Sunglasses and Tippy Taps

Sunglasses and Tippy Taps

While we were in that same village of Mino Geltie giving Uree the wheelchair, we had another fun thing happen. I had brought along some sunglasses donated by our friends Adele and Francois (Thanks, Atlas in Africa) I offered a pair to a Hamer women who looked at them suspiciously, then let me put them on her face. A big smile lit up her face! Then, ALL the women wanted a pair!  It was so much fun, and I’m sure you will agree that these are some pretty ‘hip’ Hamer women now!

Last October, our two visitors from America (Jen and Lauren) came with us to Turmi and conducted a Health and Sanitation training session for about 30 Hamer women in Mino Geltie. They taught some basic sanitation ideas like hand washing with soap and water.

They also built a Tippy Tap to demonstrate how they can sparingly use their precious water and still wash hands properly. If you don’t know what a Tippy Tap is, go to our website and check it out. www.projectethiopia.net

Anyway, while on this last trip to bring out the wheelchair, I checked up the women to see if any of them had followed through on the previous training. I was happy to see that 5 of them had already built their own Tippy Taps next to their houses. They proudly showed them off to me and told me that their families now used them regularly, but unfortunately, now there is no soap available in the market. So they are using wood ash and water. Next time I am bringing several boxes of soap for them!