Regarding America

GO Threads - Building Businesses To Care for Orphans

By Daniel Hamon

Mike and Beth Fox founded the Global Orphan Project in 2003 to help care for the neediest orphans and vulnerable children in some of the poorest areas of the world, "children of last resort with no viable means of care."

GO Threads is their new sustainability initiative with sewing centers that create local jobs, produce school uniforms and help sustain orphan care, starting with four locations in Uganda and Haiti.

In a recent letter, Mike explains how Go Threads came about:

When I started traveling to meet with our local partners several years ago, one seemingly small thing became a thorn in my side.  School uniforms.  I’d see these places of abject poverty, with orphaned children, abandoned children, and just plain poor children in the community naked or in filthy rags, sitting in the dirt, and then another group of children decked out in brightly colored, sharp uniforms bounding off to school.   Even in situations where schools were “free” (government or privately funded schools), I saw the dividing line.

That frustrated me.  I saw what I thought was injustice.  I wanted schools to do away with the school uniform requirement.  Our local partners insisted that we stop demanding and start listening. 

Schools – even overcrowded, underfunded government schools – and the bright outfits of its students bring lift.  Dignity.  Possibility.  Amidst smothering hopelessness, slipping a sharp uniform on to a hurting child lifts that child’s countenance to want to learn.  To those children, something as simple as a school uniform means, “I am somebody.”

We listened.  We learned.  And we started funding some school uniforms for our children in care.  We quickly found this lift our partners spoke of proved to be very real.  If you’ve traveled to visit our children around the world, you’ve seen it.  We were particularly struck by one little girl in Kabale, Uganda.  When she came into care, and felt secure enough to openly talk to her caregivers, one of our local leaders asked her to describe her feelings.  She could have said anything.  “I can’t believe I have a home.”  “I can’t believe I have food to eat everyday.”  “I can’t believe that I have a momma here who shows me love.”  Anything.  She said none of these.  Here’s what she said:  “I never thought I’d go to school looking so ‘smart’ like other children.”

Please visit GO Threads to learn more about this initiative, including their Team Challenge that just started on September 1st and will run through December 31st.

 

 

 

 

 

The Americans Will Adopt Anyone

By Daniel Hamon

"Doesn't anyone ever want to adopt an older child?" she asked one day as a Spanish agency rep loaded twin baby boys into his back seat. For these scenes were becoming unbearable, the older children feeling more unwanted with every glorious departure of a baby.

At the beginning, the older children had run to comb their hair and change their shirts when visitors came, hoping that a last-minute excellent impression would make a difference.

"No," said the agency rep. "People want babies. Sometimes toddlers, but mostly babies and, most of all, baby girls."

Taking our Chances in America

By Daniel Hamon

In a recent article, Scott Simon expressed his gratitude for the adoption of his daughters from China. He is forever indebted to China for his daughters, but is keenly aware of the fear Chinese mothers face due to government policies that lead to the abandonment and/or otherwise bleak fate of many baby girls in that country.

Had Simon's daughters grown up in China they may have faced discrimination if they belonged to any of China's ethnic minorities. Likewise, Ethiopian and Kenyan minority ethnic children face discrimination growing up in their countries.

Art for Orphans: Isabelle's Global Orphan Project

By Daniel Hamon

Isabelle Redford became so concerned about the plight of orphaned children in Haiti that she decided to find a way to help. Since she has always loved to draw, she started drawing and selling gift cards to raise money to help care for orphans.  Through her efforts, Isabelle raised $10,000 that funded an orphanage in Haiti and will soon fund another one in Malawi. Isabelle is only 7-years old but says she wants to keep doing this for a "very long time, maybe forever."

Maj. Scott Southworth Adopts Disabled Iraqi Orphan

By Daniel Hamon

While deployed in Iraq in 2003, then Captain Southworth met Ala'a, a 9 year old boy who had cerebral palsy. The police had found him abandoned on a street in Baghdad six years earlier. Southworth and Ala'a met at an orphanage run by the Mother Theresa organization.

Southworth was part of the Wisconsin National Guard's 32nd Military Police Company, a unit responsible for professionalizing the Baghdad Police in northeastern Baghdad. They also visited the Mother Theresa orphanage regularly during the following 10 months. During this time, Southworth and Ala’a grew close.

PEPFAR Saves Millions of Lives in Africa

By Daniel Hamon

Earlier this year I visited an HIV/AIDS orphanage in Africa. In the midst of tremendous difficulty, the children were happy to wave and smile to a stranger - their young spirits were full of life. As part of the visit, a worker showed me the orphanage's well-stocked medicine cabinet.

All I have heard about medicines to treat HIV/AIDS is that they are expensive and hard to obtain. When I asked how difficult it was to get these medicines, the answer was not what I expected: "Not difficult at all. Whenever we run out, we tell the local hospital and they send more. It is all because of the Bush Grant".

What she referred to as the "Bush Grant" is the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR. It was set in motion during the 2003 State of the Union Address when President George W. Bush proposed the following: