A day full of love and cherished memories

Though I never met Reziki my heart still aches at the thought that he is no longer with us. Hearing everyone's kind words about him is so special as it means that his memory will still live on. I wish that I could have had the chance to know that beautiful little boy and to love him as he deserved to be loved.

Yesterday, on November the 29th, on the day that would have been Reziki's 1st birthday, my cousin gave birth to a beautiful little boy. A boy who will be loved and cared for more than words could describe- just as Reziki would be if he was still here.

So, even though little Reziki is no longer with us, I feel we should still celebrate the sweet boy that he was. Remember him fondly and use his memory as inspiration for us to work as hard as we can to ensure our children are safe and happy. From now on I will use November the 29th to celebrate the birthday of my gorgeous new baby cousin and to remember that beautiful boy who is no longer here.

We, at The Small Things, strive to ensure that our children are safe. We are working in the memory of our beautiful Reziki, a boy who fought so hard to stay alive.If you ever get the chance, then take a second to remember those we have lost, and to celebrate those we have around us. There is nothing more valuable in this world than your family. Whether it is the caring family my baby cousin has come in to, or the loving family that is Nkoaranga orphanage and The Small Things- they all share a love that cannot be measured.

So, even though I never knew you Reziki, please know that you still hold a special place in my heart, and I promise to love my new cousin as much as you are loved even though you are no longer with us.

Sleep peacefully little man.

Bittersweet milestones - three first birthdays

This is a happy and a sad week - it's been one year since three fantastic kids came into the world.

Vicky, November 26th

Filipo, November 28th

And today would have been Reziki's first birthday, November 29th. I can't do better than Amy's beautiful post about his short life, here. All I can say is that we love and miss you, and you are not forgotten.

As part of honoring his memory, we're doing everything we can to keep Peace, our newest little preemie, healthy and strong. As of this morning, he is 3.25 kilos - which means he's gained a half kilo in the last week, which is FANTASTIC news. We hope that our providing the funds to have one mama caring for him exclusively has helped, and we look forward to him being a happy, healthy member of the Nkoaranga family.

Thinking Small to Think Big

Unless you've managed to hide under a a rock for the last week (and if so, kudos to getting internet under your rock!), then you probably know that the world population hit 7 billion. That's some terrifying stuff, if you ask me - and I adore kids! But I think everyone can agree that there are some serious issues with exponentially increasing population growth, both in terms of our ability to care for the needy, and in terms of the earth's ultimate carrying capacity. At the end of the day, neither of these are unlimited - and if we want happy, healthy lives for the children who are being born, population growth is a serious concern. 

That said, population growth as an abstract concern will never, and should never, change the way we see living, breathing children. Every orphaned child, every child period, deserves to grow and thrive, and our mission and passion here at The Small Things continues to be to make that happen. 

Reziki - we will never stop 
missing you, little man. 

Still, there was a part of me that was worried about reconciling the two. I knew that the kids would always come first, that I would never be able to accept loss of an infant's life as anything other than an absolute evil, no matter how bad population issues got. I worried that that made me a hypocrite - a label I would have accepted a million times before shifting my position.

Then I stumbled across Hans Rosling's TED talks on population growth, and more importantly, this video in which he looks at the specific interactions between child mortality and family size. It's a very quick video but amazingly intuitive - and he talks about Tanzania specifically, which I always love to see!

Hans Rosling Breaks Down the Impact of Child Mortality on Population Growth  - and a slightly different, 10 minute version here - "Child survival is the new green"

As someone studying development, I've understood for a while that poverty alleviation can help to counteract population growth, in that as median income goes up, average family size tends to go down. I originally understood this primarily in terms of education, especially for women - higher education tends to lead people to delay having children until later, and choose to have fewer. Still, it took this video for me to really understand the effects that reducing child mortality specifically has on population growth. And now that I think of it that way, I feel stupid for never recognizing it before - the hallmark of a great piece of educational media! 

The truth is, I would have cheered as that blue dot plunged on the child mortality index, even if average family size had been shooting up. I know this about myself - I recognize that my feeling for individuals will always trump abstract principles, and I wouldn't have it any other way. But what a blessing, to know that sometimes you don't have to choose - that doing good on one axis can help create positive change on another. 

We all do the small things that we can, and the big picture will come together, with or without us seeing it. 

These smiles will never be anything but a blessing. 

Buying gifts for the holidays or donating to charity doesn't have to be a zero-sum game, either - through our partnership with Elemental Threads, an amazing design-your-own handcrafted handbag company, you can enter code "TheSmallThings" at checkout and have 25% of your purchase donated to the Nkoaranga kids. Please also consider making a gift to The Small Things in honor of your loved one - they'll receive a beautiful card letting them know that you were thinking of them. Thanks for reading and for caring about our kids! 

