June 14, 2024

The soccer field mural is finished! Local Artists submitted their art contest entries and Boniface from the Maasai Market won. We think he has done a tremendous job. What do you think?

This very tall wall is to keep the soccer balls from going out into the road. Next comes the grass and water, bleachers, goal posts, bathrooms, and solar lights. This is going to be so wonderful for the boys, girls and women in our local area. There is even going to be a nanny’s soccer team! It will be available for community meetings as well.

Madeleine Bloom and her dad Michael Hart are holding Neema Village babies above while they watch the Saturday morning soccer game. Bless you Paul Pape for the dream of this soccer field and Madeleine Bloom, Shanna Kurtz and True North for making it happen.

My Michael had prepared scripture stakes that we hammered into each corner of the soccer field and prayed as we walked around the field for God’s protection over those who would play and watch the games.

Last Saturday we invited a hundred of our neighbors in for lunch. They took tours of the campus and held the babies and listened to the Neema Story. Our local village committee had advised us that the people around Neema did not know what we do, so we invited them in to see! Our new director, Angel is giving this tour, and with ten tours going all over campus it took most of the day! We fed lunch to about 150 people. What a day!

“Welcome Neighbors“

Our MAP houses are full and Heavenlight writes a new MAP Mom’s story:

Martha was forced by her uncle to get married to an 80yr old man after she had become pregnant and was abandoned by the father of her baby. The baby was born handicap so her uncle wanted to marry her off to an old Man. With no father a man will never marry a single mother with a handicapped child (it is a shame but they see these children as a curse to their family) so the family wanted to get rid of her by marrying her to that old man! Martha is 22yrs old, a mother of one little precious girl named Neema.

Martha’s mother didn’t want that to happen to her daughter but there was nothing she could do (women don’t have much say here) so instead she helped her daughter to escape to a friend’s home. The “friend” found a job for her in Arusha. Martha had to travel to Arusha but unfortunately she lost the contact of the person that offered her a job when she arrived. So she started walking around with her baby on her back in the middle of the night with no destination because she knew no one in Arusha. Fortunately she met Good Samaritans who took her to their village leader, the leader decided to come to Neema Village for help and she is now a MAP MOM staying in the MAP apartments.

She is attending classes here at Neema Village including reading and writing classes (she has never been to school) and also sewing classes, Bible classes and group therapy. Her daughter Neema is also going to our special needs Daycare. Both she and her daughter are doing very well, they both have the CUTEST SMILES ever (thanks to GOD they are able to smile now.)

A Big Thank You to people who sent new pajamas for the babies. We always bring baby clothes in our suitcases when we return and it is hard to send personal Thank You notes from Africa but please know that we do appreciate every thing you send for these precious babies and moms.

We have always said Neema Village is a place of Forgiveness and Hope but it is also a place of great beauty as Maria shows off our golden arch of Pyrostegia. Maria is pretty much a beauty too!

Just in case you like many of our neighbors do not know what we do here at Neema Village, this is Liam today (on the left) and when he arrived here in December 2023 (on the right).

Keeping Up with your Baby

And did you know that Neema Village has had over 450 babies who have come through our program and average between 50 to 60 babies each month living at Neema. Since we are not a large corporation and try to keep our administrative costs down our sponsors are notified of their baby’s progress by an overworked volunteer. But each baby has an album on Neema Village Facebook and Ashley Berlin does post an update 3 times a year on their album. It always has cute updated pictures which you can “save as” and put up on your fridge and a short paragraph of what is happening in your baby’s life. Many people do not have Facebook but Neema Village is a public site so you don’t have to join Facebook, you can just follow us and watch for your baby update. That would be a great help to us and I think you would enjoy following the many ways God is working at Neema Village. Bless you dear Sponsors!

May 20, 2024

We’re Home! It is always exciting to get back and see the new babies and moms who have come to Neema Village while we were gone.

Angel tells me we have 57 babies at Neema Village right now, with four tiny ones in isolation and all are orphaned, abandoned or at risk babies.

There are 16 moms in MAP Housing today, a bit over crowded but they are a great support for each other. We have 10 rooms and two moms can live in each room. These moms have been abandoned and abused with no hope and at Neema with the love of Christ they are finding Hope again.

Aren’t they beautiful in their new jean jackets? A Big Thank You to all the women in Texas and Oklahoma who donated their jean jackets to our MAP moms.

Do you remember Joari, the 15 year old girl that was supporting 5 people by working the streets and living in a lean-to shack a couple of years ago? The Christian Chronicle wrote a story about her. Yes that is Joari in the middle in the photo above. She is still too young to start a business but after a rough start she has become a Christian and is singing with the other girls at church. It is amazing to see a life changed like this!

