Zuri Medicine's Summer Happenings!

Summer happenings!!

This summer was not only hot outside but things were heating up for Zuri Medicine as well. Coming home after nine months working in Africa, I was looking forward to down time. Lazing around, spending time with family, hanging out and catching up with friends, but instead I felt like I hit the ground running as soon as I got here. There were things to do that I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do once I got back.

Great news!! We have collaborated with an organization and we can now offer you a tax deduction on your donations! The Bertha Mae Williams Foundation Inc. has stepped up to the plate for us so we can accept donations while filing for our own 501(C ) 3 status thus giving donors a TAX WRITEOFF. Now your generous donations to help the projects that are in place continue and start-up of new ones are TAX DEDUCTABLE! A win/win for us.
You can send your tax deductible checks to:
Bertha Mae Williams Foundation Inc.
3811 Ave H
Brooklyn N. Y. 11210
Or you can send a donation through PAYPAL: bmwfoundation@yahoo.com
Don’t forget to add Zuri Medicine in the memo line so it can be directed accordingly.

Our next order of business was to find a mentor at the Small Business Association to help with the business plan. Moving all thoughts from my head to paper was NOT an easy task, but it had to be done. (Why do things sound good in your head till they get to paper?) Dennis proved the right person for the job. He was able to draw these ideas out and make sure they were on paper in a cohesive way. He was awesome and his daughters experience working in rural Rwanda in the medical field gave him invaluable information and insight on how we needed to structure our plan. So Zuri Medicine now has a business plan, on paper!

We have hired a grant writer!! After many months of looking we found Staci Smith. Stacie has been to Tanzania as a volunteer so I felt she knew firsthand the work of healing we were doing. This was the clincher in her proposal that made me know she was right for our mission; “ I have conducted several projects in East Africa and just returned from a remote project in Tanzania near Lake Tanganyika in the Kigoma region, so I understand well the challenges with medicine and clean water.” Staci has jumped in with both feet and has been researching our most likely sources of funding. In order for us to move forward in our vision of helping communities to heal with homeopathy we have to be funded!
One of Zuri’s vision in the near future is to expand, adding two full time employees one to oversee our full operation and the other to be the boots on the ground popping in to oversee the clinics, for this we need funding.

Treating kids for ringwrom/scabies of the head in D.R. Congo

We have been invited back to rural Uganda to teach in September. (Starting to notice our theme of “rural”?) People there are anxious to continue their homeopathic education. The first half of our course was good but it left people hungering for more, so we will go in-depth on topics that matters most in Africa; malaria, HIV care, and childhood diseases. We teach for only two (2) weeks at a time so we pack a punch into our courses and leave them wanting more. KAPOW! Here is an excerpt of an email from one of the students who did the first two weeks of the course in February taught in conjunction with Homeopathy for Heath in Africa. “I therefore would like to go for further homeopathic study to expand more knowledges. I like homeopathy very much. I also thank MICHELLE for teaching well, she is talented friendly teacher.”

And finally Congo awaits, our most needy and heartrending clinic. There we start work at 7 am and finish when the last rays of the sun dips behind the horizon. We have an endless stream of people all day long. We have recently opened up communications with the local hospital to train staff, adding homeopathy to their repertoire of services provided to their patients. The goal is to bring an understanding of homeopathy to the staff while setting up a referral service so people suffering from acute ailments can be sent to our homeopathic clinic, already in place. This will help the already overcrowded hospital, (1 doctor to 22,868 patients), to better serve the needs of its community.

Although there was a lot of talk of going to South Sudan to train community leaders in homeopathy, sadly because of the state of unrest, we have had to put those plans on hold. Zuri Medicine hopes to be able to reopen negotiations at a later date when things settle down. It’s unfortunate as many people are suffering without access to ANY health care.

We have been offered a pharmacy by the late Dr. Mital’s wife, Shamaji. She learned of Zuri Medicines work in Africa through Yashasvi Jhangiani . As remedies are hard to come by for our lay homeopaths in rural Africa, having a kit to hand to them at the end of training with the remedies they have studied, is an invaluable tool. It’s the difference between going out and helping members of their communities, (on acute care of course), and being stuck with knowledge they can’t put to good use. We are asking for sponsorship to buy bullet cases to use as pouches to hold the remedies. Well done Yashasvi Jhangiani for helping us put Dr. Mital’s pharmacy to good use.

And finally a big thank you to Sheree LaNora who got tired of hearing about all Zuri Medicines adventures but only seeing it in photos, she has donated a VIDEO CAMERA to us. YEA SHEREE!!! As soon as I learn how to use it there will be videos of the work being done.

