Helen's Story

This month we are focusing on the individual people involved in the ministries that New Hope Initiative supports. We often report on our work in the Nairobi area slum called Kibera. There are so many areas of progress we could report on, but we want to focus on a great blessing in the life of one of our New Hope Primary Students.

In Kenya, as in any culture, adolescent girls face the pressure of conforming to standards of beauty and physical appearance.  Helen Blank is no different from most of the girls her age. Two years ago, Helen (12) attempted to pierce her own ears. However, it did not go as planned and she developed a tumor on her earlobe. This tumor grew rapidly until it was the size of a golf ball. At an age when young ladies are often very shy and self-conscious, this was a very difficult burden for Helen to bear.  She is a beautiful young lady, with an infectious smile, but Helen began to cover her ear at all times and almost never allowed people to see that side of her face. While a curable problem, the cost of the outpatient procedure required was too costly for her family.

In the midst of these trying circumstances, many of our team members have taken a great interest in Helen over the last two years and have loved her throughout the challenge. We are so happy to report that in September, through the new medical clinic program in Kibera, we took Helen to an outpatient clinic and the doctors removed the tumor. You can see the dramatic difference in the before and after photos. We are so excited for this blessing in Helen's life and we are thankful for our New Hope Initiative team that helped make it happen.

Hearing Im(re)paired

As we focus on the ministry of New Hope Initiative we primarily report on the progress at our individual projects. These reports general give updates on the progress of our works as a whole. However it is extremely important to remember that it is individual people with names, faces, and personal needs that are ultimately the ones benefited by our work. We haven't reported recently on our special needs orphanage in India and the progress for that center, as a whole, is very encouraging but I want to focus today on one very encouraging story. Thirteen your old Malik came to our special needs orphanage outside of Hyderabad India one year ago. He was brought by his frantic mother who could not afford to raise him nor did she have any ability to cope with his hearing disability. Malik's father had abandoned the entire family because in his misguided religious belief he considered Malik's hearing loss to be a curse on his family from the gods. Malik had never had anyone work with him to help him overcome his challenges. He could not speak, he could not do sign language, he had little formal education, and only communicated with self taught rudimentary gestures.

Our staff at the orphanage instantly recognized the extraordinary ability that this young man possessed and began to work with his academic and social skills. The Indian government has a correspondence course for hearing impaired children and Malik immediately began to fly through the regiments. He finished entire grades in the matter of weeks and immediately proved through technology to be an academically gifted young man.

In September, New Hope Initiative traveled to India along with a team from Sagemont Church in Houston TX. Our team was immediately impressed by the amazing personality and obvious ability of this now 14 year old young man. One of our team members had read about the large number of children in India who were categorized as non hearing that actually had never been properly tested, so immediately we began to make plans to take Malik to a hearing center. He was excited and a bit nervous to travel into the big city of Hyderabad to be properly tested at a center. Our team was amazed to learn after a few short tests that Malik had some hearing in BOTH ears and would greatly benefit from hearing devices. Can you imagine a young man living his entire life robbed of the joy of sound because he never had access to the few hundred dollars it would take to have his hearing tested and corrected?

The truth is that even though our team was able to pool their funds and easily pay for this procedure, it was such a significant amount of money in Malik's world, that it would have forever relegated Malik to a soundless world if it had not been for New Hope Initiative and our supporters.

Malik's journey will still be a challenge. He has no experience with sound or any ability to process the noises he is now hearing for the first time after 14 years of life. However we are very confident in his ability and in his passion to overcome his challenges and we believe that Malik's journey to a productive fulfilling life is just beginning. Behind every school, clinic, orphanage, or other project that NHI operates please remember there are scores of Maliks whose lives are being impacted and futures dramatically altered because you care.

A Word From The Directors

We are just finishing our very busy summer travel season and have had the pleasure of hosting 10 teams since late May! Every group has brought something special to the table and we have seen the work progress in nearly every facet of ministry. I am always amazed at the incredible heart, passion, and talents of the ministry partners God sends us. These trips are more than just mission vacations, but are vital to the ongoing work of New Hope Initiative. Without question our greatest tool in expanding the work of NHI is our short - term exposure experiences. The vast majority of our trips are group-specific trips where a church, school, or other organization brings a team from a single entity. However, in January we are going to have two open enrollments trips to Africa. From January 8 to 17, 2013 we will open enrollment for a trip going to the Kibera Slum of Nairobi, Kenya. The second trip will be to our NHI orphanage in Sierra Leone West Africa. This trip will be from January 17 to January 27, 2013. Both of these trips will be life-changing experiences. If you are interested in more details, contact Sandy Baird at s.baird@newhopeinitiative.org.

By Sandy and Karen Baird - Directors of New Hope Initiative

Construction Boom

During the past few weeks, two New Hope Initiative projects in East Africa saw construction of vital facilities accelerate at an incredible pace. We are currently about 60% complete on a large new wing for our medical center in Arusha, Tanzania. This new wing will house the very first charitable x-ray service in all of northern Tanzania. In addition to the x-ray facilities, the second level of our new building will also house an expanded lab and diagnostic section. This allows us to offer a greater range of services at much faster speeds. When we move the lab from its current position in the main wing, we will have the space to add a third doctor, increasing our capacity to see more patients on a daily basis. This is an exciting new development for our medical center and will double our usable square footage. We would ask you to pray for this project, as we are currently about $25,000 dollars short of the needed funds to bring the project to a timely completion.

Our second major project this summer is the completion of our new church construction in Kibera. The facility was under roof and usable last fall, however code restrictions in Nairobi have prevented the Kibera congregation from fully utilizing the building. This summer we added flooring, finished carpentry, painted, installed a septic system, and finished the Pastor's housing in the basement. The facility is now 90% complete and we are excited to report that the Kibera church is now using the facility on a weekly basis. We are thankful for the help that several of our summer teams brought to this project. It is exciting to see the ministries in both Arusha and Kibera going forward in these tangible and visible ways.

By Sandy Baird - Director of New Hope Initiative

A Little Girl Named Irene

Irene has lived her entire 12 years in a small village in northern Tanzania. Her community is rurally poor, however her family provides a loving and happy environment for young Irene.  When her health began to rapidly decline in June, the tranquility of Irene's family shattered. Her mother took her to a local clinic, but their lack of expertise and her family's financial situation prevented her from receiving the required treatment. As Irene's strength continued to fade, her mother became increasingly desperate, fearing for her little girl's life.  She made the decision to try a clinic 2.5 hours away in Arusha where, according to the talk, the facilities and staff were excellent and where you could be treated even if your financial resources were meager. Irene and her mom took the arduous bus journey, made even more difficult by her severely weakened condition. They arrived at New Hope Initiative’s Clinic in the Olorien neighborhood of Arusha, where she saw Dr. Byemba and his staff immediately. Following in-house blood work, she was diagnosed with malaria, a urinary tract infection, an amoeba, and an umbilical hernia. The staff gave her mother all the necessary medications and, for the first time in weeks, Irene’s mom was finally confident that her daughter would recover.

Little Irene’s dramatic story was 1 of 134 similar stories that day, of hopeless people receiving a healing touch from the amazing staff of New Hope Initiative’s Medical Clinic. Thank you, ministry partners, for saving little Irene and for making the ending of this difficult story a happy one.

By Sandy Baird - Director of New Hope Initiative