep a job as a security guard. He was raised to herd cows and city life was not easy for him. Magdalena and Zakaria are talented singers though so they sing in their church and people give them money. George’s learned that his nephews were being sponsored by a pastor in the area an doing well.  I sent someone to find George and bring him back. He had wronged us, but I had not lost faith in him by any means. He paid his debt to Baobab and continued to work. He drank to drown out thoughts of his family’s condition but he did his job well.

Late 2010 George quit smoking pot and was happy and a little more focused. He still had drinking binges that were self destructive. I helped buy his family a plot of land in March 2011 but just after, George smoked again and hit bottom because he was so disappointed in himself. Thanks to some amazing timing I got him into a 12 step sober house in Zanzibar where he stayed 3 months and completely overhauled his life. His sobriety now means everything to him and he has helped several others overcome their addictions. He is a brilliant counselor.

March 2012 Melissa Byers sent $1500 to build Magdalena and Zakaria their very own house. Caroline Larsen covered the rest. George was scared at first, but he headed to Arusha and handled the building management beautifully and frugally. The design is for three rooms. We only had the money to build two and put a roof on one room, but it’s enough for now. He got them a toilet dug and they are on their own. No more cruel treatment from the landowner where they squatted.  When I spoke to George’s mother she was so shrill with excitement I couldn’t even understand her. She said Haleluya a lot.  One day the third room will be small shop so that they can have an income and not live off handouts at their church.  George’s nephews Amani and Ibra, the children of his deceased sister Miriam, are thriving. They are in high school with terrific grades and they play music. Ibra is an artist.

Thanks for reading this far. There are so many people out there with circumstances like this and it’s been an honor to get this story told, and to be a part of such a life changing project. Melissa and Carolina, thank you for what you did. You’ve changed lives and alleviated the suffering of an entire family.

If you’ve got lots of money you can have cocoa powder sent to the farm by motorcycle and you can make the brownies that you really want, but if you don’t, it’s the banana cake that everyone else loves. Preparation is key. The day before you bake, you have to entice the fruit seller into giving you his rotten bananas (they work best) by telling him you’ll give him a piece of cake. This should work because how many fruit sellers can say that they have a mzungu making them cake?  The next morning after coffee, you save a little of the fresh cow’s milk.  Hide it in a good spot so nobody scams it.

When you’re ready to start, check your egg, banana and crowd size. There are no Grade A Jumbo eggs here so you have to guesstimate how your scrawny Tanzanian chickens eggs compare to what those hormone fed beasts back home can produce.  Likewise, Tanzanian bananas pack a flavorful punch, but in about half the size. Increase numbers accordingly.  As for how much to make, a single cake is NEVER enough at Baobab.  The question is do you double, triple or quadruple the recipe? Whatever you do, write it out. If you double your flour and triple your eggs, you’re sunk.

Assemble your labor. Put two kids on the sugar/shortening. Two others can do the banana/egg mix, and two can do dry ingredients. You are command central, setting everyone up for success and making sure measuring cups are level and eggshells don’t get into the mix.  Send one kid to pick a lime to make the sour milk. If its nap time and you only have big kids, you will gain efficiency but lose some of the thrill of it all.   Whatever you do, don’t let them pour the batter in, that’s gotta be you. If you go too thin, you’ll burn, too thick and you get a burnt bottom and a mushy top.

Fire. The best time to make a cake is late in the afternoon when the evening rice is almost finished getting a light brown crusty layer on top and the coals are glowing red. This saves you the money and hassle of starting your own fire. Why let good hot coals go to waste? Make a cake! Just sift through the ashes with a metal slotted spoon to find the perfect gems and start putting them in the clay oven. Preheat? What’s that? Break up your coals so they are an even size. That way your cake pan, or whatever vessel you are using, rests nicely on them. The last thing you want is a sloping cake.  Put a cookie sheet on top and more coals on that so it cooks evenly. Fashion a door for the mouth of the oven out of something flat and prop it up with the aforementioned slotted spoon. Do not even look at the time, as that could lead to overconfidence. Watch your cake like a new mom watches her baby sleep. Is it too hot on the bottom? Is the top getting cooked? Keep your tongs handy for coal rearrangement when needed. Smells go up the chimney so if you smell anything burning, the game is already over. By the time you get to batch number three your coals will be very tired out. You may have to go for the ‘Tanzanian microwave’ at this point. Spark up the gas stove and put some coals right in the flames. Take them out with your trusty tongs, blow on them to get them going and then add them on top or bottom as needed. Do the fork test. Done.

It should be about dinner time. Perfect. If it’s not somebody’s birthday, the kids will pretend it is anyway and will feed each other cake like everybody is a bride and groom.  That’s just the way we do it in Tanzania.

