GlobalGiving.org: Feed Zimbabwean Orphans, Body and Soul

Zimkids update January 2012

Dennis Gaobury — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 03:02:39 GMT

Shaka Ndlovu teaching Elder Sanele wall art

ZimKids has been rocking and rolling over the past two months. All of the brickwork on the buildings for our new “home” is almost complete, and the roof structures are rising. Plastering has begun, and Zimbabwe now has its first two female plasterers, our very own Sithibisiwe and Thandiwe! The grounds have been landscaped with a dry garden of cacti and aloes. The paintings on the wall between us and the street have become such a local attraction that people constantly come by to admire and photograph them. Shaka Ndlovu is teaching our Elders who will teach our children how to paint wall art.The younger children have begun digging vegetable plots for their families. Students at Carmel, a local private school, raised $150 and bought us a solar cooker and some post and pans. We distributed glasses donated by an American medical researcher here on the Fullbright program. And thanks to the generosity of the Proctor and Gamble Alumni network, we’re in the process of purchasing a full solar array so that we can be independent of the crumbling electrical grid and operate without a monthly electric bill.

In terms of the building project, while the plastering team moves from building to building, the roof team hopes to have the buildings closed in by the end of February or early March. As we complete that work, the plumber will train our Seniors to connect the toilets to the sewer and the electrician will show us how to put in our wiring. We’ll still have a dozen small items to complete – putting the glass into the windows, polishing the floors, doing the final clean-up. But we’re on target to be done by the end of April.

As Tinashe and Dennis have worked with the Seniors at the building site, the Council of Elders have been continuing their wonderful programs with the younger children. Just this weekend, they began rehearsing with them for a special play for the Center opening!

Things are harder then ever here as prices continue to rise. Rents keep rising, and people now are paying $100 a month for two tiny rooms. Food prices for everything but vegetables are now well above what we pay in the U.S., and medical care is astronomically costly. We’ve managed to continue providing the safety net that was our first project and in December, Adrian Suskin, our ever-loyal guardian angel, sponsored a special food distribution. Our terrific doctor is still keeping people as healthy as possible when they live with water and electricity cut-offs and no money.

By the end of the year, we’re expecting that we’ll have an abundant garden and a functioning poultry project to help out our families and provide ZimKids with a bit of income. Once our solar panels are installed, we’ll begin networking our computers and training our young people so that we can open our very own Internet café and computer training center – the first one for miles around!

So, as we move into 2012, thank you again for all your support and encouragement. Every time officials stop by – from the community, the city, or from embassies – and admire what we’ve accomplished, we think with immense gratitude how far we have come because of the amazing generosity of our friends!

Foster, TInashe and Dennis put up roof structure

Gogo's with their new glasses

First use of our new solar cooker

Thandiwe and Sithibisiwe plastering

Tinashe bolting gumpole to Tech center roof

Update October 2011

Dennis Gaboury — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 19:45:39 GMT

Children designing murals for the inside walls

TO our donors: Your generosity and support have been remarkable and deeply appreciated. Thank you so so much.

The children are involved with their usual activities including soccer, art, dance, song, chess, and computer training. Every few weeks or so we take them to the site of our new center now under construction for cleanup day where teams win prizes for the most trash collected. They are also hard at work under the guidance of Shaka Ndlovu, an immensely talented local artist who donates his time to teach the children and is painting the front wall murals. He is working with our Elders (age 15-17) training them to develop and implement murals that they will paint on the interior of the security wall of our center that is under construction now.

The Zimkids building project is moving along swiftly now. All foundations are in; the sub floor (5” quarrystone/cement mixture) is in place for the Resource Center. The remaining sub floors for the bathrooms, gazebo, Tech Center and Office cottage will be poured in the next two weeks. The walls, windows and doors of the resource center are up. Once the sub floors are all in the walls of the Tech center will go up followed by the Bathrooms. A pump and piping have been installed in the well. The water tank stand is built. Following my return December 2 the roofs will be installed. Once the roofs are up then the final floor finish is poured and the walls are skim-coated inside and out. Our six Seniors (18,19 year old orphans) are working at the site and have learned how to plan, mix and build with cement. Two of them have become so proficient that they could easily be hired by construction companies now. They in turn will be training our Elders (age 15-17).