Why we do this: Remembering Reziki

Just a quick video reminder of why we do this. Project Maji, the chickens, garden, vitamins, and formula to keep them healthy, supporting the mamas to recognize their hard work and ensure that they can take care of their own families so that when they are at Nkoaranga orphanage they are THERE with the children 100%. Happy, healthy kids - that's all we want.

Ebenezer just turned eight months, happy and healthy despite serious trials, on August 8th - he came in on the same day as our little man Reziki, who sadly did not make it. That's the other half of why we do this. Because unsafe wash-water on a bottle might have made a difference. Because more staff might have made a difference. Because even if nothing would have made a difference, we have to and we will keep trying to make sure that every child who comes through our doors has as bright a future as we can give them. Reziki, we remember you and we do this for you.

Reziki and Ebenezer, early days (Thanks Amy for the photo)

Gone but not forgotten

The Emily Song and so forth

So the past week has been... full? Always busy at work, of course - especially with a new baby, Joyce, who made me realize how BIG our last "new baby" has gotten. Ebenezer seems to have doubled in size, comparatively, overnight - and thinking about how little he used to be of course makes me think of Reziki, who came in at the same time. Still, I'm able to mostly be thrilled with Ebenezer thriving and not be dragged down too much by the comparison. And Joyce is ridiculously gorgeous, just a beautiful, beautiful kid.

This is a PG-13 blog, I'm assuming you can handle the lack of a modesty patch

Bethan has fully moved in, and we've been tackling lots of little projects - got the chalkboards done for the mamas and for the school, etc. Her focus is going to be on trying to get a filtration system in for the water, I think - a really important but manageable sized project that will save a ton of money and time spent boiling water every day, or worse, not boiling it and having the kids either end up dehydrated or be given untreated water by mamas who don't feel like doing their jobs (pet peeve much?)

Bethan looks like a model in the front, the others are various other wonderful volunteers

The other girls from Bethan's group have started working almost every day, which is really nice - and the kids adore them and have started really bonding. My particular favorite manifestation of this is in the "Emily" song, as recited below by Simoni.

I'm a little offended there's no Bekka song, but I'll take him coming out of his shell. Totally worth it. Today in addition to the extra volunteers, a man came by who is looking into adopting from one of the local orphanages with his wife - both work at the Rwanda tribunal, I believe. They had the very disheartening experience of falling in love with twins at another orphanage, only to have the father refuse to give permission for adoption, despite his complete lack of contact for the last three years - oh wait, no, he visited TWICE, clearly a very involved parent. Anyway, their loss will be the gain for one (or more) lucky kids. It made me realize that as much as I want Z to be mine, I'd be happy as long as she was with a loving family - anyway, they're probably looking for a baby, so we'll see what happens. As you can probably tell, I'm a little attached. Thanks so much for the comment on the last post, Marie, it helped a lot to hear from someone else who has been in a similar position.

As for medical supplies, things are slowly but steadily trickling in. So far we have a microscope and a few computers, as well as a source for vitamins. It looks like we're going to have to make retail purchases for thermometers, and we may not be able to help at all with blood pressure cuffs, etc, unless someone steps forward. Financial donations, as always, would be a huge help and make a big difference for the kids. On a related note, the kids have an unhealthy obsession, I don't know why, with Bob the Builder - apparently he transcends all physical and political barriers. All they have is one DVD and it's stuck in French. Don't ask me. Anyway, if anyone has additional BTB DVDs or hard plastic toys, it would be greatly appreciated - and I'll send you video of the kids singing the BTB song, BONUS! It's truly adorable.

That's all for now - family, friends, are you still out there? I haven't heard from most of you in a while, pretend you care what's going on and send me a darn comment or an email.

Reflections on the halfway point, and thanks

So I'm halfway through, and I don't actually have any idea how I feel about that. There are days (see "Wishing for a Snowman") when I'd give almost anything to take a break, to just pause in the back breaking work that this is and will continue to be - and then I see the kids' smiles, and the passion of my students, and it's all worth it. I know, I've become the world's cheesiest person, I'm aware! Still, every time we jump one hurdle, another one seems to appear. After waiting three hours to see a physiotherapist, we were told we need X-Rays for Zawadi and Simoni before anything can be done. After raising (most of) the money to at least start working on the pump, a hitch delays the wire transfer, meaning a wait of at least another week. Now it turns out my organization may have mistakenly booked me into the house I'm staying at for only three months instead of four - not a huge problem since I can move into the hospital house early, but definitely a frustration since the last thing I want right now is the added stress of moving. In addition, several of my friends are leaving imminently, and I'm feeling kind of alone - moving into a house by myself isn't exactly going to help that feeling. Plus my damn fever is still there, every day, after three weeks - the literature says it should self-limit to four weeks at maximum, so in a week or so I have to head back to the specialist if it's not cleared up.