Greetings from high above the Baobab Shamba! I write from the room above the kitchen (designed by Elke Cole) which also happens to be the best place to get our tempramental brand of internet connectivity. I just posted a panoramic photo taken from the door. In the distance you can see our new school, The Steven Tito Academy. Stay tuned for more detail but here are some descriptive words of what’s to come Small (70 kids or so). Garden/Agriculture focused. Targeted toward bright, but poor children. The typical government school classroom has about 100 kids and children are caned regularly. We want to find some diamonds in that rough situation and give them a much better chance at a bright future.

Biogas! After many years of me rambling on about biogas, the day is almost here! Here’s an early shot of the 50 cubic meter biogas digester. It’s much further along now, as is the cow shed. The amazing news???? We will be able to use septic waste from the toilet to fuel the system as well. What’s not to love about completely effortless composting?

The close up panoramic shot is of the ‘front yard’ of the baobab living area. The planter/bench around the guava tree was built by a team of high school students from the John Marsden school in Australia and decorated with mosaics by the fabulous Whitworth team from Spokane Washington. After a bad start this season, the guava tree is now supplying us with and abundance of delicious guava. Karibu!

See those smiling faces? Those are several of the Baobab kids with their new computer donated by Matt Puccini and his daughters, Sophia and Caroline. Sophia and Caroline and their friends did ‘good deeds’ at home and in their community and Matt did his own massive good deed………..loading up a new laptop with hours upon hours of educational video, books read aloud, games and lessons from Khan University. Asante Sana Matt!!!

We had just arrived in Bagamoyo the night before, after traveling for 36 hours from the United States.  We were on a trip sponsored by Hendrix College, during which Maxine and I would photograph and interview, respectively, as many rural women as we could with Terri’s help.  The students were with us to learn about doing this type of work and to pursue their own related projects.  Terri offered to walk us around Bagamoyo that first afternoon.  Though jet lagged, we were eager to see the town.  None of us had ever visited Tanzania before and it all felt strange and new.

We started walking at 4:00 in the afternoon.  Many people were out in the streets, as were chickens and goats.  The people called out greetings to us as we walked and we were all conscious of being such obvious outsiders with our pale skin and awkward Kiswahili replies.  Terri was stopped several times and exchanged greetings with people she knew, including former street boys now living in town.  It was clear that she did not suffer from precisely the same outsider status that we held.  She was also interrupted from her tour guide duties by the phone.

That phone rang and rang.  The babies were sick at the farm.  Her kids were sick.  Test results were awaited and discussed.  Where was the medicine?  How would we get to the interviews in Kiwangwa?  Did someone need to go back to the hospital?  Could George pick up the medicine for Mrisho? Kiswahili and English, more Kiswahili peppered with medical terms, flew from her lips.  Between calls, Terri laughed and smiled and pointed out landmarks and identified plants and trees.  Bits of her conversations began to paint a picture of her life, and the reach she had in her community.  Her very central place in the lives of so many made the pace of our walk through town comfortable for, say, a very sick turtle.

Suddenly, she said, “Oh, I’m going to have to talk to this one for a while.”  We saw the man she had identified walking enthusiastically our way.  Strangely, at that moment Terri’s sandal broke, the thong pulling away from the sole, and rain began to fall.  We hurried under the awning of a building where the man had been standing.  In less than a minute, he had Terri’s shoe in his hand and was running down the street with it.

As we struggled to process what had just happened, the rain started to come down in earnest.  We were stuck there, one of us shoeless, all of us without raincoats or umbrellas, and Terri began to explain.  That was Muba’s father, the boy who had needed facial surgery.  Another group from Hendrix College five years before had taken his picture.  Terri had sent it to a group, Facing the World, who had agreed to help.  For two long years, Terri struggled to get visas and permissions, medical records and test results, and funding.  Officials in the U.K. had lost the paperwork twice.  Complications in Tanzania arose.  Finally, though, Muba got his surgery.  That was why, with barely a word spoken, Terri would have her shoe fixed in minutes.  That was why she would always need to stop to talk with this family.

Every time Terri told me about a success story, someone she was able to help, I thought of this man.  Helping one person in Bagamoyo has a tremendous ripple effect.  You don’t help a person, you help a family, a neighborhood, a community.  Those many phone calls were laying the groundwork for the next success story.  Failures, too, surely, but moving undeniably in the right direction.

As Terri told us this “happy” story, tears rolled down her face several times as she recalled the frustrations of that process.  His surgery was in 2009, but it was still fresh enough to hurt.  Terri sees so much suffering, but she isn’t hardened to it.  It is fresh every time.  She pushes and fights so people will suffer a little less.  She knows about the high price and likelihood of failure, but it doesn’t keep her from trying.

Whenever we went anywhere with Terri, we were reminded of her impact.  The phone continued to ring, sms messages from the U.S. beeped, people came to find her.  She never walked anywhere quickly, but she was always moving forward.

