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May Menstrual Health Pilot Workshop is a Success!
“The best one yet!” says OCF Executive Director, Mrs. Josephine Barclay. “Life-changing!” say the participants. Some girls walked an hour to school as usual in the Liberian town of Salayea on Friday, May 17th. What was different was that, for the first time, these 150 girls in grades three through nine excitedly assembled at the town hall for a day of workshops on Menstrual Health. Each student received a free lunch of […]
Salayea A Trip Up Country
Beth Holtam Remembers Salayea – In 1958, Our Board Advisor Emerita, Beth Holtam, and her husband Jordan, visited the town where our next project will take place. Fifty-five years later, Salayea is still a remote town, a six- or seven-hour drive from the capital in the best weather. The Lutheran Training Institute burned down in the civil war. Today, it is a vocational day school.SALAYEA: A TRIP UPCOUNTRY!It was 1958, and Jordan […]
The Glen Ellyn Rotary Foundation’s Donation Makes a New Oven Possible!
A Big Valentine for My Heart’s AppealA Commercial Oven on OrderFebruary began with the John Mulherin, Chair, Glen Ellyn Rotary Foundation, announcing that $16,000 is available for the commercial oven project put forward by International Neighbors, Inc. The vocational baking and coffee shop hub of My Heart’s Appeal Center, Monrovia, Liberia, will be the recipient of a propane fueled, California built, convection oven, along with installation and training costs.It was after midnight […]
A Surprise Donation From the Aurora AAUW Helps Liberian Period Education
Aurora AAUW Surprises International Neighbors Donates 5 Full Boxes of Sewn Feminine Hygiene Kits Our Friend and INI supporter, Tracey Sherman-Falcon, of the Aurora AAUW, phoned a few weeks ago to ask if International Neighbors could use Feminine Hygiene Kits available from the Aurora Rotary Club. We said YES! And a short time later Tracey delivered five boxes. Soon, the beautifully sewn kits will be ocean freighted to the non-profit, Our Children […]
The Devil and Jordan’s Magic Box
By Beth Holtam Photo by Willie A. Whitten / Indiana University Liberian Collection Jordan’s mother came to Liberia to visit us three times; first, with Gran-Gran, his dad, at Christmas of 1959. She was called by the children “Greene- mama”; Greene was her maiden name. Next, she came soon after Raleigh was born in January of 1962, when the family had moved into the house next door to the Cuttington Chapel. And […]
Books and Barrels
Like me, you have probably never thought of barrels of books. Wine, beer, pickle or cracker barrels–but never books – that is, unless you are a former Peace Corps Volunteer and early childhood educator like Sia Barbara Kamara. She has sent multiple barrels of books to the WE-CARE Foundation. Modern resin barrels, we learned, are watertight and sturdy; the perfect shipping container. The blue ones are are food-safe. Therefore, these are especially […]
Dunstan Coins a Phrase
My story comes from Bolahun, Liberia days, when I was needed to teach a 9th grade class. The class was mostly boys, who teased the few girls every time they tried to get a word into the class discussion. I worked on that from the start, but it had been the way of the culture. The boys were smart, mischievous, and ebullient. In American English, the students would have been called “bright”, […]
Ending Period Poverty in Liberia
I’ll tell You My Story—Ending Period Poverty in Liberia By Nancy Hopkins Keep Girls in School In Liberia, several generations have now had their education disrupted by twelve years of civil war, Ebola and COVID. Poverty is widespread. When one high school principal realized that girls were falling behind because they skipped school when they lacked sanitary pads, or went home with stained skirts, she did something about it. She turned the […]
An Oven Story
An Oven Story to Warm Your Heart! In December, Herbert and Nancy Hopkins, two of our board members, had the opportunity to visit Lovetie and Burke Major at this amazing non-profit in the outskirts of Monrovia, Liberia in West Africa. Over ten years, they have created a school with a community coffee and bake shop to train people with intellectual disabilities (mostly Down’s Syndrome). In the small kitchen, students bake bread in […]