Pictured above, our Namelok ladies group celebrate the opening of a clean water well along with the community around St. Norbert’s Primary School. This well will serve to provide clean drinking water to primary school students and the surrounding community. Because of the capacity of the well along with the rehabilitation of a massive water tank on site, this well will be a source for irrigation, providing the school the ability to grow crops to feed the children at school.
While the public schools receive some government funding to provide food to these children, it typically lasts for about a fourth of the year. When food supplies run out, the school staff must resort to sending the children home for lunch. Most of children opt to stay at school, knowing the trip home will be fruitless, they choose to stay at school and conserve their energy.
We will be updating you as the irrigation construction and farming begins. In the meantime, providing water to these children during the day as well as allowing them to carry water home is just another incentive for them to come to school!
One of the exciting aspects of this project was discovering that the massive water storage tank built in the 1940s during the colonial farming era where sisal plantations once flourished, was actually viable with some rehabilitation. The rehabilitation cost as much as it would have originally cost to purchase a water storage tank, one that would have been plastic, so it would have lasted about five years with a capacity of about a tenth of what this concrete storage container can! It’s also incredibly exciting for us when we get to see the use and rehab of local resources that were once colonial-era now be used to serve children and local communities, and it looks much more attractive!
Another aspect of this story is the redemption of a well-intended project gone bad. About five years ago another organization drilled a well on the primary school site. It provided clean water for a couple years to the school and community. Unfortunately it was not drilled properly, so it began to collapse and ceased to provide any water. This was not only an unfortunate waste of resources but it was became a serious danger to the students because they could easily fall into the well.
The drilling and construction of this well included the filling in and securing the safety of this hazard. Foothold also made sure that the construction of the well was done according to guidelines to insure that it would be safe and secure for the workers drilling it and have structural integrity to last for generations.
One of the reasons Foothold chose this particular school is because of our long-standing relationship. We have been working with this school for over seven years working with them on sexual abuse prevention, reproductive health, providing soap and hygiene education. We’ve been impressed over the years how this school has strived to reach the Maasai community as this particular community has the historically had the lowest rates of school attendance. We have observed each initiative has increased overall enrollment, attendance, and test scores especially among the Maasai. Every one of these interventions makes sending their children to school more appealing to them. These trends quickly become contagious as the school earns the trust of respected families among the Maasai people.
Prior to this, the dry seasons were very difficult for families, especially women and children, who often travel up to 8 miles per day to fetch water. Instead these women and children are coming to their local public school, opening opportunities for families to become familiar with the staff, to see children enjoying their education, etc. This just creates more positive interactions among the community and the school.
This project was funded through a special peer-to-peer fundraising campaign called Kilimanjaro4Water. Cherie Catron climbed Kilimanjaro in the fall of 2021 along with Chelsey Bolles and Kalyn McGraw. All three of these women paid for their travel and climb expenses and used the climb as an opportunity to create awareness and raise funds. Along with these three women, over 25 people and businesses sponsored them through peer fundraising campaigns.
Cherie Catron will be climbing Kilimanjaro in September of 2022 along with her husband Brad Catron and their son, David Masters. If you are interested in climbing with them and/or hosting a peer campaign to help Foothold provide more clean water, contact Cherie at [email protected]. You can also follow her story on social media under the hastag #kilimanjaro4water.
Melicent carries herself with a presence that sets her apart. She has a quiet, but powerful speaking voice as she opens the Namelok ladies group meeting with a whispered prayer. In group, she does not take the lead, but instead, she spends much of the meeting listening to the other women. Her eyes are intent as she listens to each person. When it is her turn to speak, the room is quiet, as the group leans in to hear her voice and light-hearted humor.
Melanie Detty, who traveled with me many times to Kenya, noted on our last trip together in 2019 that there was something about Melicent that we struggled to put to words. We finally settled on the word, “regal” because she walks with an air of royalty in the midst of dirt floors, cow dung, and thatched-roof houses. We resolved that she was like a princess.
The word “princess” is misleading because Melicent is no stranger to back-breaking work, typical for rural Kenyan women. She cooks. She cleans. She tends to seven children. She carries 30-50 pounds of water on her back daily.
Her brother is a pastor and the first Maasai to win public office in the region. He is famous in these parts for representing their people who are marginalized and disdained for their traditional way of life.
Melicent was 19-years-old when she married her husband, Isaya. She was older than most Maasai women who begin having children. Her husband, Isaya, was an educated young man, one of the few in her village. He had been forced as a young boy to attend boarding school by the government, against the will of his family.
She benefitted from his education. He credits that education for fostering a desire to live differently than his parents. Traditionally, Maasai men and women live in separate homes. It is the young men who prepare food for the elders. Fathers rarely have contact with their children growing up.
Isaya chose Melicent to be his only wife. He chose to live together, raising their children, and therefore, defying tradition. He risked being ostracized from his village and being ridiculed by the elders, but instead of being ridiculed, Isaya moved up in the community, became a village elder and later attended seminary and became a respected pastor and village leader.
Together, they work as a team, raising their children, working to improve their community through education, addressing WASH issues through soap making, Biosand filters, washable menstrual pads, mentoring and encouraging their neighbors. Melicent and Isaya both emphasize the importance of honoring their culture before they could help empower them to improve their lives.
Melicent is often late for meetings because, along the way, she deals with important business that only the pastor’s wife can attend to. She is frequently delayed by people asking for advice or support. But more often, we find her educating women and girls about WASH (Clean water, sanitation & hygiene) and selling soap as only she can.
