Q&A with a Boy Named Gift

What is your favorite part of sponsorship?

My favorite part of sponsorship is when I receive things. My favorite was a set of pots I recently got. My mum was very excited and happy to have new pots.

What is your best memory about coming to the community center?

I was happy the first day I was allowed to read the the nice books on the shelves in the library.

What would you like to tell your sponsor?

I would like my sponsor to see my books and also visit my school and see how well I am performing - all because of her help.

Photo and reporting by Clementina Chapusha, Communications Coordinator in Lusaka, Zambia.

A Fighting Chance

Does the name “Marcia Brady” ring a bell in your mind? You might be interested to know that the woman millions of people remember as Marcia Brady of “The Brady Bunch” fame traveled to Africa recently on behalf of Children International.

CI team members Gretchen Dellett, Scott Cotter and I were in Africa with “Marcia” (Maureen McCormick) and her husband, Michael. They were gracious traveling companions who truly connected with the needy children of Lusaka, Zambia. In this piece, Gretchen reflects on Maureen’s visit.

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A Fighting Chance
Posted on behalf of Gretchen Dellett

“I think about that hug every day.”

You can hear the emotion in Maureen McCormick’s voice as she recalls an emotional embrace with Mary, a 14-year-old orphan she met on her recent trip to Zambia, Africa. It’s evident as you speak to her that the journey – and the people she met – profoundly impacted her life.

The well-known actress and television personality spent ten days in Zambia on behalf of the nonprofit humanitarian organization Children International.

Maureen visits with Mary (left) and her sister, Manase.

Maureen met many children during her visit, but Mary, in particular, touched her heart. Although Mary is only 14, she has known a lifetime’s worth of pain and loss. Three years ago, Mary’s parents died of AIDS, leaving her in charge of her four younger siblings.

Each day, Mary wanders the nearby neighborhoods, looking for household work that may bring a little money for food. Her siblings also seek work. When that fails, as it often does, they beg on the streets. There are days when they eat nothing.

As Maureen took a tour of Mary’s barren home, she could hardly believe what she was seeing. The five children live in a cramped room with only a tattered, foam mattress and dirty blankets to sleep on. “Wow,” she said. “They could really, really benefit from Children International.”

Through an interpreter, Mary told Maureen of the difficulties they face. “I feel more like a mother than a sister,” she admits. “It’s been really difficult. I can’t afford food for them, or to send them to school.”

As she listened, Maureen shook her head in disbelief. “I have a daughter, and I just can’t even imagine her, you know, at this age, doing what Mary’s doing,” she said. Impulsively, she reached out to Mary and hugged her. Mary’s eyes filled with tears as she felt what had been missing in her life for three long years: a mother’s touch. “It was a moment I’ll never forget,” Maureen said.

When Maureen departed Zambia, she left Mary with far more than just a warm embrace: she and her husband, Michael, gave Mary the gift of their sponsorship.

Sponsors have also been found for Mary’s siblings. Now, as sponsored children, all five have access to Children International’s nearby community center, where they can receive medical and dental care, educational assistance, emergency food, vocational assistance and perhaps most importantly for these young orphans… attention and support from caring adults.

Maureen and Michael have already helped put new beds in Mary’s household, and they look forward to being a part of her life – and giving her a fighting chance to rise above the poverty and sorrow that has marked her young, difficult life.

If you’d like to discuss this post with other Children International sponsors, why not join the Children International Google Group?

Read more about Maureen McCormick and Children International.

What it Means to Be Alone

I just returned from nearly three weeks in Lusaka, Zambia, where my colleagues and I spent many hours working in the desperately poor communities of Chibolya and Kanyama. Children International’s community centers have made a remarkable difference in the less than four short years we’ve had a presence there.

One of the most touching stories I encountered was that of Mary and her four younger brothers and sister: Mwanza, 12, Clever, 9, Manase, 7, and Lavmo, 5. Mary is just 14, and she’s been both mom and dad to her siblings for nearly as long as any of them can remember.

These five children live completely alone. No relatives care for them. In fact, when their mom died and left them the tiny shack where they live, their relatives showed up just long enough to take whatever furniture was in the house and then left the children to fend for themselves.

One of Children International’s volunteers lives nearby, and she does what she can to look after the children, who survive any way they can. Mary goes through the neighborhood looking for opportunities to wash dishes or do laundry for her neighbors, and the older boys, Mwanza and Clever, roam the streets looking for odd jobs or just begging for food.