We have been chosen to be one of eight charities for the Barnert Temple Mitzvah Mall focusing on water projects. Our plan is to install drip irrigation and to have caregivers and our children participate in the planning, implementation and care of the market garden. Once the buildings are up we will enclose a space to raise broiler chickens and egg layers. Both the market Garden and Chicken project will both feed our kids and produce some income that will move us closer to self-sufficiency.

We have applied for a grant to purchase computers for our Tech Center which will be used to train our kids in the use of a computer and internet. When the children are in school the tech center will become an internet café for the greater Pumula neighborhood. Again, moving us closer to self-sufficiency.

Thanks to you all of this is happening. We are all very excited and are looking forward to the grand opening sometime in March, 2012 to which you are all invited!

One of the Murals by Shaka Ndlovu Front wall

Foster, 18, laying block for the Resource Center

Zimkids new Council of Elders ages 15-17

Links:

Zimkids Website

August 1, 2011 Update

Dennis Gaboury — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:44:14 GMT

Zimkids working on wall mural designs

Dear friends of Zimkids,

We at Zimkids want to extend our deepest gratitude for your support and kindness. We welcome our newest donors at Lilly who put your faith in us. Be assured your donations will be used wisely and directed entirely to benefit the children at Zimkids.

We continue with our food distributions and activities as described in our website at www.zimkidsorphantrust.org.

And we are still paying school fees for those who are at the top of their class. (Paying for everyone would cost us $50,000, so that is not an option, and our system seems to encourage the children to work hard.) This year one of our most active members passed her O-level exams with flying colors, a real accomplishment given how frequently her teachers were on strike for the past several years. Thus far, she is the only Zimkid to have made this achievement, so we are paying to send her to a wonderful boarding school in Matopos for her A-levels in the hope that she’ll finish well, be accepted into the United States Achievers Award (which helps disadvantaged kids find scholarships to U.S. universities) and fulfill her dream of going to medical school. We are all very proud of her. Kudzai Sithole and Lindiwe Mabhena, both 15 years old, are always at the top of their classes and we are hoping that they will follow Pauline’s example.

Construction on the Zimkids Center continues apace. The children of Zimkids, under the supervision of our Council of Elders are currently designing the interior murals that they will paint on the interior of the wall. In a few weeks, the children, Seniors, Elders and our Director Tinashe Basa will be painting classic Ndebele designs on the front wall of the site. And the children gather periodically to continue to clean the site and assist as needed in whatever ways are appropriate to their ages.

Once the first building is up, we will begin to furnish it. A clothing manufacturing company went out of business and sold us chairs and tables at rock bottom prices. The Bulawayo public library has agreed to sell us children’s books for $6 per large box that we’ll add to our library. We have received two more donated laptops for the eventual tech center. And we seem to be on the verge of free shipping for donations.

All in all, we’re feeling extremely proud of how far we have come – thanks to your kindness, assistance and good wishes. We will continue to work hard to deserve it and use it in the most cost-effective, focused and positive way to assist our children.

Seniors installing the gate

Zimkids Project Update April/May 2011

Dennis Gaboury — Sun, 22 May 2011 08:14:56 GMT

Zimkids new Council of Elders

Dear friends of Zimkids,

First, we at Zimkids want to extend our deepest gratitude for your support and kindness. It has not only allowed us to continue our work but has given us enough stability so that we’ve been able to begin building our new home, which will give the orphans we work with a classroom and clinic, a computer lab, library, playing fields and a full kitchen – all powered by solar energy!

The building project is not only giving us the space that we need but is providing the older children we’ve worked with for years with training for their own futures in a country where unemployment now tops 90 percent. Several years ago, we turned Zimbabwean tradition on its head by appointing these older children to a Zimkids Council of Elders and teaching them to run activities with the younger kids – from chess to traditional dance and choir - and even to provide first aid.

