Happiness Initiative received a letter of gratitude from the president of one of our partners, Families are Nations (FAN), thanking us for our support to the construction of a well to their Community Centre in Kapiri Mposhi.

Happiness Initiative hopes to help more communities with the Africa Well Project.

**Families are Nations are currently running a campaign against teen pregnancies and early child marriages. FAN is encouraging girls to keep healthy and focus on school.

Hello!

Happiness Initiative partner, Families are Nations (FAN), are doing amazing things in Kapiri Mposhi, and we wanted to spread the word!

On August 11, 2017, Families are Nations (FAN) officially launched the “FAN Community Family Education Centre” in the Chitambala village in the Kapiri Mposhi district under Chief Nkole.

Chitambala village is home to a population of over 5,000 families of whom 60% are children and youths.  The village lacks community education facilities for families and children who end up on the street due to family disintegration.  Majority of the children have a history of broken families, lack of education support and various other complicated backgrounds bordering on family.  As a result, the area records high immorality levels illiteracy, early child marriages, teenage pregnancies and HIV related incidences.

This place will be designed to provide Family Development Facilities to address various issues affecting families. It will also be an effective one-stop institution that will provide activities to address the various needs of family development through specialized family building interventions.

The Centre will provide the following family building services to Chitambala Village and catchment area in Kapiri Mposhi District;

• Early child Education and mentorship activities
  • Nursery education
  • Grades One to Seven
• School Feeding Programs
  • Nutritional Activities (training and awareness)
  • Feeding Program for OVCs
  • Food Processing and curing services
• OVCs Drop in Centre
  • Children Reintegration program
  • Counseling and mentorship
• Empowerment and skills activities for Family Development
  • Recycling project and Echo construction
  • Village Banking Project
  • Vegetable Drying and food processing
  • Cobblestone cutting Technology
• Adult Literacy services – targeting youths, parents and guardians
  • Basic Literacy
  • 3Rs – Reading, wRiting and aRithmetic
  • Health Awareness
  • Older person’s empowerment activities – crafts, weaving, traditional games, etc
• Character Education Sessions for all age groups
  • Youth mentorship and empowerment
  • Family training and education
  • Spiritual Guidance and counseling
• Health and Nutrition education services for families
  • Healthy Eating Club (Promotion of good nutrition)
  • Keep fit and health activities
• Family counseling services including
  • pre and post marital counseling
  • behavior change counseling (alcoholics, abuse and other vices)
  • child counseling services
  • spiritual and psychosocial counseling
• Agriculture and Cooperative Services
  • FISP distribution Services
  • Cooperative services including training and sales
• Family based Social and Recreation activities
  • Family interaction, fellowship and conferencing
  • Family sporting activities
• Creative Arts and talent identification activities
• Communal activities focusing on family wellbeing

The FAN Community Centre has since January 2017 enrolled a total of 381 (217 females and 164 males) children of which 173 were withdrawn from the streets of Kapiri Mposhi through the FAN Reintegration Program from various activities including begging and streetism while, 122 were brought to the center by family members who declared inability to support and need help to educate the children.  The remaining 86 children drop into the center on their own to seek education or other support services.  Among these are orphans, challenged, abused and neglected children.

Here are pictures of the official launching ceremony to commemorate the opening of the school in Kapiri Mposhi:

FAN also sent us a request letter asking for sponsorship for a well for the children to have access to as they go forward with their education.

Happiness Initiative is proud of FAN’s contribution to the community, and we hope to continue supporting their efforts for a greater good.

Families Are Nations (F.A.N) was officially launched in Kapiri Mposhi on 15^th May 2015 by Her Excellency, the First Lady of the Republic of Zambia, Madam Esther Lungu.  FAN has since been creating awareness and undertaking community based interventions in line with the FAN vision “raising communities anchored on Family as an Institution of Love, Peace, Integrity and National Development.”   

Updates on Happiness Initiative‘s Africa Well Project!

I was not able to attend the banner and dedication ceremony this time, but I am excited and pleased that we have successfully sponsored the construction of Well #2 in Nyawombo village in the Gawa Undi Kingdom in Zambia! I appreciate our sponsors who helped with this project.

The hope of Happiness Initiative is to expand this project across Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Namibia. In just Zambia, there are 225 chiefdoms, and each chiefdom needs at least 40 wells to allow all their people to have access to safe, clean, drinking water.

Here are pictures from this special day:

On May 20, Happiness Initiative held an event locally in Las Vegas with guest speaker, Rev. Wone. Forty people consisting of local community leaders gathered at this event.

Rev. Wone conveyed to all of us that the chiefdom is truly thankful to Happiness Initiative in sponsoring the construction of two wells.

Rev. Wone also questioned us why wells are not being built despite other NPOs collecting donations to build wells for Africa. Wells are still one of the necessities for all chiefdom.