The day before we visited these orphans, Clever had gone to the city market to beg. When darkness fell, it was too dangerous for him to go home – so he slept all night in a ditch in the city market. Nine years old.

We’re excited because we’ve found sponsors to help Mary, Clever and Manase get on the right track. You should have seen Mary’s smile when she realized she would be able to fulfill her dream of going back to school!

But we still need to help Mwanza and Lavmo. Would you consider sponsoring one of them today? It’s bad enough to be a child living in desperate poverty…but it’s even worse to be all alone.

If you’d like to sponsor one of these children, please drop an email to blog@children.org. We’ll handle your sponsorship personally.

Photo by Scott Cotter.

Thanks, Annie and Sara!

Posted on behalf of Kevin Fleming.

When 12-year-olds Annie and Sara discovered the harsh realities of life for some African children from their 7th grade religion teacher, they had to ask themselves, “What can we do about this?”

“When we heard about kids with AIDS, malaria or malnutrition, we decided to do something good,” explains Sara.

For inspiration, they had to look no further than their own wrists and to the neatly woven thread bracelets they wore. They decided to create bracelets and sell them to their friends for $1 apiece. The bracelets only take about five minutes each to create – a job Annie and Sara really enjoy.

Their bracelets came with the message that more could be done to attack the problems that plague other children around the world.

A school wide bazaar provided yet another way to market their wares and raise not only money, but also awareness. They added earrings and cookies to their offerings – and made $80 in all (so far)!

They decided to donate the money to Children International and help support our work in Lusaka, Zambia. Children International – Zambia has over 200 sponsored children who have been identified as being malnourished, and 80 of these are HIV-positive.

Annie and Sara’s kind donation is going toward the purchase of new cups, plates and utensils to better serve the nutritious meals that volunteer mothers prepare at the community center three times a week.

When I Grow Up...

"I want to be a a bus driver because I want to take people everywhere they want to go." – Himutinta, age 8, from Lusaka, Zambia.

New Hope in Zambia

This past Friday marked the opening of our latest Children International community center, located in the impoverished neighborhood of Chibolya, in Lusaka, Zambia. A number of distinguished guests attended the festivities, including the Patrick Olson family, Jodie Emmett and various Zambian dignitaries -- including the vice president of Zambia, Rupiah Banda. Clementina Chapusha, our communications coordinator in Lusaka, wrote the following account of the inauguration ceremony:

"The newly built David Emmett Community Centre in Zambia’s Chibolya compound was a hive of activity on Friday when people from all walks of life met to witness the official opening of the centre.

Among those in attendance were children, parents/volunteers, sponsors, government officials, heads of departments and institutions, the mayor of Lusaka City, the area member of parliament, CI staff and the vice president of Zambia, Rupiah Banda.

As a way of showing their appreciation, the children performed a lot of dances and recited poems, much to the amazement of the crowd. The children highlighted the need for government and its cooperating partners to work together in the fight against diseases such as AIDS which had left most of them orphaned.

The sponsors were also taken by surprise as they did not expect to see what they were seeing during the inauguration. Guest of honor Patrick Olson was visibly touched by the performance from the children and their plea to the public about their rights.

The sponsors then joined the children in their dance to show the children that they were loved and therefore were not alone.

Zambia’s vice president, Rupiah Banda, could not hide his joy.

‘There is something very unique about Children International and I think it is important to acknowledge this publicly. The funds this non-profit organization uses for such programmes, including the construction of this centre we are opening today, come from ordinary people in America who give willingly without wanting anything in return.”

The vice president then asked the sponsors to stand and be recognized for their benevolence.

After the inauguration ceremony, the mayor of the City of Lusaka, Stephen Chilatu, invited the sponsors and CI's vice president for development and marketing, Brian Anderson, to his office to sign the visitors’ book.

Brian Anderson took this opportunity to appeal to the mayor to assist CI with acquisition of land for the third centre."

The Children International David C. Emmett Center is bringing new hope to thousands of poor children in Zambia. We extend our sincere thanks to all who have worked and contributed to make this and other centers like it around the world possible.

Zambian Vice President Rupiah Banda cuts the ribbon.


Vice President Banda (center) poses with the children and the guests of honor.


The children presented some typical Zambian dances, and some of the guests joined right in.