If you remember this was the house, above, where we went with Erik Tryggestad to pick up Joari and bring her little family to Neema.

While we were in the States the water well drilling was going great. Scott Lockett you are awesome!!

Scott writes: This is a photo taken by Francois Uzale of the villagers at Simanjiro Village outside of Arusha getting water from their new well. They have installed a pump and are testing the water flow. It has to pump thousands of gallons before it completely clears up! You can tell they are eager for good clean water. Trust me this water is much cleaner than they usually get!! This is going to provide a major boost to their lives — by reducing the hundreds of hours spent collecting water.

We have a new baby, a Jersey bull which the staff has named Mr. Scott, I thought Pot Roast would be a good name but they chose Mr. Scott.

And another new baby came to Neema last week. His name is Johana and his mom died from an infection from childbirth out in a dusty Maasai village where there is no medical care. The first thing we teach our traditional birthers in the Save The Mothers classes is bring the moms in to the hospital please but the moms always prefer to birth at home. It is so sad that this little one will never know his mommy

Thank you to Kim White for all the hard work directing Neema Village while we were gone. If you have been at Neema with Kim you will know how phenomenal she is. And thank you to Saint Bruce White who supports her to come and direct Neema! I will leave you with this happy video of Lightness directing singing at church last Sunday. This amazing little girl has Spina Bifada but that does not stop her!!

May God’s Face shine upon you and give you peace.

Love, Michael and Dorris Fortson

April 29, 2024

Kim says the monsoons have come in gully washers this year. It makes the grounds at Neema Village beautiful but causes some major problems since Neema is built on the side of a hill.

The banana trees look good though don’t they.

Two walls, the retaining wall and the side wall of the soccer field, came down with all the heavy rains. Neema Village is at the top of the cliff in the picture below. Our chicken and cow barns are close to the edge of that cliff. We are praying the cow barn does not get washed over!

Along with the walls falling, the hospital where Michael had drilled a well had no water because the pump for the water well stopped working. Then the stove at the volunteer house blew up when Ritha tried to light the oven to cook the morning biscuits! It blew the stove out to the middle of the room and broken glass was flying everywhere. Thank God Ritha was not hurt. At the end of the day Scott Lockett’s comment was, “How do you get anything done here!”

Lazaro is four months old today. He is still in the isolation room. He has had a couple surgeries due to hydrocephalus. He is doing well, praise God, and continues to heal and get stronger. His family visited him before he had his fist surgery. Please continue to pray for this sweet boy’s health journey and future.

Kim and the Neema group traveled out to the Simanjiro area this month to do a Days For Girls program and to check the water well which Neema had drilled for them. They thought 50 young girls would show up but took food for 100. Around three hundred showed up!! Thankfully the loaves and fishes multiplied.

If we can save some of these sweet faces from having babies at 12 or 13 and dying in childbirth it will all be worth it. Our GIFT (Girls Informed For Tomorrow) program uses the Days for Girls format and three of our directors are certified to teach that program.

Maria’s Village asked if Neema could help a young mother who was released from the government hospital after giving birth to a very tiny baby, pictured with Kim below.

He is all head, tiny baby Masia was born weighing 1.3 kgs which is about 2.8 pounds. We will keep mama and baby at our emergency housing at the MAP apartments. Mom will kangaroo (skin to skin) with little Masia in an overly heated room which will act as an incubator. The other MAP moms will look after her and will cook her the rich bone soup all new mothers in Tanzania must drink after giving birth. Mama and baby will stay with us until Masia is healthy enough to return to his village.

Volunteers got to help with the Save the Mothers program for April. It was a younger group of twelve traditional birthers who came for a week this month so most of them could read. Later the volunteers went out to a Maasai village with Ester to check on some of the older Bibis who deliver babies and had been through the Neema STM program in the past.

Ester gave them a refresher course in safe delivery and they talked about the problems they have had and how many births or deaths they have had. She also took more gloves and items to help them in their deliveries. I wish you could hear them sing, it is so lively and beautiful. After the last STM session nine of the women decided to follow Jesus and wanted to be baptized.

Please pray for these sweet women that when they return to their villages they will be able to lead the life to which they have been called.

Our six big school girls were home from boarding school for Easter break this month and Lucia, Yacinta, Memusi and Zawadi along with a neighborhood girl named Heavenlight also made the decision to be Christ followers and were baptized. Ya’ll these are our babies!! Michael and I were crying. And someone told me years ago that they didn’t think keeping these babies was really mission work! Malikia, Maria, Jojo and Nengai are next.