Our summer has been fun, but also a lot of work taking place behind the scenes. Zuri Medicine can’t thank all those who are helping to move us along enough. As I start to pack my bags for another long stay in Africa I am overwhelmed by the work ahead of me but pleased with the work done over the summer to ensure we build a solid foundation on which to move forward. We are grateful to all our friends and supporters as your kind words and donations help us to achieve unimaginable goals in rural communities that are medically underserved.
Please consider making a donation to our PAYPAL to help us continue projects already started while implementing new one.
Thank you,
Michelle

Shoes, learning and school fees.

So what do shoes have to do with school you ask..... Answer, everything. We were told by the clinic coordinator there was a grandma and a mama we needed to do a home visit for, the mama was suffering from an ulcer and complaints of not being able to sleep at nights. We showed up at the house to find both women sitting outside, bibi (grandma) in her 90’s, shelling peas to sell to feed the family. (check out bibi's shelled peas right below the tin cup in the basket.)

The small one bedroom house was being shared by bibi, the mama, an adult child with a baby of her own, 1 child in school and 2 small children that were left in the mama’s care after their parents died of AIDS. We start the consult and she tells me she’s suffering from anxiety because of thoughts. “What’s worrying you mama?” “My daughter can’t go to school because she has no shoes, and I don’t have money to pay the school fees.” “No shoes?” The school fees I could understand because education wasn’t free, but no shoes? This shouldn’t stop a child from learning. I knew there were certain dress codes the schools held the children to. I’d see them after school in their identifying uniforms headed home playing together in the streets, but I never thought that not being able to meet the dress code by not having a pair of shoes could actually stop them going to school. What difference does it make what you wear as long as the child has an interest in learning? (Kids headed home in their uniforms)

This was one of those times I was silenced by the complexity yet simplicity of my African experience. In the end I wound up buying the shoes, they were second hand and cost me about 5 bucks, and giving the mama the money for the school fees worked out to be about $18. It was hard to know that for such a small expense a child was being deprived of an education. Now that I’m back home, I get up in the morning and start my day with the thought of what to wear, go to my closet overflowing with shoes and choose the one that best matches my outfit. Sometimes I can’t help but wonder about the little girl who had no shoes while my closet overflows with the many I haven’t worn in years, something I take for granted. I often think of her mama too, shelling peas, the only source of income for the family. It’s pushed me to try to do something to help while home. I’m challenging you to help me make this difference by donating your unwanted shoes no matter the condition or the era. Let’s get them outta the closets and to a 3rd world country where mama’s like this one can use them to start micro businesses to feed their families and send their kids to schools. It also gets some feet covered in things other than old tires and smashed down plastic bottles. My ship date is August 1st 2013. Please contact me if you’d like to donate your shoes. Camrhyian1@yahoo.com

December already?

This December has been a whirlwind of activities and we're not even at Christmas yet!
We have been thru 5 birthdays thus far since the end of November (My brother Miguel, my Mum, sister Jessica, daughter Camela and brother Tom), and we will finish off the year with my son Ian's birthday and begin the new year with mine.

Unfortunately, December saw me laid up in the hospital for a few days with a pulmonary embolism which was treated conventionally, with about a million test and medication for the next several months, as well as homeopathically and I'm on the upswing now, but this does mean I'll have to postpone my trip back to Tanzania till May when I'm finally given a clean bill of health, (which really means taken off conventional medication), by the doctors.
On a lighter note, we have a visitor from Tanzania who is spending the holidays with us and the kids are happily learning a few words of Swahili. My youngest daughter is learning a Swahili song at school and told me "Dont worry mom, if he doesn't speak any English, I got this, I know Swahili!" glad to have a translator among us. :)
It's been pretty interesting to see our visitor struggle with the concept of Santa Clause, as this part of the Christmas tradition seems to be foreign to his culture. How to explain Santa to someone who has no concept of him....why, you sit him down to watch the movie The Santa Claus with Tim Allen of course! It was a priceless moment when I saw the dawning of the magic of Christmas wash across his face.

Although I am sad I won't be headed back to Tanzania in February as originally planned, I am grateful for the extra time it gives me to continue raising funds and awareness about homeopathy and the volunteer work I'm involved in with Homeopathy for Health in Africa.

Don't forget there is still time to give a end of year donation, and the best part is you can claim it on your taxes!
Have a very Happy Holidays and a Wonderful New Year!