Before we broke ground, those Elders (aged 17 & 18) – all of whom have finished school but cannot find jobs – became our Seniors and are now hard at work under the supervision of professional builders who are training them in every aspect of the process, from preparing the foundation to building walls, thatching, plumbing and electricity. If all goes well, we hope that by the time we’re done, they’ll be ready for some training in running a business so that they can spin themselves off into Zimkids Builders!

There’s still a huge amount of work to be done, of course. The wall encircling the 2-1/2 acre building site is almost complete – and it has been an enormous job! The Senior boys and girls have not only been laying brick and pouring concrete; the boys have been living on the site to provide much-needed security and have already chased off men in donkey carts with their eyes on our bricks, blocks and sand! They’ll be taking a break soon to go to a nearby national park to harvest thatching grass. Then it will be time for the construction of our buildings! We are working closely with Dr. Sashka Maksimovic to make sure our clinic/first aid room has what she needs to serve our kids and their families. All of our children were tested for HIV last year. Those HIV+ children are closely monitored.

Meanwhile, our new Council of Elders, having grown up under the influence of our Seniors, have taken over our activities with great skill and have begun learning computers, for themselves, so they can in turn teach the younger kids and as part of our long-term goal of opening an Internet café. That is just one element of self-sustainability plan. The other two elements include a market garden based on environmentally sound drip irrigation processes and a project to raise chickens. Fortunately, a local chicken farmer has promised to train our Elders and Seniors to raise both layers and broilers and to recycle their waste so that we can avoid the use of chemical fertilizer in our garden.

We have many new children who have joined us over the last 2 years so in an effort to bring them together in a shared experience all the kids and the Seniors went to Masiye Camp for 6 days of fun, games and barbecues in April. They had a great time making happy memories that will last a long time and returning to Bulawayo as a Zimkids family.

Life is frantic, then, at Zimkids. But, immodestly, we believe that we’re creating a model center for orphans that will allow us to care for their educational, social, medical and personal needs even as we help train them to become leaders and business owners that will equip them to care for their families, their community, their environment, and their nation’s future.

Senior Girls Janice, Thandiwe and Sithibisiwe

Senior Collen Makurmuridze cementing first block

Elder Bucket Brigade to clean the land of trash

Links:

website

Exciting News from Zimkids

Dennis Gaboury — Sat, 12 Mar 2011 03:32:02 GMT

Entrance drawing to the new center

We are incredibly excited and proud to announce that in honor of our board member Adrian Suskin, two generous donors have given us enough money to build Zimkids its own home. Adrian has been in a pitched battle with cancer the last few years. In spite of monthly chemo he tirelessly assists us at Zimkids. Attached you'll find drawings of what the Adrian Suskin Center for Zimkids will look like when we finish building, hopefully by the end of the year. As you know, we've been operating out of a classroom and on the playing fields of a local primary school. Now, we will have our own multipurpose classroom, a future internet café stocked with laptops donated by the Town School for Boys in San Francisco, a clinic, storage facilities, and a performance gazebo. We are using the surrounding land not only for playing fields but for a market garden and chicken coops to move us toward self-sustainability. We are installing a well for irrigation. The center was designed by a local young architect pro bono and features Ndebele/Shona designs and thatched roofs - a updated version of a typical rural kraal.

The children are, of course, wildly excited about the plans, and the Elders are keen to begin building because we have arranged with the builders and other tradesmen for them to work alongside the professionals to gain skills in laying brick, installing plumbing and electricity, and preparing a modern drip irrigated market garden - skills that are actually marketable in Bulawayo.

In the next week or so you'll notice that we have added a new project page on globalgiving to help in buying desks and chairs for the classroom, bookshelves, clinic supplies and the like.

Join us, please, in giving an enormous thanks to Adrian and his wonderful friends!

NOTE: Global is holding a matching funds campaign on Wednesday, March 16. For every dollar donated Zimkids gets $1.30! Also there is a prize of $1000 for the project with the most donors.

All the best! and Thank you again for your support.

foreground Resource Center, Kitchen and Clinic

Performance/Activity Gazebo

Toilet Facilities Lft - Office/Director Cottage Rt

Links:

www.zimkids.com

Zimkids Project Update January/February, 2011

Dennis Gaboury — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 16:46:07 GMT

Dear friends of Zimkids,

We have a lot of news to report!

