Water Well Project Exceeds Expectations!
With great joy, 3 girls dormitories were finally completed last year. However, the nearby water source, a local creek, was drying up and only a little muddy water remained. The school badly needed a good water well. ZAF began fundraising for this desperate need. Finally, after funds were raised the drilling began. After several days of drilling, no water was found. Every foot deeper was costing more money. The drillers were asked to continue a little longer. After a few more feet only a small amount of water was appearing but the funds raised were almost gone. It was. not good enough The drillers were told to resume drilling and finally…success! Water gushed out of the ground in a mighty way at the rate of 30 liters per second - more than was hoped for! The water was piped over to the school and now provides clean, fresh, abundant water.
Relief for Displaced Families
Thousands of individuals and families have suffered losses of homes, farms, and the means to sustain themselves. ZAF worked with donors to help provide sacks of food, goats, and cattle with which to sustain themselves and their families.
Six trucks loaded with 110,000 pounds of corn flour and 110,000 pounds of beans made it to Sekota, and 2,400 refugees have enough food for four months.
Also, a herd of goats, 192 of them, bought to distribute among the families. Goats thrive in lowlands. We gave five female and one male goat to each of the 32 families. 14 of the 32 families are women with children. These women lost their husbands during the recent civil war. The other 18 have small children. Goat milk has calcium, iron, vitamins, and protein. Good for kids.
In addition, we bought oxen for 25 families to plow with.
Returning Sight to the Blind
The need for services to restore vision to people in rural Ethiopia is overwhelming. Several organizations, including ZAF, recently teamed up for a pilot project to address this need. The results are dramatically changed lives. A total of 32,903 patients were screened. Out of those, 5,823 patients were treated with medicine and 1,987 were refracted resulting in the distribution of 986 pairs of eyeglasses. 274 cataract surgeries and 86 trachoma surgeries were performed. In addition to giving eyesight back to the grandmother in these photos, the operation liberated her granddaughter who had functioned as her grandmother’s eyes for years. The girl will now be able to return to a more normal childhood. She hopes to be able to attend school now.