Pray and Simoni, my "twins"

BUT. There are lots of good things happening too, I don't want to sound like I'm just whining. The chickens are thriving and brooding eggs, all of the babies seem to be doing really well, with the possible exception of Ebenezer - who came in with Rezeki - and is still worryingly small. But even he is gaining. We've got vitamins set up for all the kids, and extra bone-strengthening ones for Zawadi and Simoni. The garden is all ready to go, once we can summon up the energy to weed, fertilize, and plant - but the seeds are ready and we're not far from entering the rainy season, making this perfect timing. The well project is almost fully funded, we're only about $500 off at this point (THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU, see the "How to Help" page for a full list of donors), taking a huge burden off my chest - and I know there are more generous people out there who will come through for the last part. Most importantly, the kids are HAPPY, thriving and learning and growing every day, and what more can you really ask than that?

Deep breaths and kids' smiles, I will be fine. Still on the lookout for that teleport, though.

Iron wills and other things

So it turns out the kids aren't just savages, I beleive we have discovered the cause of the kids flaking fingernails, eating dirt, licking the chicken wire, and chewing on any metal object within reach, including but not limited to bottle caps, nails and springs - they're iron deficient! I feel like an idiot for not putting this together sooner, it makes perfect sense, and they're all starting on Flintstones Complete multivitamins with iron this week, so hopefully that'll help. If nothing else, I'd like to be able to wear my bag without the metal clip always ending up covered in slobber.

In other medical news, today I witnessed the drainage of a large, pus filled abscess on the back of Pray's head - I know he's feeling better because it took four full grown adults to hold him down sufficiently and they could hear him across the hospital. He's fine, recovered rapidly when informed that he would get all the candy he wanted as compensation. I do hate being the bad guy, though - because I've been working closely with the docs on the well project, and I'm reasonably medically knowledgable, and also because I frequently insist that kids need to be seen before the mamas think they do (and, PS, I'm always right), I've kind of become the designated hospital-goer. And poor Pray handled it pretty well (for him, which is to say the hospital was still standing), and he still loved me afterwards, but Zawadi now goes into alert-silent-terrified-prey-animal mode whenever I take her near the hospital, and I just hate seeing them hurting. Ebenezer, the other tiny preemie who came in with Rezeki, has malaria, and I'm really worried about him, too.

Friday I'm taking Zawadi and Simoni to a local rehabilitation center to get their hips looked at - some tourists stopped by today, one of whom was a doctor, and confirmed Dad's suspicion of hip dysplasia. It's likely too late for Simoni, but since Zawadi is just learning to walk, maybe we can get that hip back where it's supposed to be before the window has closed. Keep your fingers crossed!

In other news, the well part of the well is complete - thrillingly - meaning we just need to have the guy come install the pump and piping to the tanks to be water self sufficient! Unfortunately, my financial partner had to back out of this half of the project, leaving me between $500 and $1000 dollars short, which is slightly problematic. All of this is still basically for nothing if we can't get that last bit of funding. Soooo I'm working on seeing if we can bring the price down at all, and harassing everyone I know to see if they have any pocket change this month that they want to throw in our direction. Sanitation? Saving lives? Anyone?

In addition, I'd like to reiterate that we have an incredibly generous $500 per year pledged by my wonderful aunt Rita towards the education of one of our kids for next year - three of them are still unsponsored. That means, however, that we still have $400 per year to go. Before the well snafu occurred, I was hoping to use some money from the donations to get a head start on that and simply make up the difference myself - however, that's not looking like a possibility anymore, and it's likely that I will instead be dipping pretty deep into my own savings to make the well happen, making it even less likely that I'll be able to commit to the other half. Is there anyone out there who could commit to even $100 or $200 per year to send one of our kids to school? It's through a US based nonprofit, The Foundation for Tomorrow (blog), meaning that it's entirely tax deductible, good for your taxes AND your soul!

Dianess (with the incredible smile)  is one of our unsponsored kids for next year. Just look at that face!

Sorry if this post is naggy, but these are really exciting and important projects, and it would be awful to get bogged down in the final stages and not be able to make the huge difference that is possible for these kids. Think about it!

