An extra special treat of BANANAS for school kids in Kibera Slum

Nearly 600 students attend Saviour King Educational Centre in Kibera Slum, Nairobi, Kenya. We have seen first hand how much these kids LOVE their school and their teachers. This place is beyond just a school. This center is filled with HOPE BRINGERS (teachers and staff) that speak into these children’s lives, bring them a solid education, along with the encouragement to DREAM BIG and GO FOR IT! No wonder these kids love school.

This isn’t the only reason these children love coming to school. They also come for the food. The meals they are provided at school can easily be the only solid meal they may receive that day. So imagine the thrill when 600 bananas arrive on the scene, along with an added dose of nutritional veggies for their lunch bowls.

That is what a $100 donation can achieve. The basic cost of one families holiday meal can light up the faces of 600 children! We would love to be able to offer this to the school kids once a month.

What if a classroom of kids gave $4 per child to cover one days food gift? Or what if co-workers came together and instead of a HUGE outpouring of food for the staff party you put some of the budget towards bananas? When many people are willing to invest their “little”, together it amounts to a lot. That is what we LOVE about our nonprofit. It is all about working together as we give with the little we have to accomplish something BIG in the name of LOVE. Pamoja Love. Together Love.

If this is something that makes your heart sing at the idea of - please click this link : https://www.pamoja.love/givingcatalog There you will find the 8 giving catalog projects we are highlighting this year. Click the “DONATE” button below the project you would like to join in. And make sure to keep checking back on our blog, we will be sharing more stories about the incredible people we are partnering with to make a difference around the world.

We would love to have you be a part of the Pamoja Love family!

If you didn’t happen to read our previous post on the Teachers Helping Teachers Around the World - then you will want to make sure and click that link (article title) and read up on what community this particular project serves.

Teachers Helping Teachers Around the World

Kibera is the largest slum in all of Africa, second largest slum in the world. It is about one mile square with an estimated 1 million people living within it. If you are one who lives on a plot of land this could be very hard to imagine. I’ll try to help you here, the average home is 12ft x 12ft, built with mud walls, a corrugated tin roof, and dirt or concrete floors. Some of these homes have a partition to create two living spaces within them. They do not have running water, plumbing of any kind, and many do not have electricity. And the shanties often house 8 or more people with many of them sleeping on the floor.

Kibera is filled with story, just like everywhere else: tight-knit families, broken relationships, joy, challenges, and dreams of a better life. However, the biggest struggle is probably finding an affordable wage to provide for your family. And with that kind of struggle you find all kinds of coping mechanisms, numbing agents, and desperate, risky, options to provide just enough for that day.

We are so thankful to work alongside local partners who understand what it is like to live here, and who are taking steps to help bring the change people are looking for. Thomas and Beatrice Omolo are bringing hope, dreams and opportunity to the next generation of Kibera. They founded a school in 2008 with 100 students attending, they now have nearly 600. These children are earning an excellent education but let’s not stop there. When families enroll their kids at Saviour King they are cared about and loved on as a whole unit. How could one couple possibly do this for 600 students? Well, they couldn’t. But the teachers, they are the ones carrying out the mission on a daily basis.

These teachers at Saviour King Ed. Ctr. don't just teach these children, they choose to live in their neighborhoods and do life with them. They daily pour their hearts and lives into the well being of these precious children and their families.

So Maddy, one of the Pamoja Love Dream Team Members, came up with a brilliant idea in October as she was in Kibera walking the school grounds and witnessing the teachers loving on the kiddos. She dreamed up the idea of the Teachers for Teachers Project. A project that a school, or a group of friends, could join hands to make a global impact with. We know teachers understand the joys and challenges that come with teaching, and then to imagine the extra demands put on these teachers when parents are struggling to provide the basics like food, medical care, etc.

But we can send them some encouragement and remind them they are loved and cared about. Every $250 donation will provide 5 teachers with a Christmas meal package for their families along with a personal gift. This will be such a huge encouragement to them.

We have made this giving opportunity super easy. You can go to our giving catalog page online and select Teachers for Teachers. Or if you want to each give individually to one teacher you can go to the “Donate” tab and make a $50 donation with a comment listing “Teachers for Teachers”.

We hope you will share this giving opportunity with people you know that would have a heart for It.

Click here to visit the Giving Catalog Page

Together we can make a difference.