She is a perfect choice to lead marketing for the ladies group. She finds women at the spring, in their homesteads, fetching water. She is never without a small bag of soap tucked in her skirt. She boldly puts a bar in their hands, confident they will pay her in time. It would be bad luck to leave a debt, even a bar of soap unsettled. It would be devastating to owe that debt to the pastor’s wife. Melicent knows her power.
Today, she oversees the soap making production and leads in marketing. She and the Namelok ladies give soap to over 1,300 children per month in their community with the support of Pacha Soap Co. while selling affordable, high-quality soap to hundreds of families in their community.
Melicent and her husband have taken a the bold stand by sending all seven of their children to school, even selling their prized cattle to pay for school fees.
Last year over a cooking fire, she laughed and told us how her 8-year-old son came home crying that week, saying, “I don’t want to be Maasai anymore!” She giggled retelling his protest. And she sang the song that was familiar to her, a sing-song insult calling the Maasai stupid and dirty, a song children of other tribes sing to make fun of their people. It would seem an unusual response to her child being bullied, but to Melicent, I understood her laughter to be that of a woman who knew how petty and weak this insult was in the face of what she and her husband had already overcome for him.
In January of 2020, Foothold International launched the Maasai Adult Education Center. Melicent was instrumental in organizing and supporting the project.
It wasn’t until the first day of class, that she shared with us that she had never been able to attend school herself. We asked her and each student why they were attending and what they hoped to gain.
Melicent shared with us that what she wanted was to better understand what her children were learning in school. This time it was her turn to go to school, and in doing so she made a courageous statement to her children, to the men of her community and to other young women. And to date, she continues to show up early, and even stay after class, to be tutored by some of the younger women in the ladies group.
She promised us before we left in March of 2020, that the next time we returned to Kenya, she would be speaking English. Even though I too promised her I would study Swahili until then, I am confident her English is already much better than my Swahili.
Foothold Market (formerly Namelok Soap Co.)
Foothold Market is an online store that supports the mission of Foothold International through the sale of handcrafted soap and accessories made in Kenya, Nebraska and Ohio. What originally began as the Namelok Soap Co. to support our soap making groups in Kenya has now grown into an international venture bringing artisans from Kenya and the United States together.
We decided in 2020 to change the name from Namelok Soap Co to better connect with our mission and to broaden the title as we were adding more than soap to our products to our sales.
Although our partnership with Pacha Soap Co began in 2016, we took our relationship another step in December of 2019, when we began working with them as a vendor, selling their handcrafted soap.
This venture supports the work of Foothold twofold. Every bar of Pacha Soap supports clean water initiatives, hygiene education and small business opportunities worldwide through Foothold, Imagine Burundi, Water4, and other like-minded organizations.
When you buy a bar of Pacha Soap directly from Foothold through our website or at a Foothold table at a live event, proceeds directly support our work in Kenya as well as Pacha Soap Co’s other partners.
Purchasing Pacha Soap through Foothold further helps us devote more time to the mission of Foothold instead of making soap. We still plan to make soap in limited supplies. Check the Foothold Market site for available products.
If you are in our hometown of Chillicothe, Ohio, we also encourage you to visit another Foothold Market partner, a retail of gifts an apparel called Kindly, located in the Fort Collective Building on the corner of Mulberry & 2nd St.
Owner, Deidre Rowland has an incredible testimony of her own and a beautiful variety of items that have a story, a message or a mission. Not only she has offered us generous shelf space where you can purchase Pacha Soap, but she has also worked with us to craft high-quality candles and other self-care products.
In February of 2020, we provided our ladies groups in Kenya with new sewing machines and training to help them diversify their current business of making washable menstrual pads which they both sell and donate to more tailored items. They learned to make bags, aprons, headbands. During that month Cherie also worked with the Maasai women who are already famous for jewelry-making to develop lines of jewelry that would be marketable back in the US.
During the months of April and March, Foothold family members and supporters began sewing masks which they donated to Foothold as another way to provide for our local community and raise money for Foothold. We are so grateful for these generous and talented makers and look forward to adding more handmade items to our Market.
UPDATE! Julie’s Shop on Paint St. in Chillicothe, Ohio has resumed carrying our handmade soaps & candles too. Check out her Facebook page
Contact Cherie at [email protected] if you are interested becoming a partner in the Foothold Market.
I will never forget the day I met Irene. She had the most radiant smile…All the time! She was beautiful and energetic and I remember thinking I want to be just like her! Cherie and I and the Namelok Ladies fellowshipped together, and Irene sang her heart out!
A day or 2 later I experienced Irene at her home. She had the same energy, the same smile & still as beautiful as ever. It was there that I met Irene’s daughter, Zerete and her son, Lawrence.
Lawrence didn’t speak, he couldn’t sit up, couldn’t control his arms and legs,
couldn’t walk and couldn’t feed himself. What he could do was smile & giggle when he heard Irene’s voice
…he smiled just like his momma.
Irene did her daily tasks, and I watched her chop, bundle and carry firewood on her head all while Lawrence was strapped to her back. If you know my family, then you know this day was emotional for me as I have watched my mother care for my sister almost my entire life.
I know how exhausting this can be, and how sometimes it can even rob you of your joy. And yet there was Irene before me
, happy as she could be!
Part of me melted out there in the field and the other part of me wanted to scream, “Go Irene Go, You’ve Got This Girl!”
A few days later, with a couple of texts and a handful of people, not only was a wheelchair ordered for Lawrence but he will be receiving physical therapy as well. Thanks to the combined efforts of generous people, Foothold International and TCA, Irene is able to say, “Thanks for giving Lawrence legs and a seat!”
Look for updates, pictures and videos of Lawrence therapy and progress.
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