Zambian Enterprise

Posted on behalf of Clementina Chapusha

Just a five minute drive from the beautiful, modern and well-kept streets of Lusaka’s town center is Chibolya. To visit this place would make one think they have suddenly gone back in time. Chibolya is a dusty, overcrowded shantytown where people live in abject poverty. It’s amazing that in just five minutes people can live such different kinds of lives.

Children International has been in the Lusaka region of Zambia since 2003. Over 6,500 children receive benefits and badly needed services, like dental care and educational aide. The demand for Children International’s services is so immense in Zambia that Children International is constructing its second area center in Chibolya. Around 1,900 children have enrolled even before the center has even opened. Until the new center opens, the children in the area and their parents walk four kilometers to get to the Kanyama Service Area Center for CI services.

Problems abound in Chibolya. Even greater than the hunger for food in this community is a hunger for opportunity. To really fix poverty, people must have access to work. When work is not there you must create it. With this in mind a brainstorm was initiated. Parents of sponsored children (who are also committed CI volunteers) organized themselves into a group of twelve. They united to find ways improve their economic situation and help motivate each other.

The idea of a chicken-rearing project was conceived. With the help of local Children International staff a business plan was written and a request for funding was made. The volunteers were awarded a total of US$1,000 from Children International’s micro-enterprise grant program. Their idea was now able to hatch.


They began their project with 200 broiler chicks in a small rented building, which they used as a chicken run. They secured a source for food and clean water and medicines to keep the birds healthy.

Children International has encouraged the team and inspired them to work hard towards making their project a success. Christine Nantufya is a chairperson for the group; she explains how they would like this great opportunity to grow. “This project will help all the parents who have children on the CI program. It is a group project, but after making profit we intend to give individual loans for individual businesses to empower ourselves.”

These new business people take tremendous pride in their chickens. They take tremendous pride in their new skills. All the volunteers are undergoing training in bookkeeping, entrepreneurship and proper chicken care. They have opened a bank account with a recognized bank. The account will have three signatories comprised of two volunteers and their field officer.


The project has already experienced success. The group of twelve has sold all of the 200 chickens they started with. 250 chicks have been purchased for the next round.

Clementina Chapusha is Children International’s communications coordinator in Lusaka, Zambia.

Children International in the News

The Matriarch of Mushrooms
by Damon Guinn

A metamorphosis like the one transforming mushrooms into income and extra food for Elizabeth's family is also changing the role of women in Zambian society....

Read the full article here.

(Photo) Elizabeth Mwiinga of Kanyama, Zambia, harvests homegrown mushrooms as part of a micro-enterprise project through Children International. Photo by Greg Tobey

A Party for Lizzy

As a photographer for Children International, I’ve met hundreds -- if not thousands -- of sponsored children around the world. I was excited to learn that my next assignment would take me to Lusaka, Zambia, where I would meet my own sponsored child, Lizzy, for the first time.

I became Lizzy’s sponsor last summer after my sponsored child of 13 years, Karl, graduated from the sponsorship program. Upon realizing that I would be in Lusaka on her birthday, I started planning how I could make this special day for Lizzy.

When I met 6-year-old Lizzy at her aunt's home, she was quiet and shy. Her mother had passed away only a few months earlier and her father was no longer around. She now lives with her aunt and cousins, who have taken Lizzy and her siblings into their own family. With so many children who’ve been orphaned due to AIDS and forced to live on the streets, I was comforted by the fact that her family was caring and she had a safe place to call home.

I arrived in Lusaka hoping for two suitcases to come off the plane, but found that only one had made it to Zambia with me. Although clean clothes would’ve been nice, I was thankful it was the suitcase full of gifts that my friends, family and I had purchased and carefully packed for Lizzy and her family. It would be five days before the suitcase with clean clothes would finally catch up with me!

Later, we arrived at the new CI community center for an afternoon of birthday fun. The staff had cheerfully decorated one of the rooms and had snacks and treats for everyone to enjoy. With her first birthday party ever in full swing, the cake and gifts arrived and Lizzy’s face glowed with smiles. And so did mine...for I had received the best gift of all...a huge hug from Lizzy.

Posted on behalf of Greg, a long-time Children International photographer who has traveled around the world capturing the essence of our sponsored children and their communities in hopes of giving sponsors a glimpse into our children's daily lives. Look for more from Greg next week as he, Damon (a staff writer for Children International) and I travel to Honduras.