First: Global Giving will match all donations with 30% up to a $1000 per donor on March 16^th. They also will award the project with the most donors and/or the highest amount of donations with $1000. So Please you mark your calendars and think of us on March 16. Last year Zimkids raised over $20,000 in matching funds alone! That will feed all our children and their families for 5 months and pay for medicine and some school fees! Thank you so much for you past support.

In April we are taking all of our 160 orphans to Masiye Camp for 6 days. The camp, run by the Salvation Army, provides leadership training and a multitude of meaningful activities, team building, workshops and just plain fun. It’s been four years since we were there.

Five of our 16 year olds took their O level exams and two passed, one with very good scores. Pauline Mhendo, one of our superstars, a 17 year old young woman who lost her father in 1995, her mother and her grandmother in 2005, and joined Zimkids several years ago just defied the odds by passing her high school graduation exams. Her scores were a real tribute to her intelligence and tenacity since she'd spent most of high school not in school due to strikes and, when opened, without any qualified teachers. Zimbabwe has a second level of high school for the most serious students, and we went searching for a good yet affordable place for her. We're pleased to announce that she is now enrolled in the science program at Matopos Mission School. Thanks to our donors we are able to pay for her schooling. They have a 94 percent pass rate on the examinations for what are called A-levels, and we are confident that Pauline will do them, and us, proud by emerging at the top of her class. She wants to be a doctor. Following medical school she wants return to Zimkids as our physician.

Re Land Project: The site is now cleared of all trash and our Elders are working on the preliminary efforts to set up a viable market garden. A well will be drilled in March that will supply the complex with water and irrigation.

We continue our food distribution program and visits by our volunteer doctor. Since November we have had no deaths and everyone is in good health.

A special thanks to Tinashe Basa whose tireless efforts make Zimkids hum.

All the best and thank you from all of us at Zimkids Orphan Trust

Dennis Gaboury

Founder

Help Zimkids win $10,000 just click your mouse

Dennis Gaboury — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 09:57:05 GMT

Dear Friends of Zimkids

As I mentioned in our last update Zimkids has produced a video to compete for $10,000 in the Ford Focus Global Drive. After much work it is now posted entitled “You Can’t eat a Ford Focus” (right now it’s the first in the upper left corner) and all we need is your vote by clicking on the “Love It” button so could you take the time to go to this site: It has to be done by midnight December 31!

http://apps.facebook.com/globaltestdrive/showentry?entryurl=%2Fcontests%2Fshowentry%2F695615%2Fnull%2F4

Click on the “Love it” button.

The more Love Its we get the better chance we have of winning. And we need A LOT! We are up against some stiff competition.

So make it your New Year’s resolution to Click and please ask your friends and family to join in the clicking!!!

Here’s the blurb on the video:

Everyone has heard about the misery of Africa, about the violence, death and dying. But no matter the hardships, just like their counterparts in the rest of the world, African children like to have fun, especially the children we work with. Every one of them would love to have a shiny new Ford Focus since trekking kilometer after kilometer on foot to get water and food is exhausting. But what the children we care for really need is security – and we’re trying to provide them with that possibility by establishing a garden and chicken coops to help feed them. We at Zimkids have the land to do that, and with $10,000 from Ford, we can dig a well, install a solar-powered pump, build chicken runs and teach our kids to grow their own futures. And if we do our jobs right, in the future, they’ll be able to buy their own Ford Focus.

Thanks SO much!

Dennis

Zimkids Project Update November/December, 2010

Dennis Gaboury — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 13:52:20 GMT

Tinashe Basa teaching his first computer class

Dear friends of Zimkids,

I returned to Zimbabwe December 2 made a beeline to Pumula North to see all the kids. Tinashe Basa, Sipho Nyoni, Prosper Mhodi and our Council of Elders have done an amazing job keeping Zimkids thriving and moving forward.

As you may know, the City granted Zimkids a large plot of land in October. The site was littered with heaps of detritus: needles, broken glass and cement, rusted metal, plastic bags, feces and more. There is no trash pickup so people have to have somewhere to throw it and the nearest open spaces generally gets the worst of it. So the Council of Elders set to work cleaning it. The first step was to clean the trash on the surface then to dig and dig and dig to get the buried trash out. Then we are collecting all the scattered glass shards and rusty cans. So far we’ve removed 15 bucket-loads. That was a must do before our barefooted little ones can use the land. This week all our kids age 15 on up chipped in and got to work. It will take a good month before we are done cleaning. Next we will be planting our garden with hardy protein-rich plants like chimulia (a kind of kale) and spinach, secure the property with donated fencing, and get our building plans drawn and approved by the City Council.

We are trying to put together a video to compete in the Ford Focus Global Test Drive “Start Something More Than a Car” competition. The award is $10,000. Once the video is done and submitted I’ll let you know the site where you can see it and ask that you click the “Love it” button that will help push up our chances of winning.

Tinashe and Sipho like to save surprises for me. The first was how much they had accomplished cleaning the land. And the second was when Sithibisiwe, Mbuso and Nqabutho’s’s mother died in September all our caregivers decided to chip in 5 rand (about 75 cents) each to help pay the cost of the funeral. Considering they are all poor our message of volunteerism is seeping into the Zimkids Community. They are also providing us with tools to clean the land.

On the school front, Kudzai Sithole who lost his caregiver last year scored at the very top in his seventh grade exams. Bravo Kudzai! Pauline Mhendo, Ayanda Nkala, Thandiwe Mlotshwa, and Mqondisi Ngwenya took their O level exams in November and we are awaiting the results. Pauline has been consistently at the top of her class. Janice Mabudah continues her A level schooling but wasn’t doing as well as she should so we are giving her one more term to improve. We pay the cost of their O level tests as well as school fees at a top A level school so long as they do well.

Tinashe began teaching the children about computers. His enthusiasm is contagious!

Our thanks go to all our individual donors for your continued support. A special thanks goes to the International Pilots Association Foundation for their grant and to Global Giving who make so many dreams come true. Also, a special thanks to the Ross School in East Hampton NY, Ramaz School and the Friends Giving Circle in New York City and the Town School in San Francisco for their continued and enthusiastic support and to all our friends and supporters in the Catskill Mountains in NY.

Best wishes for the Holiday season from all of us at Zimkids. If I can get it uploaded before the electricity goes out you can see the attached video clip and photos!

Sipho Nyoni standing on our plot of land

Cleaning the Rubble

Links:

Happy Holidays

Zimkids Project Update September/October 2010

Dennis Gaboury — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 18:54:35 GMT

Dear friends of Zimkids,

Great news! We finally got official notification from the Bulawayo City Council that we have been granted 2.5 acres with the option of further acreage as we need it. The Council of Elders is gearing up to clear the fields for sports areas, our market garden and chicken runs and eventual activities center. We are all very excited as this is the beginning foray on the road to self-sufficiency in food.

As you may know we cannot afford to pay school fees for the all the children, but we're able to provide some fees and are doing so by paying for those children who are in the top 10 of their classes. We've long had 12 children who excelled, but this term, another six who rose to the challenge.

We also pay for the high school graduation exams. Unfortunately, because of the collapse of the educational system that had left children with five years of strikes and school closings, only one of the ten who decided to give the exams a try last year passed. But that one, Janice Mabudah, is doing wonderfully at Sezani High School, where we are paying for her A level studies, a college prep course. She was recently chosen as one of two students from that school who will fly to London to compete in a British version of a College Bowl. We are so proud of her accomplishments. Another seven of the older children are about to sit this year's exams, and we're hoping that several of them will be inspired by Janice.

Many thanks to the Town School for Boys in San Francisco. They have donated 7 used loaded pc laptops and I'm taking them back with me, along with laptops from Julia Tazzia, Dennis Metnick, Justin Gillis and Gerald Murphy for an additional four laptops. We are starting a computer training program for our Elders that will later be extended to the rest of the children. So we are looking for any educational DVD’s/CD’s that can be used on pc’s with Windows XP. As we build this part of our program we plan in coming years to operate an internet café serving the neighborhood staffed by the Elders for income generation.