</end Jewish guilt>

The good news is, I'm PROBABLY not dying!

 First: I'm too lazy to do a Safari post, apparently, so you can see all the pictures here.

Ok, this time I have a better excuse for my extended absence than "I've been really busy" - I have, in fact, been running through the catalog of African ailments and also possibly the patience of several doctors. It all started a week and a half ago with a double bout of malaria and bronchitis for me and malaria and pneumonia for my friend Peter (see his lungs below). This, while unpleasant, was also a pretty great excuse to lay on the couch for a few days and watch movies until our brains melted and temperatures went away.

My sick buddy and my gorgeous friend Sydney a few days earlier at his birthday celebration

Unfortunately, it didn't work quite like that. Four days later, two days after finishing our courses of meds, I still had a fever and Peter was coughing up a lung several times a day (he must have had LOTS of lungs in there), so we went back to the hospital. This is when we got the pretty picture of Peter's lungs, after much wrestling, because the DOCTOR WE WERE SEEING DIDN'T KNOW HOW TO READ X-RAYS so he wouldn't order them. Thankfully I'm a pain in the butt and also know many of the doctors well through the work with the well, so we managed to get one done and read eventually, confirming pneumonia and getting an Rx for stronger antibiotics.

This should not be so difficult to get read in a hospital.

As for me, they did a typhoid test which came back sort-of-kind-of positive-ish, so they told me I probably had typhoid despite having had the vaccine, and gave me some antibiotics. Fast forward a few days to Monday, a full week after the initial diagnosis, when I had to go into Arusha with the hospital secretary (see the last post about church and chickens) to get some financial stuff figured out for the well drilling. He was, to say the least, a little concerned upon seeing me shivering violently for about an hour, and insisted on taking me to the referral hospital in Arusha on Tuesday. At this superfancy hospital, they still didn't have covers for the thermometer, necessitating an armpit thermometer reading, which my deodorant apparently screwed up by insisting I had no fever. After half an hour of shivering violently in the 80 degree waiting room, another patient complained and I grabbed the damn thermometer, wiped it down with my handy and omnipresent waterless hand sanitizer, and stuck that sucker under my tongue. THEN the believed I was sick.

Unfortunately, they concluded that the typhoid result WAS a result of the vaccine, and my blood was clear of any signs of bacterial infection, sooooo... basically they have no idea why I still have this stupid fever. Thankfully, the Jewish doctor network came through for me - the wonderful and well-connected Ruth Sack saved my life by harassing her brother, who is an infectious disease specialist, for a name of a specialist in Moshi, about an hour and a half away, who has gracefully agreed to see my diseased self tomorrow morning. So tomorrow I'm up early and heading to Moshi, and hopefully they will tell me I'm not dying and possibly even figure out what the hell is wrong with me. Crazy idea, I know.

As for everything else... it's been kind of a rollercoaster. Some things at the orphanage are going incredibly well, so let's start with the good. We have three chickens brooding, although they have laid their eggs in two next boxes and therefore insist on attempting to roost ON TOP OF EACH OTHER. None of them seem to have done this before. Regardless, we're hoping to successfully hatch at least a FEW chicks. It's all up to the cooperative powers of Porky, Lola, and Bugs.

Gracie, who was tiny and very sick with Malaria when I got here, and Loveness, who has moved up to be with the big kids all the time and is SO PROUD.

Zawadi looks silly with her hair gone but she is consenting to STAND as long as she can hold onto something, and can occasionally be cajoled into walking all of three steps before she makes her scrunchy pissed off face.

We had a ton of help lately from our neighbor and one of the world's sweetest fifteen year old boys, Frankie, who all the kids obviously adored beyond all reason.

David has been sick but on this particular day he was just ridiculously adorable in his matching outfits with Baracka, also attempting to eat his shoulder. Peter did nothing to stop these atrocities.

But the big news... we HIT WATER! It was earlier than we even expected, at around 50 meters - we had been afraid we would have to go to 100 meters or more, so this is very exciting. We still have to buy PVC pipes and get a pump installed to get water up and to the orphanage, but it's still a huge breakthrough and within a few weeks we should have a fully functional water system for the hospital and orphanage.

The drill rig and our personal Superman, Chuck.