I will leave you with this sweet photo of Liam who was like a little skeleton a few months ago when he came to Neema after the death of his mother. He has gotten so big and handsome while we have been gone. Doesn’t this just warm your heart!

Michael and I will be heading back to Africa in a couple of weeks. We have missed so much that Kim and Scott and Sarah have accomplished while we were in America speaking everywhere we could. It has been amazing to hear about the water wells, the paving, the remodeling and bookkeeping changes and all they have been able to get done while we were gone.

Please pray that God will Bless these three Mighty Warriors who work as volunteers without pay to save the babies and moms in Tanzania.

Africa is calling and it is time for us to get packed up and go relieve them!

Nakupenda Sana,

Bibi and Babu (Grandmother and Grandfather)

www.neemavillage.org

April 2, 2024

I know you have been wondering about something, let’s just get it out there, Ok? Michael and Dorris are getting old, is Neema Village going to continue into the future? Will this baby rescue center, saving babies like cutie pie Loretta below, go on into the future?

A Sister for Dorothy

Years ago in Neema’s early days a newborn baby, umbilical cord still attached, was left in a gravel pit. We prayed that the baby we named Dorothy would find a good Christian home and she did. A family with 3 boys wanted a little girl and they took Dorothy home. Now our baby Loretta above has become Dorothy’s little sister! Isn’t that the sweetest thing!

You might be asking, will all this baby sweetness continue into the future?

Years from now will mothers like Marianna who have been abandoned by their husbands, still be able to come to Neema and learn about a man named Jesus who has never abandoned them and take classes and learn to read and write and learn to sew and set up businesses to support their families and send their kids to school? Will the Mothers Against Poverty program, helping these lion hearted women of Africa change their world one woman at a time go on long into the future?

And Yes Marianna, above, made those cute dresses, sweet huh!

Will grandmothers who help birth babies out in their Maasai villages still be able to come to Neema and learn ways to help their mothers survive childbirth? Older women like Botoyo and Anna who came to a recent Save The Mothers week are deciding to give up FGM during their classes at Neema. The circumcision ceremony for young girls like Maria above was how they made their living so Neema is setting these two women up in a Better Bean Business. Saving lives is what this program is all about, will it continue?

And how about the free rehab daycare for babies like Bryson who began walking this year when doctors told us to buy a wheelchair he would never walk? This program makes everybody happy, even little Nasiri clapping his heart out for Bryson as he walks flat footed after surgery down the bars.

And the Neema water wells bringing water to thirsty people, and the GIFT programs training young Maasai girls to wait for marriage and babies, and our Foster Care/Boarding School program educating our big kids, and the new men’s conferences training men to be good fathers and husbands and the Neema Soccer field keeping young boys and girls off the streets and the bible classes for babies like Lightness learning her colors below; will all that continue long after we are gone?

Yes! God has got this! It has always been His work, not ours.

But if you have been wondering about the future of Neema Village we have some exciting news for you.

Our Legacy Fund is now open!

The 14 member Neema Village board, including Neema Directors Kim White, Kelle Samsill and Scott and Sarah Lockett, have now set up a way for you to contribute to the future of Neema Village. As a 501c3 non-profit, Neema Village is able to receive QCD (Qualified Charitable Distributions) which allows IRS holders to donate to a charity directly from their IRA – Tax Free! Th

The Legacy account will also allow donors to make gifts of stock and securities without adding to your tax burden by direct transfer into Neema’s Legacy fund. (Volunteer Directors Kim White and Scott and Sarah Lockett, Kelle Samsill not pictured below)

And a new interesting way to fund the future of Neema, you can will a house, a boat, a motor home, an RV, so that when you pass it will go directly into a Neema fund without probate or taxes!! Pretty exciting

We know God wants you to take care of your family first but after that remember the less fortunate and leave a legacy that will actually make a difference in the world!

Michael and I are in the States for a few more weeks, if you would like to talk about this email us and we can provide account information to help you make this happen. dorris@neemavillage.org

*And for future reference please put on your calendar an exciting event coming up, “Dining Out With Neema” on October 15, 2024.

Neema means Grace and any good that has been done and will be done in the future at Neema Village is always by the Amazing Grace of God!

Michael and Dorris Fortson

www.neemavillage.org

March 8, 2024

(Hang with me, its going to have a happy ending!)

Her name was Mary, she was a widow, 28 years old, with a baby she could no longer nurse, her breasts had gone dry and obviously she was starving.

This was her home or what was left of it, chunks of the mud caulking had fallen out between the sticks and the dust and wind blew continuously through the house.

She lay on the ground covered by a thin cloth, not wanting to see or be seen by a world too harsh to stay in.

Ester made her look up. Can you see it? It is the face of complete despair, all hope exhausted; youth, dreams, joy, plans, pleasures vanished like the smoke of her cooking fire, now empty ashes.

Too much? Sorry.

It’s not something we want to see or hear, it’s not one of our happy stories. But we hear it quite often now. The men leave the village looking for work in the towns and they never return and the women and children starve.

Ester our “Save The Mothers” director brought me pictures of Mary and asked if we could help.

She had left at 6am with some of our volunteers for a long, dusty trip out to a Maasai Village to check on the Bibis (Grandmothers) from one of our previous Save The Mothers classes.

It’s important to follow up after a few months to check how the Bibis are doing, how many babies has each one delivered, how many moms or babies did they lose, what were their ages and what were the complications, were they able to use the simple skills they had learned in our classes, etc…

And we had sent gifts and supplies to help them in their work. The Bibis were excited, each one wanting to tell their successes and some their losses.

Each month twelve Maasai traditional birthers come to Neema Village in Arusha for Save The Mothers.  It is our attempt to stop the high numbers of moms dying in childbirth and I think it is working. We have now had over 384 women come in for training.

Our first lesson for them is bring the moms in to the hospital! But they want to birth at home, women die in the hospitals, they say.

With little or no medical care during pregnancy, girls as young as 12 marry and get pregnant. They eat grass to make themselves vomit during the last three months so they will have small babies. Maasai women are tall and thin, narrow hipped and they’ve learned big babies kill.

And complicated by the Maasai practice of FGM, female circumcision, the chances of not making it through childbirth are high. Scar tissue does not stretch like normal skin so they rip and tear and bleed to death having a baby.

Too much again? Sorry, someone needs to know, someone needs to care.

And Ester cares, a Maasai herself whose been through all of it, early arranged marriage to an abusive old man, running away, scared, alone, trying to get free. We helped and she made it, now she tries to help her people. She cries as she tries to teach these grandmothers.

But today after this session out in the village they asked Ester to go to a hut with them to see a widow named Mary.

Can we help her, she asked me? How could we not, I asked.

More and more as we live our lives in this beautiful, blighted land of Africa we ask ourselves how did Jesus do this every day, hear these stories, continue to care, not throw up his hands and say it’s just too much?

What would He do? We know. He would help.

So, we sent Ester back out the next day to bring Mary in to Neema. Another long exhausting day for her and Kilele the driver. Later sitting on the couch in the baby home at Neema Village Mary was so weak she couldn’t stand by herself. We took her to the hospital and in a few hours, she had medicine and a drip in her arm.  Thank God, Another life saved.

We had sent Ester back out to pick up one woman but she brought in two. A pregnant woman in the village was so big she could barely walk and, on the way home they dropped her off at Maternity Africa.  But Maternity Africa wanted to trade her for another mom who had delivered twins in their hospital earlier and had no home to return to. So we have a new mom in our MAP program with little twins. I went to visit and mom wanted me to name her babies.

Babies Madeline and Michael Bloom, above, like little buds waiting to open, are named for Madeline Bloom who lost her husband, Michael, last year.

Madeline is on the right with her sister Molly with two Neema babies. The Michael Bloom Foundation in collaboration with “True North” is building a soccer field on Neema property to help young boys and girls and women have a place to play off the streets.

If you’ve been to Neema, the “Furaha Soccer Field” is right below the cow shed. We will paint soccer balls all over that wall. And we will have a women’s team with lots of Neema Nannies to work off their frustrations after a hard day playing with our babies!

It’s not all sad and depressing, our granddaughter, Maria, is Maasai, the last child of an eighth wife who died in childbirth. She is proud of her culture and loves to visit the simple life of her family out in the village. Like Maria and Ester, Maasai are beautiful. God made each culture in His image.

What’s Mary’s future, now that she has one, you ask?

We brought her back to Neema Village after a few days in the hospital to the MAP houses where she is being fed nutritious meals and where she has other women with similar stories to lean on. She is still skinny but she will attend classes where she will learn that God never lost sight of her. His love heals and one day we will set her up in a corn or rice business and she will return to her village. Hope restored.

Why do we do this you ask? Because Jesus would. He loves these beautiful Maasai women more than we do. Did you know that His longest discussion with a single person recorded for us was with a woman?

I wonder if her name was Mary.

February 14, 2024

Sweet little baby number five so far this year came to Neema just in time for Valentine day. His mom has severe mental issues and did not care to name him. Kiersten from Illinois was here and since the baby was born on her birthday she got to name him. She named him Christian. We love it.

Don’t worry sweet boy you are going to be so loved here and after a few months a new mommy and daddy will be found for you. Once again what evil meant for death, God meant for Life!

Summertime on the front porch at Neema. Somedays it is just too hot to be inside for a nap. It’s a full house with fifty-eight babies at Neema Village today.

Ester, the one in the green shuka, is the director/teacher of the Save The Mothers program. She is loved and respected by these Maasai women who come in for training. Esther is Maasai and has suffered through much of what she is now teaching these traditional birthers to avoid. I wish you could feel the excitement of these women as they go through their graduation ceremony.

It is loud and fun and wonderful!

When the twelve Bibis (grandmothers) spend a week at Neema they learn so much that will help their moms in their villages; from healthy eating so the moms can have healthy babies to how to extract a retained placenta. The Bibis say they go home with their heads too full. They are very proud of their certificates. Our latest Graduation was the 9th of February, 2024.

At the daycare for special needs babies, this is one happy little boy who got his very own wheelchair this month. The surgeon now says that it will not help Bryson to do surgery on his legs to make his feet go down and could make it worse. So Bryson is going to be the champion wheelchair driver of Arusha! Bryson’s dad has now finished his welding apprenticeship and is ready to start a business.

Juliana has been sad for a long time. She says alcohol has ruined her life and it is too late for her to have a good life now. She does not yet know the power of our God to repair broken lives!

Juliana is only 36 years old. She is our newest MAP mom and has just spent a year in an alcohol rehab center. She was HIV positive when her family abandoned her. She met a man at the meds clinic who was also positive and they bonded, fell in love and married. She tried to take her meds faithfully but their first baby died at birth and then a few weeks after having her second baby her husband died. She began drinking heavily, moved to the streets, lost everything including her son and finally some neighbors dragged her to Sober House where she has been in treatment for the last year. She has worked hard but was worried about where she could go when she was released.

Our Map Director Anna was at Sober house checking in another mom when she met Juliana and told her to call when she was released. Thank God she called. Juliana is learning to pray and learning that there is a God who has never forgotten her. She has never owned a bible but is now attending nightly bible classes in our MAP apartments and attends Christian based group therapy twice a week. Hope has come alive!

Now Juliana can’t stop smiling and saying, “Asante Sana,” Thank You!

For now she is staying busy helping at Neema with the day care babies. Hopefully in the near future she will begin business training and be able to start a business that will support her and her cutie pie little boy.

The Power of Hope is amazing isn’t it. “Without Hope life is a broken winged bird.”

We hope your day is filled with the great Giver of Hope, Jesus the Christ.

dorris and michael

www.neemavillage.org

January 16, 2024

I have been waiting on the end of this story and today I can tell you there is a happy ending. A few weeks ago Kim had gone out to check on five little kids who were living in a house by themselves with no adults. Iaisha, the biggest at ten, was taking care of her four siblings in a shack with no water, bathroom, kitchen or electricity.

“I’m not leaving here without them, Kim said. I don’t care if the police arrest me for kidnapping. These kids are coming with me. That is what I said and I meant it.

When I looked in those five little faces, I could see the loss, the abandonment. The oldest, Iaisha stares at the floor and mumbles “Mama comes every few days, mostly at night, with some shillings for us.” I can see it is just enough for a small bit of corn flour but surely not enough for all five of them.

Since Iaisha is the oldest at 10, she has been taking care of her brothers and sister. Her eyes are dark circles, weary as if she has lived too much life for her young years. She is made to clean the landlord’s house to pay the rent for their own tiny square of concrete floor. Then Iiasha goes in search of food for her little family. No point in looking for Mom to help, she has long since learned Mom doesn’t care.

The normal laughter of little children is eerily silent in this dirty hollow place. There is no light to show the sunken cheeks of hungry children. All thought of play is consumed by need, need for food, need for water, need for shelter. When they were given some bread and peanut butter, it was stolen by the landlord. So they sat, huddled together this little band of five waiting for nothing as they had come to expect.

There are no tears as we load them in the car. No one in the alleyway to say bye or have a good life, just nothing. Anywhere is better than here. They take nothing with them. There is nothing to take. I cried, all the adults cried, even the seasoned social worker cried.

Today I sit listening to giggles and squeals of these five children playing on the swings. The little band of five are all washed and fed and most of all safe and loved here at Neema Village. But what to do with them now, I wonder, we are a baby home and only take babies two and under? But for Iaisha, the little momma, I know we must keep her little family together.

Above at Neema, probably their first meal where “more” was an option.

Kim continues, “I could see each child was beginning to hope again. There is light in their eyes. It’s easier for the little ones. One year old Mo reaches for a hug. Four year old Amina gives a sweet smile and six year old Godbless is quick to laugh. It’s the two older ones, eight year old Shariff and our little mama Iaisha, who are more reserved. It’s hard to trust when you’ve never had someone to trust. But the light of hope is lit. I see a corner of a smile as I push her on the swing. Oh, what a sweet sight. I begin to cry again.”

Today they have a new mom, a new home a new school and three new brothers.

Mama Aneth, on the left, is one of our MAP moms. She was abandoned after her husband wanted to bring a second wife into the home. She said no, so he kicked her and her son out. Last week we found a nice big home to rent for her, her son and the five kids along with Meshack and Ema. We have also hired an Auntie to help her.

Thanks Cliff for putting their new beds together. The children have had no schooling to speak of but they are now in one of the better English schools in the Arusha district. Ashley brought some school supplies. They don’t have toys, books or enough furniture in the house but we bought a regular gas stove with four burners to help with the cooking.

For now it is enough to see the smiles and hear the laughter of happy children.

It is the Moment of Lift for these five. They have a chance now, education, food and God will make all the difference for them. This is your money at work in Africa. I wish we could give this moment to every child living without parents, under bridges, or on the streets but for now it is enough. We helped five today. Bless you for standing in the gap with us for them.

Michael and Dorris Fortson

Neema Village.

The Year that Was 2023

In 2023, thirty new babies came to Neema Village. Twenty eight babies went home with a family member or a Foster Care mom and eleven babies were adopted this year. Currently there are 59 babies living at Neema Village with 93 full time Tanzanian employees and on the campus of Neema they are still the only people paid. Numbers do not tell the story but maybe they will help as you read how God is working daily in Arusha, Tanzania, East Africa.

Like these precious water babies above each baby has a tragic story or we would not have them. As a registered and certified children’s home in Arusha, the babies are all assigned to Neema through the Arusha Social Welfare department. If you follow Neema Village on Facebook you have read the babies’ stories and been able to keep up with their progress on Ashley’s updates. Their intake stories are all on our website under see Neema Babies at www.neemavillage.org

Neema’s MAP (Mothers Against Poverty) program has grown to over 135 women who have gone through the MAP program. Like Linet who tells her story of being abandoned, pregnant and on the street at 18 but now has a thriving used clothing business, she encourages the other women to be strong and courageous.

Twenty three new moms joined the program and sixteen new businesses were born in 2023. Twelve Women’s Rights seminars were taught teaching African women that they have the right to inherit their corn, their cows, their land and they have the right not to be beaten. Ninety seven English classes and 105 Literacy classes were taught in the Preslar Mothering Center at Neema.

Business sessions to help women know how to do a business and keep records, and seminars like earring making and other business ideas were taught this year. Daily bible classes, sewing classes, and two weekly Bible Based Group Therapy sessions were added this year to help these women recover from the trauma they faced as they endured abuse and abandonment by the men and families who should have cared for them. Many of these women continue to struggle with problems but like Fetty, pictured above with her small shop, are working hard to overcome the addictions in their lives.

Twenty sewing machines were given out to women who finished the sewing classes at Neema this year.

The ten MAP apartments for women brought in off the streets remained full all year with women going through counseling, bible classes and business training. Women usually stay about 6 months in the MAP housing before they are ready to start a business. Like Florah who was pregnant at fifteen with her second baby and homeless, sleeping on a church bench when a friend brought her to Neema Village. Florah has now graduated from beauty school and is ready to start her hair styling business and will be checking out of the MAP housing soon.

Many of these women are giving their lives to Jesus as they learn about the powerful gifts He offers for forgiveness and hope through a life in Christ.

The Save The Mothers program teaching traditional birthers better how to save the lives of women out in Maasai villages held monthly sessions in the new conference center at Neema Village. One hundred and forty four grandmothers who help young women birth babies were added to the growing list of Neema’s trained traditional midwives this year. From how to deal with HIV patients, to the problems FGM presents to birthing mothers these grandmothers returned to their villages better able to save the lives of their women.

Four truck loads of food were delivered from Neema out to starving people in remote villages this year. Our first big medical mission was held out in Simanjiro with 4 to 500 people attending. Three doctors, Drs Pam Green, Steve Ruiz and David Dawson from the big Scott and White Hospital in Temple, Texas facilitated that work. A VBS for children was also held at that time.

It was probably the hardest, dirtiest yet most incredible single work we have done out in the remote villages of Tanzania.

Three GIFT programs were held this past year with three hundred plus young girls between 12 and 18 attending each session. Gift (Girls Informed For Tomorrow) modeled after “Days For Girls” is training young women to wait until older on marriage and having babies. Some of the babies living at Neema today lost their moms because the moms were thirteen to fifteen years old.

We all know that education is the single biggest indicator of children being able to lift from lives of poverty. Neema’s school program is becoming one of our bigger budget items. With 44 Neema children, like Meshack, Julius, Maria, Ema and Elesha in school this year, over $25,000 USD was sent to English schools around Arusha for our Neema children’s educations.

One of Neema’s sweetest programs is the free Rehabilitation Daycare for special needs babies. It is a bright and cheery place where the babies learn to walk and how to hold a toy and how to sit up by themselves and how to talk and then graduate out of the program. With a sensory room of bright colors and music, a therapy room, a room for naps, and an exercise room, we believe there is nothing else like it in all of Tanzania.

During 2023 the Day Care center graduated 12 children, like Editha above, who had learned to walk or aged out of the program. Twelve children are being supported in their homes with monthly food allowance and home visits. There are currently eleven babies enrolled in the program attending Monday through Friday. When babies like Lightness or Editha or PJ who seemed to have had no hope begin walking, running and talking we know God is still in the miracle business!!

After rebuilding the water drilling rig donated by friends from Nacogdoches, Texas, we are finally having success in drilling for water for thirsty people. We drilled seven wells this past year, 4 have been successful and three not yet. A member of parliament asked that we drill a water well for a school of 1,100 students which does not have water. They truck in water daily, can you imagine. This well is coming in today and it looks like it will have lots of beautiful, clear water for these school children. Praise God!

Volunteering has become an exciting and integral part of Neema’s program. A total of 247 volunteers came to hold the babies, share their faith, love the moms, see Africa’s beautiful game parks, and learn about other world cultures this past year. Two hundred and eleven volunteers were from the USA, four were from the UK, eight were from Canada, eight were from Australia, two were from Germany, one was from the Netherlands, three were from Sweden, six were from Italy and two were from Dar es Salaam. Short term missions change lives, it did ours.

Two new buildings were finished this past year on the Neema campus with the big Preslar Mothering center grand opening and the Hallelujah house, pictured above. The Hallelujah House was designed for special needs babies who have outgrown the baby home but have no other home. It also has room for our big school girls who come in from boarding school for school breaks.

God is busy in His world and there are many good projects going on around the globe. We hope you are involved somewhere. If not join us as we try to show God’s mercy and grace to the moms and babies of Tanzania.

As two retired 80 year olds, we cannot say thank you enough to those of you who love and support this work.

Michael and Dorris Fortson

www.neemavillage.org

December 15th, 2023

Sing along with me… “I’ll be home for Christmas, You can count on me…”

Our Christmas Photo of the year! Wishing you a Merry Christmas.

Eleven babies went home while we were in the States for a couple of months. Four of them were adoptions of abandoned babies. Just in time for Christmas I would think! It’s what we do best at Neema Village, putting families back together.

Quite a moving story, Kim writes: “About a year ago I began purposely praying for a family for our sweet, quite shy Anna. At 4 years old she is our oldest girl at Neema Village. We try our best to get the babies adopted by age two. For some reason Anna was just not being chosen, maybe because she was shy. Wednesday my prayers were answered.

Anna’s new mother told me an interesting story. She has two sons and wanted to adopt a daughter. She tried to adopt at several centers in southern Tanzania but they were poorly managed, paperwork was lost and the adoptions failed. She became discouraged that she would ever be able to find her daughter. Until she came to Neema Village! She had always said she would name her daughter Anna after her late mother. Then in walked our Anna girl and she knew why all the other adoptions had failed, there was her daughter. As I held Anna in my arms I told her, through my happy tears, that I loved her and I wanted her to keep Jesus in her heart always. Her new mother heard me and said her new brothers will sing songs about Jesus to her everyday. God’s timing is always perfect.” And a perfect ending too, Kim.

Naleku was one of a set of triplets born out in a Maasai village on Nov 20, 2022. We have lost count of how many triplets we have cared for, over twenty sets I’m sure. It’s the sweet potatoes! The Maasai triplet girls were very tiny and a friend brought the mom with the three little ones to Neema Village. We agreed to keep the two smallest for a few months and mom took the biggest triplet home. Mom came every month to check on the two little girls she had left with us. Nembris went home first but Naleku needed a few more months of Neema care. Finally she was strong enough to go home. Now together again!!

