Sep 26, 2019
We are in the middle of the busy period of granting school and university scholarships for the new academic year. You can imagine the feeling in the air: there is a lot of commotion, meticulously organized, but a lot of commotion nonetheless. There are happy and satisfied faces all-around: on the mothers, on the boys and girls receiving the scholarships, and, of course, on us, who have the privilege to bestow them. But the reason why one mother was four days late to pick up the scholarship for her daughter has triggered an anxiety that I’m having trouble overcoming.
Aug 29, 2019
It’s not that at FAR we are alarmists, or repeaters or shocking headlines. We have written and sent hundreds of posts over this past decade with the sole purpose of helping the Friends of Rimkieta make sense of what’s going on over there…
Jul 31, 2019
The start of the rainy season, around May or June, marks the beginning of the new tree planting. And like every year, when it’s over, Jacques – the project leader – reports on how it went. I love how he recounts it, with the depth and seriousness with which he works, and that all of us try to apply. I’m sharing it with you today.
Jun 28, 2019
The father of a friend of mine passed away a couple of days ago. I want to believe that an autopsy would rule out the reason why he – overnight, without any previous symptoms of illness – was said to have died: a “wak” (evil eye) from a family member with whom he was having a dispute over land-property.
May 31, 2019
We’ve been dealing with a very, very delicate case for the past few months: that of AK – a girl from our “Education for unschooled girls” project. She was sexually abused by a neighbor who ran the shop where she habitually went to buy the little daily purchases her family needed.