Husna's outgrown her artificial leg and now walks with a limp

Husna is a girl of 11 who lives in Dar es Salaam. She was born with no anus and a leg that had to be amputated. Her mother can’t afford the colostomy bags that she requires. Also Husna has outgrown her leg and a new one costs a minimum of $200, probably closer to 3. If anyone knows of a medical supplier that might be able to donate the bags the details are “two piece drainable pouch, small, transparent/overlap Cut to fit 13-32 mm.” Thank you! The photo was taken on Christmas eve. Baobab took Husna out for a memorable Christmas. She even got to meet ’santa” in the city!

In March, two of our older guys- former street boys-now young men who work for us, each reached a breaking point.  Drinking had begun to do damage to their lives. Where did our responsibility to these guys end? We had loved them for years, but they were grown men now.  We struggled as a family with it. I talked to the other former street boys and then  I took them each by the ear to Dar es Salaam and introduced them to AA and ultimatums. Within 24 hours they were each in a “sober house” in Zanzibar learning “the program”.  We were all a little scared that first day. The houses are stark, with only plastic chairs and a lot of men in various states of heroin detox. Food was basic at best. This was no Betty Ford. A month later I went to visit them and found their Swahili now peppered by 12 step phrases in English. They had made some deep friendships and were genuinely happy. They said that they had entered the house to please me, but they were staying for themselves. I could already see incredible changes in both of them.  Now, 5 months later, seeing these guys, not just ‘get ahead a bit’ but dig up their lives from the roots and replant has been one of the most extraordinary privileges I’ve had here, and I’ve had so very many.  The ripple effects on the whole Baobab family have been extraordinary. They lead our morning feelings/workshift meeting and they attend weekly AA meetings. In our small town nobody had ever heard of AA before so this is revolutionary and they are sharing their success with friends. They are committed at a totally new level to life on the Baobab farm. They are truly invested in our family life and it shows.

In July we had several volunteers. I was concerned that one of them did not have enough to do. I went to my dear friend Halima, age 63, pos, grandmother to half the town, former gun runner during the war with Uganda, tough as nails and soft as a pillow. I explained my problem. I was looking for a child in the community with a tough medical problem who would likely get better care if accompanied by a mzungu who could probe the issue and get extra tests done. I said “who doya got?” She didn’t know of any kids right now but took me two doors down to see her neighbor, Maua. She’s a beautiful woman in her mid 50s who has been sitting at home for three years due to blindness. She explained to me that a doctor from the city had prescribed her some vitamins a few years ago that seemed to increase her ability to see light, but that was it. Could we get more vitamins for her? I was not hopeful. I knew it wouldn’t be much money to take her but I worried that we were giving a woman hope where there was none.  A few days later volunteer Melissa B from Canada took Maua in to the eye doctor right down the road. Cataracts. That was it. Really thick cataracts. Three years of solitude and resignation with no resources to probe the issue further.  Two weeks later, Mugin took Maua to have her first eye operated on. For about $100 of Melissa’s donation money, which included travel and food, Maua can see out of one eye. In a few weeks she’ll have the other eye done, also courtesy of Melissa.  Halima and I have been calling each other on the phone throughout the process high fiving each other.

There is no guidebook to this job and I know I make a lot of mistakes. I’m just so grateful when the universe gives me such clear signs. Thank you all so much for your support.

We found Martin’s Dad and the baby is now called Martin Joseph. He is thriving and happy and walking like a champ. His father likes his son’s name and loves his son. He’s done his best to visit and get to know Martin in the months since we introduced them. On October 28 we will pay bus fare for Martin and his father to travel back to their tribal home of Kigoma where Martin will be raised by his father and his father’s Aunt, a woman who lost her only son several years ago to a tragic accident.  Soon everyone will be where they are supposed to be and a new baby will join the Baobab family-maybe for awhile, maybe forever.  Good luck Martin and Baba Martin!! Thank you to the Martin family and all of our donors who enable us to really love and tend to each child in our care.

At long last here are the photos of our little herd. Thanks to Randy Michaelis for inspiring the purchase and to Marilyn Weiland and George and Susan Edmonds for contributing generously. We are the proud owners of 13 cows.  These cows are very eager (we asked them) to do what they do best (digest and produce waste) for a purpose and one day they will. Baobab will eventually cook all food for kids and staff using biogas and not waste even one more Tanzanian tree. We are slowly moving toward our vision to build a locally constructed biogas digester. If anyone would like to help our cows reach their full potential, you are welcome to donate or come visit and help us to build. It will cost about $4000

Thanks to volunteers Liana Woskie and Katie Balk though, The Baobab Home is now conducting research on the psychosocial needs of children living with HIV. We have finished the preliminary interview stage and this Saturday we will lead discussion groups with dozens of parents and caregivers about how best to expand our breakfast program to meet the growing psychosocial needs of positive kids. The good news is that fewer and fewer children are born positive each year, yet it happens. But for Mariamu and her many peers, born before drugs were available here, something must be done to help them to live the healthiest and happiest life possible.