GibMissionAfrica

Ethiopia Mission September 2008

GibMissionAfrica is a charity founded in Gibraltar with a dedicated team of Volunteers, who are devoted to working against all the odds to help the victims of disease and poverty in Africa.

The organisation works to help individuals, families and communities become more self-reliant and prosperous, and strengthen their ability to work together to combat the impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic and economic hardships.

Current projects include the provision of a Mobile Clinic for rural villages, rural teacher training as well as health, nutrition and agricultural training. The building of Kindergartens, one recently completed, and another two currently being built in the Nekemt area of Ethiopia. The results – thousands of individuals in Africa will experience profound improvements in their daily lives and create strong foundations for generations to come to build upon.

How did GibMissionAfrica come about? Dilip Tailor was inspired by Father George Grima, A missionary from Gozo within the Maltese Islands, who founded the ‘Jesus is thy neighbour’ movement. Initially he worked in Brazil but latterly has spent a lot of time in Eastern Africa, and more recently in Ethiopia.

This September Dilip Tailor, founder of GibMissionAfrica, Natalie Smith from Scotland, and David Raven from London took it upon themselves to travel to Ethiopia for a ten day mission. The reason for this firstly, to visit and locate area’s, guided by Father Grima, in desperate need of funding for new Kindergartens/Clinics. Secondly to see for ourselves the good use the money donated to GibMissionAfrica is actually being put to.

On Sunday 14^th September 2008, after a two legged flight from London Gatwick, we arrived in Addis Ababa and were met by Father Grima. My initial thoughts were that I couldn’t believe after a years wait for this trip that I was actually there. I never thought that as a child in 1986, when I watched Live Aid on TV and all those starving children in Ethiopia that I would actually one day actually go to Ethiopia, and there I was!

After a seven hour road trip east through the lovely green countryside of Ethiopia we arrived in JIMMA, our first port of call on our journey. Upon arriving at our residence run by local sisters, we visited a local cemetery. Here we met Lepers who actually live within the cemetery. Some simply live on top of tomb stones within a cage; others live in mud huts above their family tombs. I was shocked by what I saw.

“The Lepers are above the dead, but below the living”.

We then went up to the orphanage run by the Mother Teresa Sisters. What I saw here will live with me for the rest of my life. Father Grima took us upstairs into a room full of mothers and babies severely malnourished. One baby was lying on a bed covered by blankets. The blankets where pulled back for us to see, this baby was about three months old and malnourished. So malnourished that she had open scabs all over her body, she looked in so much pain. Father George asked me what I thought and I couldn’t answer, I wanted to walk out of the room and cry but I kept strong and stopped myself.

Along the way to JIMMA we saw children carrying logs on their backs; these logs must have weighed at least twice their weight. They carry these logs to take home and to sell to try and make money for their families. They walk for miles sometimes walking non stop for a day or overnight.

That evening I remember going to bed worried and wanting to return home. I was shocked by what I had seen in only the first few hours of our journey.

During our journey we woke up early and did a lot of travelling. To BONGA, DEMBI DOLA, GAMBELA, NEKEMT, JIMMA and other smaller villages.

A place of note was a Kindergarten called ‘our lady of Europe’ this was pleasing to see from the charities perspective. We visited this Kindergarten and officially opened a newly built building there which is to be used as classrooms. Dilip Tailor presented a plaque.

This building was opened as a direct result of the money donated to GibMissionAfrica over the last year.

One thing I was beginning to notice throughout the journey was how happy the children were to see us. They all looked so happy and were always smiling. It makes me think back to my life in the UK and how the children there have absolutely everything compared to the children I was meeting in Ethiopia, but I never see them truly as happy as the children I encountered in Ethiopia. The children in Ethiopia are happy to make themselves a football out of dirty rolled up rags; would the children of the Western world be happy with that?

We visited Leper colonies in some villages. Lepers forced to live away form the main area of the villages because local people do not wish to integrate with them.

