Selling Selling Selling!

We are now entering the third month of the program. I think we have made a lot of progress so far and am very happy with how things are going. I hope that this next month we can continue moving forward with the classes and small businesses. 

As of now, everyone has sold at least a handful of products to not only the staff here at Shelter, but volunteers, visitors and even people in town. It has been quite and experience going into town and trying to sell things. They have learned that its not easy to sell things to strangers. They found out that you need some tough skin because not everyone is going to respond nicely to them. Some people are very rude and will just ignore them as they try to talk/sell to them. But, there are also people who were friendly and even if they didn't buy something they wanted more information about the program. There have also been a few who said that they wanted to come to Shelter and see what our project is all about. We even had people who didn't want to buy anything but wanted to donate. It has been a very interesting process and I am learning a lot as well. 

We are doing the best we can without a vehicle. I didn't realize how hard it would be living so far from the city without our own car. By not having one it takes away from a lot of the socialization programs I wanted them to do, thus not giving them the full transition experience. I'm hoping that we can raise enough money soon to purchase something so that the girls can be fully prepared and aware of what to expect once they live out on their own. 

Other than that, all is well. I have been bad about posting blogs and videos and I'm sorry about that. I will try and force myself to sit down for two seconds each week and post something, even if it is short. Thanks for all the support, the girls and I really appreciate it!

Until next time!

Social Worker

Hello again!

I hope all is well in the States, everything is going great out here! All the girls are still working hard on their small businesses. We are currently looking for places to sell our products. We would love to get a shop of our own, but there are no places available. So, until we can get a place of our own, we are looking to see if we can share some space here. The big problem is that everyone and their mom has a non-profit/charity that they are trying to sell their items just like us. Hopefully we will find something soon! 

Last week we went out and got three of the girls that have ID's, saving accounts. Since they had worked  two and a half weeks for their jobs here at Shelter, they all got paid. They were all so excited to get money of their own that they earned. That day I had arranged for us to go to the bank and get saving accounts so that their money would be safe. The program requires them to put at least 50% of all earnings in to their saving accounts. Since only three of them had ID's, and you need an ID to get a bank account, they paired up with their small business partner for an account until the others get their ID's. 

I figured that they would all put the bare minimum 50% in the account but come to find out almost all put between 75%-90% in. It was so great! I keep reminding them that this program is for their future, so everything they do, they need to take that in consideration. I'm happy to see that speech is working!

In other news, Social Worker Mary is back! For those of you who don't know her, she has been the social worker here for quite a number of years. She has been gone these past few months on maternity leave. She is now back with her two month old son Jerry. He is so cute and I love him. 

So now that she is back, we have decided that she will help out with Karama House at least three days a week. This is very very good news! As much as I love doing all of this, I still need help. She is great and knows a lot more about all the girls than I do. It will be so nice to have a partner in all of this. I feel like things will move faster and smoother. We have a Social Worker!! YAY!! 

I think that is all the news for now. I will make sure and post some more next week.