On a sad note, Thoko Tshuma, the mother of Zimkids Sithabisiwe. Ngqabutho and Mbuso Ngwenya, died in September. She was 46 years old. She married her second husband Innocent (father to our Zimkids) at the age of 30. He died in 2003 at the age of 41 of an HIV related illness. Stihabisiwe who is 17 and one of our most active members of our Council of Elders will now become head of household and care for her brothers with our assistance.

That's all the news for now. Mostly, I want to say that we're thriving and growing thanks to all our donors whose kindness, support and generosity have made this all possible.

Zimkids Project Update August, 2010

Dennis Gaboury — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 16:47:27 GMT

Dear friends of Zimkids, A year and a half ago, 10-year old Brian Dube showed up at Zimkids coughing and weak. We took him to the doctor, who diagnosed him with both HIV and active tuberculosis and put him on medications for both. It was too late for his tiny body; he died in the middle of his night while sleeping with his grandmother.

Six months later, we lost 17-year-old Simsethu. HIV positive and on antiretroviral treatment, she’d run out of medication and informed no one. After two strokes, she succumbed in the summer of 2009.

Their deaths were a wake-up call, and I realized that food wasn’t enough; we had to make health care for the children a priority. Since then, we have tested all of them for HIV, and those who proved positive are now on medication. And we regularly take kids in for treatment for scabies and worms, tuberculosis and myriad other infections. We have had no deaths among the children since then.

But our caregivers have not fared so well.

Sizi Moyo, mother of Musa and Mthabisi, died this February at the age of 42 of HIV-related illnesses, having refused antiretroviral treatment. Three weeks earlier, she’d given birth to a 4-pound baby boy. Esther Mashaba’s mother Sekai, died later that month at the age of 35, also of an HIV-related illness. She had refused to be tested.

At the beginning of June, we buried Sidumisile Ngwenya’s mother, Sithibile, following what appeared to be a diabetic coma. We’ll never know for sure since the hospital did nothing to figure out what was wrong with this funny, energetic woman who’d seemed in perfect health.

Then, Busisizwe Fuyani’s mother, Sibongile, suddenly fell ill. She’d had a rough time after her husband, Vigour, died in 2008. His family had taken everything they’d owned, and she’d been forced to move in with her sister. But she’d raised an amazing son, who’d just been elected to our Council of Elders. Sibongile languished in the hospital without treatment or diagnosis. Her nieces had to feed and bathe her. She died two weeks later.

We at Zimkids made a decision long ago that we would rather provide ever-deeper care to the children we serve than to increase our numbers, and we now provide them with food, medical, educational and social resources. After this year’s disasters, we realized that we also need to protect our caregivers’ health and provide them with the tools to support the children. When a caregiver dies, the children left behind are too often sent to live in rural areas, where there is no schooling, no healthcare and no support. Thus far, we have managed to keep Busisizwe, Sidumisile, Musa and Mthabisi and Esther in the community, where we can continue to provide for them. But we cannot risk adding to their numbers by neglecting their grandparents and aunts.

We’ve updated our website with more thorough biographies of both the individual children and their caregivers. In the caregivers bios we included their wish for the tools that would bring in income.

I’m back in the States fundraising until November and while I’m gone, all Zimkids programs continue under Tinashe’s guidance. I’m hoping to be able to take back a stack of educational DVDs and used laptops when I return. If you have either that you no longer need, please think of us. This year, we’re really hoping to bolster our educational programs. Thank you for your continued kindness, support and concern.

Sithabile Ngwenya and Sidumisile Ngwenya

Simosethu Ndlovu

Brian Dube

Zimkids Project Update June, 2010

Dennis Gaboury — Mon, 24 May 2010 17:09:03 GMT

Dear Friends of Zimkids,

As summer approaches in the States and winter is making its way to Zimbabwe my wife Elli and I are returning to New York for six months. I leave Zimkids in the hands or our extremely capable team of local trustees, Sipho, Tinashe and Prosper and our Council of Elders. All activities, distributions and medical monitoring continue. On June 8th I begin meeting with our friends in the States with a visit to Ramaz School in New York City. We have a pen pal project with some of their students and Zimkids. I plan on visiting many locations throughout the States including Alaska for fundraising. I begin in earnest in September with occasional meetings over the summer. Please note I do not use donated funds for travel. If your school, club, church or synagogue is interested in hosting us or establishing a connection with Zimkids please contact me at dennis.gaboury@yahoo.com or call me at home at 607-326-3301 after June 1 and we can make arrangements.