Jolly little Nickolaus was last year’s Christmas baby. In December 2022 his mom just walked out of the hospital and left him. This year for Christmas he has a new family. It doesn’t get much better than this.

Nicky was another one of our Kangaroo babies, he weighed 1.7kg and had to live under the nannies t-shirts for about a month to keep him warm. Adoptions are always warm and cosy at Neema Village.

With her little rosebud mouth Afsa was such a pretty baby. Her mother had some major health issues when the baby was born and could not care for the baby so social welfare brought her to Neema Village. Mom was faithful to visit Afsa and after the mother ‘s health improved Angel decided it was time for Afsa to return home. Happy baby, Happy momma.

Neema’s babies who cannot return home for one reason or another and are not adoptable are enrolled in our Neema Village Foster Care program. Most of them are placed with our nannies in their own homes who cared for these babies when they first came to Neema and know and love them. We have 19 babies living in our Foster care program with Neema nannies. Priscilla, our Office Manager, fell in love with these little twin girls, Naleku and Nosiligi as newborns. They were Emily Broadbent’s special babies, too. The girls would toddle into Priscilla’s office almost every morning to help her do some paper work, mostly wadding and tearing it up. When it came time for the girls to go into the Foster care program Priscilla stepped up. Quite a job for her but Priscilla is always up to the task.

Nosiligi and Naleku growing big and strong with lots of love from Priscilla who is teaching them all about the Wonderful Love of Jesus.

Abandoned baby Godlove, brought to Neema by the Police, was able to return to his mother after a few months at Neema. It appears the father had done the abandoning and mother had not know where her baby was. Social Welfare is always good at getting to the bottom of the story for these little ones.

Big girl Maria loving our little Bush Baby Bruce who was abandoned as a newborn in the bushes near a local village. The nannies named him Bruce after Bruce White, Kim’s husband. He was adopted while we were in the States and Praise God he will never be a Bush Baby again!!

Delvis was abandoned on the streets with a wrenched shoulder. He was in a lot of pain when he first came in and did not respond to his name until Ali Maddox called him Clarence so he became Clarence Delvis and we all fell in love with this little guy.

This little sweetheart, Lisa was able to return home to her grandmother. Thank God for Grandmothers in this country!

Cutie Pie Nelson’s mother died at his birth but his father and an Auntie decided they could keep him.

Let’s make 2024 your year to enter these gates in Tanzania, East AFrica!

Come for two weeks and see if you don’t fall in love with a different kind of mission work while you show the love of Jesus to the 63 babies still living at Neema Village today.

Come on, We’ll leave the light on!

Michael and Dorris

www.neemavillage.org

December 6, 2023

Almost twelve years ago Michael went out to a Maasai village to pick up our first baby.

Four hundred and fifty babies later, we can look back and remember the babies, the moms and the hundreds of volunteers who have come and gone, each one touched by the love and joy of Jesus through this precious ministry called Neema Village in Tanzania, East Africa.

From that first trip and all the ones since that have taken us back and forth around the world so many times we have lost count, one thing we have learned. God is so Faithful! Neema Village through God’s faithfulness is changing East Africa one baby at a time. But as I look at these younger photos of us I realize our time is short. If we want to make a lasting difference we have to do it now.

Below is a photo of Neema land before we began to build.

While looking back we are also thinking of the future and what God has planned for this ministry. We know that abandoned babies are not the problem and women who have been abused and abandoned by their husbands are not the problem. The men of Africa need so much help here. Is God calling us to build a trade school for men teaching them small engine repair or how to weld, or…? We know one thing, we cannot out dream God!

Below Neema today, isn’t it amazing what God has done!

“A civilization flourishes when people plant trees under whose shade they will never sit.”

As part of the vision for the future of Neema Village our Board of Directors is establishing a “Leave a Legacy” perpetual fund to support the ongoing needs of this ministry into the future. This separate fund will allow donors the option to choose whether each gift will be devoted to the long term vision of the ministry or like all gifts up to this point, dedicated to specific immediate projects and needs. If you would like to know more about how to “Leave a Legacy” give us a quick email michael@neemavillage.org and we can talk.

Our ninety three Tanzanian staff love to sing about God’s Love. Each baby that leaves Neema Village goes knowing there is a man out there named Jesus and He loves me.

He loves you too.

Dorris and Michael