Wed, Aug 31st - 2:30AM
Latest Happenings with Jallah, Mercy & Trokon
Greetings,
It has been a number of months since I last updated you on the happenings with Jallah, Mercy & Trokon. A number of things have taken place regarding them on the Buduburam Camp in Ghana. We still stay in constant contact through e-mail and Instant Messenger and with the regular contributions that are currently being received we are just about able to cover their immediate daily food and water needs. However there isn’t much left over to explore other, larger, long-term needs such as improving their living conditions, education or toward developing a plan for selfsufficiency.
Jallah & Mercy in Mercy's house
Some initial one-time contributions enabled Mercy to get a temporary tarp to cover her leaky roof through the cold, rainy season as well as some badly needed pots, dishes and utensils. They were borrowing these pots and dishes from a neighbor, but eventually they demanded they get their own. We have also managed to get them some warmer coats and a decent mattress for Mercy. Jallah and Trokon are still sleeping on a thin mat on top of the cold concrete floor.
Unfortunately, during a torrent of rain a river of water mixed with sticky sewage flooded through the door of her 9 x 6 foot shelter. With some further financial assistance she was able to get a concrete mason and carpenter to build a porch onto the little shanty which now keeps the floods out, but also gives them a veranda under which they can cook even when it’s raining without filling the house with smoke which only stings their eyes.
Most recently Jallah was forced to leave the small sleeping quarters which he shared with some other guys. He has been forced to sleep on Mercy’s porch which has been cold and wet. He informed me last week that he found a room for rent and after much deliberation they decided to put most of their weeks supply of food money toward this room in order to hold it. They gave the owner 800,000 cedes of a total of 2.4 million. He still requires the other 1.6 million cedes (about $180.00 CAD) for Jallah to take possession. We are seeking assistance to cover this one-time cost in order to secure this room for a full year.
We are also working on a plan for them to become self-sustaining and eventually no longer need on going financial support from an outside source. One idea that has been explored is to have them build a store there on the camp where they could supply refugees with food and other staple items. They found another woman who has been doing this business for some time now and is able to support her small family by traveling into the food market in Accra to buy bulk food items. She then sells them out of a secure galvanized steel building. After asking some pertinent questions of this store owner and doing an analysis of this type of project, we all felt that there are better less expensive ways to get started in a small business.
Both Jallah and Mercy are anxious to learn more about computers and in turn become trained in others areas of interest through on-line courses. The internet café there on the camp gives them this ability to some degree, but it is limited by the amount of time allowed as well as the fact the most of the computers are outdated. They have little or no control over what software that is on those computers, they never know what PC they will end up using for any given session, its costs a minimum of 6000 cedes (1 hour) to access and they often have to wait in long line ups. Apparently Jallah’s new room may have electricity which is unusual for the camp. An idea for a small business opportunity came to the fore when I asked them if they could obtain some photos of this other lady’s store along with other pictures of themselves and their surroundings. This turned out to be quite a process and cost more than what I expected for only about 6 photos (included in this article). They hired a Ghanaian photographer from Accra to come and take conventional 35mm photos which he had to get developed. They then paid to have the prints scanned into the computer at the café in order to send them to me. This gave me an idea. What if we were to set them up with a computer of their own computer or laptop, a digital camera and a printer. The initial set up cost for such a business might be a little higher, but the monthly overhead would be very low. This would only require electricity and an internet connection along with periodic replenishing of printer paper and ink.
Mercy & Trokon
The many advantages a business like this would offer in terms of their ongoing communication with the outside world (we could talk practically for free) and the exposure they would have to the world of technolgy makes this a very desirable option. They could not only develop some valuable services and make a potential living, but could train themselves very inexpensively have an impact on their community.
We covet your feedback on this and other topics. Please participate in our Club Forum by clicking here.
Another interesting thing happened right here in Edmonton which will serve to help this project. We have met a precious Christian woman and mother of seven children who is from the Buduburam Refugee Camp living in downtown Edmonton. She was sponsored about 2 years ago and came to Canada. Four of her older children are in various places within North America, but she still has her 3 younger ones living in and/or near the Buduburam camp. We had her over for dinner one evening and learned first hand about her experience there confirming much of what we have learned already from Jallah & Mercy and other sources. It was fantastic to speak to someone with first hand experience and a story to tell. Her name is Gertrude Cooper and she works as a security officer at one of the hospitals. She does what she can to support her kids over in Ghana. We hope to fellowship more with her and have her out to some of our gatherings. If you’d like to meet her and hear her story, let us know and we will make arrangements to have her out again soon. We are hoping that our relationship with her and the knowledge and experience she offers will help us in our pursuit to effectively assist Jallah, Mercy and Trokon.
If you would like to get involved in our community and this project, click here to become a member of WOWedmonton and the Apply for membership into Families4Refugees.
http://wowedmonton.com/cgi-bin/members/clubs.cgi?forumid=9990189386265
Thanks for your interest!
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