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The TurtleWill Goal: Making the world a better place where people can preserve their traditions and retain their dignity. |
| For a long time Turtle Tours has been making major contributions to
the welfare of the tribal peoples it visits. This has included helping
with well digging, buying animals for herds (24 cows to date) so that nomads
can retain their way of life, sending sick people to clinics and providing
medical care, supporting local schools that need anything from a new roof
to the full gamut of school supplies, and funding working cooperatives
for women in Mauritania to help get them out of poverty and dependence.
While these were at first my own personal efforts, I now want to offer
testimony and thanks to all the people who have traveled with me who have
jumped in to do the same thing. I can't help but be very proud that for
such a small entity of people (Turtle Tours travelers and friends), we
really have made a major contribution. I continue to marvel at how truly
easy it is to make a big difference in someone else's life and what great
pleasure we all get in doing it. Irma Turtle |
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Shuka before |
Shuka after |
Meet Shuka Kallo, from the remote Borana village of Dida Yabelo in southern Ethiopia. Shuka is eight years old and was seriously disfigured from birth by a cleft lip, as was six year old Abdu from the same village. Initially instigated by Larry Hallock and Elaine Berman, almost the entire group of tour members from the February `98 Omo Valley Expedition got together and raised over $2700 to date for what we now call our "Ethiopian Childrens' Medical Project." Larry went onto the Internet with a photo of Shuka to a support group and raised well over $800. Terry Jones told her church group about both children and promised to match any contributions, raising more than $600. Other participating trip members are Rosemary Ahmann, Sue Thickett, Steve and Jacquie Hirsh, Debby and Dan Jones, Archie Sharp, Kieron Nelson, and Larry Escott.
We had the children brought up to Addis in July where they were operated on at the public hospital. Shuka only needed one operation. She yips and squeals with delight and is so pleased with her "new" face that she hardly knows what to do with herself. (Shuka is an orphan who is being brought up by an elderly blind woman in her village.) Abdu requires a total of three operations to completely restore his face and palate. He now has had two of the three and the last surgery will be in March. This past August when I was back in Dida Yabelo on another Omo Valley expedition, I was taken to see a four-month-old baby girl with two clubbed feet. She is our next candidate and we are already working on getting her up to Addis for surgery, where she will have to stay for four to six months.
Diana and Donald Ryan: Mali `95 In February `95 this family
of four met and fell in love with 10-year-old Huseini Sangho from Djenne,
a small Fulani boy who was selling his tiny clay animals, and badly crippled
with polio. It took a while and a lot of legwork on the part of the Ryans
and Solo, our operator in Mali, but Huseini finally arrived in the US in
January `98 in the care of the Ryans who had made all arrangements for
him to be operated on at the Shriner's Hospital in Chicago. After several
operations and a few months in the U.S. where he also attended school and
was the hit of the local community, he is now back in Mali, much taller
and straighter, and with a great future.
Larry Decker and Carol Scribner: Ethiopia Aug `96 have been sending 12-year-old Ababa Gulilat from the tiny Hamar town of Turmi in southern Ethiopia to boarding school in Addis since 1997. She is now in grade three. They also provided the funds for our "Ethiopian operator extraordinaire," Yohannes Assefa, to start his own tour company, Red Jackal Tours.(more about Yohannes later.)
Dell Russell: Ethiopia Aug 96 mobilized the other trip members to
send 22-year-old Lali Biwa, a young man from the Karo tribe, to Teacher's
Institute in Arba Minch. Lali now runs the new government school in his
own village and is the first Karo tribesman ever to have completed school.
Dell even flew over this summer to attend his graduation.
Sally Bookman: Ethiopia Feb 97 A well-known commercial artist, Sally
promised everyone a free print if they came to her show bringing school
materials for the Omo Valley. She not only collected four huge cartons
of supplies but over $200 in cash. The supplies were distributed among
schools in the areas we visit. The $200 was used eventually to move 12-
year old Ayalnesh Hailu and her mother from the tiny Omo valley outpost
of Dimaka to the much bigger town of Sheshamene, where her recently widowed
mother has relatives and where Ayalnesh could get an education. Sally is
running her "campaign" again this year.
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Tiffany Drever: Ethiopia Aug 97 In August `97 Tiffany met Ayalnesh and is now sending her to boarding school in Sheshamene where she is in grade four. I turned the money over for the full year to Ayalnesh's mother in August. As the tuition only needs to be paid quarterly, this will allow Ayalnesh's mother to invest part of the money in small goods that she can resell for a profit. So, the school money will not only buy Ayalnesh a superior education, it will help provide the family with an income!
Ruth and Irving Heisler: Ethiopia `95 Have helped support and educate
Daniel Beneberu, a young Ethiopian Falasha Jew, waiting to be repatriated
to Israel. Together we sent him to Computer school and Mechanics School
so that he would be better prepared to work in Israel, as well as provided
funds for his family. After two years of support, Daniel is now in Israel.
Jim and Martha Foght: Niger Festivals `97 Along with the help of Chris Jent, Leslie Clark and Turtle Tours, they have made a major contribution to the support of the "Experimental School for Nomadic Tuareg Children" northeast of Agadez. Jim and Martha alone purchased more than 100 blankets for the children for the cold Sahara winters.
Steve and Jacquie Hirsh: Ethiopia Feb `98 Have undertaken the complete support and education of Tamrate Zemedkun, a 14-year-old orphaned boy from the remote town of Jinka in southern Ethiopia. He is now attending boarding school in Addis in grade five.
Andrea Yee: Ethiopia Aug `98 Very impressed by Andualem Gebre, an
equally intelligent and motivated 17-year-old in Jinka without the means
to continue his education beyond the 9th grade, Andrea has committed to
sending him to boarding school in Addis to finish his education. It's certain
he will go very far!
Stefanie Hightower and David Baker: Ethiopia `97 Have been doing their best to support, educate and eventually adopt another orphaned boy, 14-year-old Dawite Assefa, from Jinka.
Stan and Beverly Diamond: Mali `98 Are now providing the funds to
send one child from Mali's Dogon Country to school each year.
Leslie Clark: traveling with Turtle Tours since `94 Through her own Nomad Foundation has made major contributions to the herds and welfare of the Wodaabe and Tuareg of Niger, and funded Women's Cooperatives in Mauritania.
Yohannes Assefa, Director of Red Jackal Tours, Ethiopia Yohannes
is the superman who runs our tours in Ethiopia. In addition to his extraordinary
work on our expeditions, it is Yohannes who enrolls the children in school,
spends part of his few weekends at home driving well over an hour to visit
them, takes care of buying their clothing, and making all their transportation
arrangements. As for the medical care, it is Yohannes also who goes to
the hospital, interviews the doctors, makes arrangements for the children
to be brought to Addis (a two-day trip from the Omo region), sees that
their parents are properly housed, and that food for all of them is brought
to the hospital daily. The fact is, without the help of Yohannes, all our
best wishes and intentions in the world would not succeed.
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