A few quick updates: · We are continuing our monthly outreach to the squatters living at the city dump. Our last visit included our Council of Elders and their mentees - 28 Zimkids in all.

· We have added beef to our monthly food distribution. Depending on the number of beneficiaries in a family we provide 20 – 30 KG mealie meal, 2 – 3 kg beef, 1 liter peanut butter, 2 -3 kg dried beans, 1 liter cooking oil and fruit and vegetables per month.

· The school term ended in early April. Following examination of the children’s report cards 21 Zimkids qualified for payment of their school fees. They had to be in the top five of their class. Of the 21, 12 had never scored that high.

· Mpilo Hospital, which is where children go to be tested for HIV, had agreed come to Zimkids to test all our beneficiaries. When we went to pick up the nurse they cited jurisdictional problems and declined to test unless we transported all the kids to them – an arduous, lengthy and expensive process. So we purchased the HIV testing kits (45 cents each) and Dr. Sashka Macsimovic, our volunteer physician, agreed to come and conduct the tests. We tested 102 children. Two were found to be positive for HIV. We are now assisting those two as well as those previously testing positive with transport and assistance with treatment.

· We met with an official of the city land department and with his assistance have selected a plot of land large enough for a community garden and activities field with access to adjoining land (rent with option to buy). It now heads through the city’s departments for approval a long and arduous process. We have been told all will be finalized by the end of August.

· Our new video will be ready by mid-June and up on our website soon thereafter. The guardian bios and photos will be posted on our website by the beginning of July thanks to Hezvo Mpunga, our wonderful volunteer web designer in Toronto Canada.

· Should you wish to send packages to Zimkids send in care of Tinashe Basa, 14 Chapman Road, P O Burnside, Burnside Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. Mailing time takes at least six weeks.

Finally we thank all our donors for their kindness, generosity and support.

Zimkids Update April 2010

Dennis Gaboury — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 03:39:37 GMT

Zimkids Brandon and Tabiso Moyo at home.

Hello and thank you to all our donors. With your assistance we continue to provide monthly food distributions (over $3,000/month) to our beneficiaries, medical assistance, as well as social, sports, and creative activities. We have several new programs at Zimkids. We began an outreach program to the squatters at the city dump. The idea behind this was to impress upon our older children that assistance does not end with them, that it should continue with them assisting others in even greater need. The squatters at the dump lost their homes, everything they own and now live in squalor. Our Council of Elders (Zimkids ages 15-18) paid their first visit a month ago. Members of the Council are assigned to an individual at the dump to interview. To date they have interviewed over thirty people and voted to spend some of their money in their microcredit accounts to assist them with food aid. They are discovering the value of giving to others and are expressing gratitude for what they have. They also decided that each child in Zimkids make a special doll the proceeds from which will be dedicated to assisting the children of families who live in squatter villages. We are now providing school fees for all children who score in the top ten of their class. We are unable to provide it for all our beneficiaries because it would cost us over $30,000 per year. So we decided to encourage them to work hard to get in the top ten of their class in order to get assistance. Over the previous three months Zimkids trustees have conducted 134 home visits to assess need, evaluate our performance and further deepen the services we provide to our beneficiaries. We have finished more detailed and accurate biographies of the children, identified those with special medical requirements and taken them to doctors for treatment. We have provided 7 of our kids with glasses; treated worms, scabies, fungal infections, allergies, provided insulin and diagnosed two with heart disorders. We are almost finished with the biographies of our caregivers. They will be used to assist donors who may choose to help them with the tools needed to provide for their families. These biographies along with a photo of them and their Zimkids will be on our website in about 2 months. The good news of the last three months is that none of our children have gotten seriously ill or died. But we lost three mothers ranging in age from 33 to 49 to complications from HIV/AIDS. As a result our child headed households increased to 6. As part of our effort to intensify medical oversight we are in the midst of conducting HIV tests for all Zimkids and any family members who wish to be tested. We have 14 previously diagnosed with HIV. To date we have discovered another three. We are also providing the households with guidance and assistance in dealing with their HIV infected child. We have been unable to procure land from the City Council yet. The bureaucratic wheels have screeched to a halt. But we continue to prod. We are continuing to film our activities as well the daily lives of some of Zimkids as part of an Israeli documentary project. We are also using that footage for a new film about Zimkids for our website and speaking engagement in the States. We began a mentoring program for our Council of Elders matching them with people who work in the field they are interested in pursuing. They spent a day with their mentor at work. They will continue contacts as they pursue their education. We are bringing another 14 younger Zimkids on to be mentored in turn by the Council. We have conducted over 5 video Skype sessions with schools in New York, Florida and New Jersey and another with a school in Colorado in which a group of Zimkids and a group of American kids meet each other. Both groups benefit significantly from the exchange. Finally we thank all our donors for their kindness, generosity and support. Should you have any questions, comments or suggestions please contact me at dennis.gaboury@yahoo.com or dennis@zimkids.com. I am in Zimbabwe until the end of May when I return home to New York for 5 – 6 months. All Zimkids projects continue with the guidance and administration of out Trustees especially Tinashe Basa.