The importance of keeping the health of the kids up and preserving the sanitation in the hospital was brought home powerfully this week, too. We lost one of our babies. Rezeki was very premature when he came to us three weeks ago, and had had several medical issues, including a nasty abscess and trouble eating. He was admitted to the hospital last week on Thursday, and he passed away on Sunday. I'm still numb and really struggling with the whole situation - several of us volunteers thought he was sicker than the mamas were giving credit for, he seemed to throw up everything he ate and had diarrhea, but he went to the doctors a few times and they never admitted him, so we convinced ourselves it was ok. And it wasn't. At all. And it's really, really difficult to think that maybe if we had pushed harder, he could have been saved. I tell myself I've been busy, and I have, but I can't shake the feeling that I should have known and I should have done something more.

So I'm trying not to be completely sunk by the despair of his tiny little life, and use these feelings instead to fuel pushing harder for better nutrition, for clean water, for more donations to hire more staff, for better organization of information between shifts... something to stop the wrenching of gaining my precious, beautiful, already adored beyond all reason new baby cousin Jamie, and in the same week losing a baby, a baby with no family, with no one to fight for him, whose name is already gone from the orphanage in the insane struggle to keep caring for the kids we have. And I understand that the mamas HAVE to be tough, have to block out the pain to keep doing the work that they do - but I'm not so tough. So I'm asking my mother to say Kadish for Rezeki this week, and it would mean a lot to me if you would keep him in your thoughts too. I can't stand the thought that he will be forgotten so fast. And, as always, any money will be turned into real improvements for these kids, so that they're healthy and so that they know that people out there in the world DO care about them.

Ok. That's all I can really handle for today, and I'm sorry to end this on kind of a bummer note. I will keep you all updated on the health situation as soon as I know what's going on, and also can get out of bed. Minor detail.

Some more good news, some more bad news, the steeper mountain

Alright, this past week has been beyond crazy so I apologize for the infrequent posting. Giulia and I have been in meetings all week with various hospital administrators and different drilling companies, trying to figure out how to get this project off the ground. In addition, and poignantly, the orphanage and hospital themselves are currently without water, which at LEAST doubles the workload of everyone working there - plus Mama Pendo is on holiday, visiting kids from  the orphanage currently enrolled in boarding school and now on vacation, and I have a billion things to do for Tamiha as well, which are sadly sitting on the back burner as I try to keep my head above water. So, first the bad news.

After speaking to various drilling companies, it appears that the well is going to be much more expensive than we originally thought. Because Nkoaranga is on a hill, the well will likely need to be at least 60 or 70 meters deep, maybe as much as a hundred. Even the best quotes we've gotten average about $90 USD per meter. Before we even know how deep the well will need to be, we have to comission a survey, which comes to about $500, even given the extensive discounts people have been willing to give us.

The good news: Giulia's amazing family and friends have come up with $5000 for the project, and I currently have about $3000 available - but we will almost certainly need closer to $10,000 to $12,000. Again, we might get lucky and only need to drill 700 meters, and then have money available for all the other projects - but we're not counting on it. The hospital is opening an independent account, that Guilia and I will be signatories for, exclusively for the drilling project. It is through the hospital (which funds the orphanage), which is a registered nonprofit, and therefore donations should be fully tax deductible - however, we have to figure out the details of the international aspect. Any tax experts out there? We are working on it!

Vaguely controlled chaos

Apart from that, we have two MORE new babies, bringing the grand total to six under the age of 6 months, four under one month. They are very, very, very small - I would bet that Rezeki is pretty severely premature, his face is very downy, and he also has a pretty nasty abscess on his arm that the hospital operated on yesterday. Poor little munchkin. The other kids are doing well - Zawadi tested positive for worms, which is, counterintuitively, a GOOD thing, because it explains why she is so little and it's easily treatable. Of course now we have to test the other babies... and really, I get enough interactionw ith poop as it is, I'm not thrilled to be signing up for more. Anyway, their health is clearly more important.

Other good news - TAMIHA received a huge donation of books from a project in America, and they are happy for us to take a bunch of them over to Nkoaranga for free, which helps a lot with financial stress on my end. We've also spent a lot of money in the last few weeks to buy new diapers, because when the water is out it gets incredibly difficult to keep up with the demand.

I miss home a lot sometimes, but I am honestly ridiculously happy here, I don't totally understand it - I love this work, and I guess at the end of the day that's what matters.

I know that it's the holidays, and you have a million demands on your time and money. But please consider whether this project is something you can help with. We're talking about drastically affecting the hygeine and survival rates of the thousands of poor Africans who use the hospital, about making the lives of these children and all of those who will come in after them - and there will always be more - infinitely safer, cleaner, and happier. Thank you for reading and caring -and a special shout out to Nikki and her kids, who sound wonderful - so glad you're enjoying reading!

All my love to you back home.