-Pamoja Love

Bigger Than Yourself - Giving With Heart

The holidays often bring a certain pressure with them, don’t they? Or is it just me? I feel like our culture (here in the U.S.) has created this need to, well…. to perform. To put in immense effort to please people, to out-do others, to have it all look and feel just so.

I’m not sure how fulfilling that is really. I mean, yeah, we can pull it all off and at the end of the day kick our feet up with pride. Plink… done. Yes, I am certain in the mix of events and thought-itudes (don’t worry, I made that word up) we succeeded in pleasing the people around us who were blessed by our efforts. And that’s good. After all, we want our people to know they are loved and cared about. Sharing love and life together is important.

But what if we are missing a ginormous piece of the puzzle? What if we are so focused on our inner circle we are missing the uncomfortable needs outside of our cushy little lives? What would be accomplished if we simply turned our gaze? Would we be able to forget with a blink and a nod… or would we feel pressed to be a part of something bigger than our norm?

There are a TON of opportunities all around us to expand our hearts. You can probably look outside your front door and find someone who can use an extra dose of love. I challenge you to do that.

I also invite you to look and listen to the different stories we have collected working alongside the local leaders in Kenya and Tanzania. They are doing some incredible work reaching out and loving on people who have no options, have perhaps lost hope, or simply need help problem solving a basic need.

Over the next 10 days we are going to highlight different giving project areas. If you feel a little tug to step up and get involved we will show you how to do that easily. Keep your eyes peeled, we are SO excited to have you join us as we share what has captured our hearts. (if you just can’t wait and you are ready to DIVE IN now - click here it’s the link to the online giving catalog)

TOGETHER we can make a difference.

I’ve learned that whenever I decide something with an open heart, I usually make the right decision. - Maya Angelou

Unexpected: a new way to celebrate.

In the last 24 hours we have had two people with upcoming birthdays ask if they could run a campaign to build widows homes. The concept is to have friends and family give a little, with purpose, to collectively accomplish a lot TOGETHER.

The goal is to celebrate these birthdays by raising funds to build widows homes. The project starts at $500 and goes up depending on location and type of home needed. Does this $500 cover total cost? No…. the recipients of the home begin by having some investment and end with some labor with the help of the local community and church. That leaves room for us to join in what they are already doing. Fabulous, right?

With $500 raised we can provide one dirt floor home for someone in great need. And it may not seem like much to you but trust me, it is HUGE to them.

So all it takes is 50 people giving $10, 20 giving $25… Or 5 giving $100.

What if we Could do even more… like raising enough to put cement floors in to guarantee it would be jigger free. (If you haven’t seen the video of this check out our FB Page) That would cost an additional $500.

Jen Hansen dreamed up the idea to do a campaign supporting a woman in Western Kenya for her birthday. ( see Team Members tab for details) She would love to see her friends and family donate towards a widows home vs. buy her a gift.

Linda Gist loves working with the Koko’s In Maasailand and for her birthday she would like to start a campaign. You can donate below by clicking the donation link.

We absolutely love the fresh new ideas people are coming up with to get involved. Let us know if you have an idea. Together we can make difference!

Please join these incredible projects and share some love by jumping over to the “Get Involved” link and make a donation to “most needed”, make sure to add a note letting us know who’s campaign you are supporting.

Linda working to build a home in Maasailand.

Being Brave

I sat there thinking “What? Who am I?” Did she really pick me to be on the prayer team because she thought I was a prayer warrior or did God tell her to pick me just because. I questioned this with every shaking bone in my body, I was terrified to sit face to face with someone who spoke a different language than me, lived in a different culture than me, would have expectations of me. I really didn’t feel qualified to offer a single thing. In fact, why was I going on this trip? Oh yeah, I wanted to meet our sponsor girls in person.

I often wonder if I would have been brave enough to make that first trip had it not been for the love I had for these little girls I had yet to meet. The love I felt for them drowned out a lot of those voices telling me I couldn’t / shouldn’t go. It helped me to think outside of myself. Those girls are what God used to get me out of my comfort zone and closer to His will.

To think of ALLLLLLLLLL the things that followed that first trip and are still being dreamed up. I could have simply missed the ride by not even showing up in response to fear, with no idea of what I missed out on. Actually, I wonder how many times I have done that?

I think the key to squashing fear in the face and stepping towards what we were designed to do is easier than we think, we need to love something more than we love ourselves. Being brave is much easier when we find something bigger than ourselves to care about. So… start looking around, see what makes a little stir, a little compassion, in your heart and try that.

Together we can make a difference.