Elder Collen interviewing squatter at dump

New Year Zimkids update

Sipho, Tinashe, Dennis, Prosper — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 22:39:51 GMT

Happy New Year to you all from Zimkids! We wish you the very best. To start the New Year off we thought we should send our donors an update of what we are doing now and what we hope to do in the coming year.

As you know, providing quality food and medical attention to our beneficiaries and their caregivers is at the core of our program. We spend over 85% of our annual budget on these two items. The third tier of our program involves social, sports, and creative activities. As part of that program our Council of Elders (beneficiaries 15 and over who have been with Zimkids for 2 or more years) provide leadership and training in activities that include drama and comedy writing and performing, drawing, dance, choir, drumming, girls and boys soccer, chess as well as group play activities. We now have a lending library composed of locally donated books from the city library and local private schools. We have applied to the City Council for land for a community garden and have a farmer ready to donate seedlings. We are waiting for the slow wheels of the local bureaucracy to finalize our application. Medical oversight for those children who are HIV+ has been intensified. Zimkids has been chosen by an Israeli filmmaker and has received a video camera to film their daily lives as part of a documentary project. Each of our Council of Elders has microcredit accounts funded by a donor’s purchase of one of their dolls. Their monthly food allotment is paid by direct donations. They may use these funds to pay for school fees or O and A level tests or other educational programs.

Over the last year we have grown from serving 60 orphans to 160. We stopped at 160 because we feel that in order to be effective we need to know each of our children and their situations very well. Any more beneficiaries and we would have to increase staff taking away money from our core programs. With that in mind we are planning on expanding oversight, programs and resources to include the concerns of our caregivers. Our caregivers range in age from 18 to 80 with the bulk in their 50’s. Many have high blood pressure or are HIV+. All are unemployed. We are presently in discussions with them about the kinds of tools they require to independently provide for themselves and their families. We also plan to expand the lending library to benefit Amaswazi Primary School which generously allows us free use of the premises. To that end we are teaming up with a teacher in San Francisco, who ships containers of books to Africa (www.booksforsouthafrica.org).

Finally, the availability of foodstuffs in Zimbabwe has improved since the country cancelled the currency and is now using Rand or US Dollars. However, prices have skyrocketed. In earlier years, Zimkids didn’t have enough money, volunteers or transport to buy and distribute food or provide medical care while our founder was out of the country fundraising. We were accustomed, then, to the tragic news of the death of a child, the sickness of another or the malnutrition of all. Thanks to your generosity we were able to provide food and medical care for the full 12 months – and it really showed. Thank you from all of us at Zimkids.

Sipho, Tinashe, Dennis, Prosper, the Council of Elders in Zimbabwe

AND

Adrian (Maryland), Desiree (Florida), Ric (California), Julie & Marybeth (Massachusetts), Gloria (Alaska), Allen & MaryJane (Minnesota), Chris, Sara & Alaya (New York)