One leper who was also HIV positive requested help from Father Grima, she had two children. Her story was particularly sad as she had been advised before by the sisters not to have children, but she presumably had to earn herself some money in the only way she could, thus leaving her with two children to now look after. A positive for this is that the children had been checked and did not have the virus like their mother.

We also came across a woman who had no roof to her home. She was living underneath the trees and requested that Father Grima could help her in some way. Father Grima told her that he would make sure her home was completed so that she had a place to live with her three children. The woman was overcome with joy and kissed Father’s feet.

During our journey we had to fly to the GAMBELA/DEMBI DOLA region, near to the border with Sudan. The roads to GAMBELA/DEMBI DOLA are on passable by car. Whilst in this area we visited a clinic which is currently treating people suffering from Goutar. This is a condition unique to Ethiopia and is caused by a lack of Iodine in the salt. Goutar is a lump which forms in the neck area. At this clinic they are treating this condition by treating the salt. People arrive here after walking the hours/days and are suffering from Goutar, Elephantitus amongst other diseases.

Whilst in this region we visited a small village, where Father Grima had provided funding from ‘Jesus is thy neighbour’ movement to have a grinding mill built for the local community. This was done to provide the small community with some income. This in turn helps the community to become self resilient and prosperous.

Whilst visiting the many Kindergartens on our journey I learnt that in order to have the children attend the centres, the children need to be fed. So every day at the Kindergartens the children receive bread or rice. If the children are not fed at school, the children stay at home to work in the crop fields to try and earn money for their families. This is why it is so important to build more Kindergartens, to not only teach the children for a better future, but to feed them, keeping them strong and able to fight off disease. Rather than no education and working non stop in the fields at the age of 3/4 onwards, they get to attend school and have a chance of a future.

I couldn’t believe what I saw in Ethiopia. People are suffering so much from disease. People will walk for days to collect food or water. Children drinking dirty water likely to give them Cholera. But what I saw on day eight of our journey made me angry. We visited a government run clinic/hospital in Nekemt.

A hospital which has goats and dogs roaming around, inside and outside the corridors. We visited a children’s ward and I saw used syringes lying around next to beds and on the floor. Quite shocking considering Ethiopia has a massive problem with HIV/AIDS. I later learnt that these needles are used more than once on the same person as there is a shortage of syringes! I left the hospital feeling angry by what I had seen. Firstly why can’t the government provide enough syringes? Secondly why cant the doctors and nurses there make sure they at least put these needles away instead of leaving them lying around for someone to cut themselves on them and maybe catching the HIV virus.

I did think after this visit though that GibMissionAfrica along with the support of others could maybe provide a clinic to the area, run properly and kept clean.

We stopped at Gatama, and were greeted by the Combonisisters and spoke with Sister Laura. She showed us the school which she had recently built from scratch. Children will attend this school for 2 to 3 hours per day. Parents have to pay 50 cents for their attendance or if they cannot afford this they must attend the school and work in the fields on the crops. This is done to make the parents feel as though they are contributing to their children’s education and that they are not getting it all for free. This In turn helps to get rid of the begging culture.

After visiting the Nekemt area it was decided by me, Dilip and Natalie that GibMissionAfrica would provide by next summer enough money for two new Kindergartens in the Nekemt area to be built, as it desperately needs them. This would mean raising £30k by next summer. Work on these Kindergartens is due to begin soon. We told Father Grima also that we would continue to raise money for a clinic also.

In conclusion to our journey, it has left me focussed on what I must do along with GibMissionAfrica. This is to raise money in anyway that we can. I have seen so much out there and I could never have been prepared enough for what I saw. This trip most certainly has changed my life for the better.

I have learnt that out in Ethiopia, education is power. The new generation of children must be educated so that they can provide money for them and their families when they grow older. The must also be educated regarding disease and how to avoid diseases. A good education will bring these children a better chance in life for themselves and their families.

From left to right below:

David Raven, Natalie Smith, Arch Bishop of Ethiopia, Dilip Tailor, Father George Grima

Please visit the charity website gibma.org/ and Facebook group page GibMissionAfrica for more information.