Without a well, schools are not permitted to be built.

Without a well, farming is not possible.

Without a well, clinics cannot be built.

Just imagine, how many lives can be saved and changed with just one well?

Would people consider contributing knowing that $5 can save one person’s life?

Rev. Wone pleaded us to take interest. He asked us to just think about the impact we can have when we are drinking one bottle of water or eating our lunch.

The event was very inspirational to us all, and we had a great time.

Here are pictures from the event:

On January 19, 2017, I visited the Mapanza chiefdom in Zambia once again to attend the borehole dedication ceremony for the completion of Well #1. It was amazing to think that it was only a few months ago that we had the banner ceremony filled with hope for access to clean, safe drinking water to the people of the Mapanza chiefdom. Having access to clean water is the major challenge in the Mapanza chiefdom, and women suffer the most in this situation because they have to travel long distances to collect water.

Although Zambia is suffering from a drought, when I visited, I was surprised to see greens and rainy weather. It was a new experience for me as we traveled by car and had incidents along the way where the car would get stuck on the mud, and our driver had to painstakingly try to get the tires unstuck.

I think pictures say more than words, so here are pictures from this time’s occasion:

Happiness Initiative helped sponsor a mission trip for Hannah to serve in Myanmar. Here’s her reflection of her mission trip!

With the support of Happiness Initiative, I was given the opportunity to join Cottonwood Church’s mission team to visit the orphanages in Yangon, Myanmar (Burma). Since 2012, I was running donation drives at North Torrance High School to collect clothing, sports equipment, school supplies, etc., to send to orphanages in Myanmar, and this year, I was able to meet the children there in person.

The mission trip was from December 15 ~ 27, 2016, and we spent our time in Yangon with the children at the orphanage home, “Love Children’s Home.” LCH is run by Peter and Rebecca Thang, a Christian couple who started their orphanage with just twenty-two orphans and a single bamboo hut. Now, their orphanage is a home to over two hundred children. At the orphanage, we spent time together with the children doing volunteer activities and gave them our full attention.

The children at LCH all carry different stories in how they came. Many of them were living in the streets because both parents passed away due to illness. The parents were too poor to afford healthcare. In another case, the child’s parent was murdered from a feud between tribes. Other children were thrown out by their own parent after remarriage because they did not want to take part in any of their past lives in their new marriage life.

Coming from a background of pain, hurt, and hardships, these children seriously lack the most crucial love that any human being needs in their life—parents’ love. Not knowing what it is to like to receive this filling, unconditional, and supportive parental love, these children wander searching for this love by their desire for skin ship, such as wanting to be hugged and carried all the time.   

Yet, despite their hardships, these children have shown me love like I’ve never experienced before.

From the moment we first stepped off the bus at the orphanage, children were grabbing my hands and arms and reaching out to at least be holding some part of me. They were constantly trying to help me with the volunteer work and would fill my water bottle when it got low. Every time I stepped out of the main house, my shoes would be lined up by the kids and they would be waiting for me right outside the door. These kids have such an enormous heart, and all they wanted to do was to serve us even though we went across the world to serve them. I often wondered how these children, who had no idea who I was, where I came from, how much money I made, etc. could show so much love to me, a stranger.

These children have revealed to me such a pure and unconditional love that I had never experienced before. Sometimes when it was too hot to be running around, I would just sit under a tree with a group of kids and hang out. There was a language barrier between us because they only spoke Burmese, but the children were somehow content with me just sitting with them as if my presence was simply enough.

During my time there, I developed a relationship with many of the kids at Love Children’s Home. One little boy even went around telling his friends that I was his mom. Leaving the orphanage was absolutely heartbreaking, but I am confident that I will meet them again in the future. This time was a time for me to consider how much strength these children had in their hearts. I was moved by their strength of living when their precious parents and siblings either passed away or left them. Their willingness to give to others and stay optimistic was inspiring.

My purpose to go on this mission trip was to volunteer and offer what I can, but instead, I was the one receiving and feeling love from them. I felt that from this give and receive relationship between the children, this invisible emotion, love, grew and multiplied, and I was left with the heart of wanting to love them more and strongly desiring them to be happy. I am grateful to Happiness Initiative for providing me this opportunity.

No water.

No food.

No medicine.

These are terms that are said in the media often, but honestly, how many have considered what it is like to lack the bare minimum of basic human needs?

Early marriage.

Early pregnancy.

Orphanage.

In the Southern African country of Zambia, this is shockingly common. With the vicious cycle of early marriage and 80% divorce rate, we are seeing children thrown away in the streets by their parents because they cannot afford to take care of their own children.

On top of all of this:

Drought.

Not only do they have to manage sharing the scarce resources of water amongst themselves, the people have to share the water with wild animals. In the Mapanza chiefdom in the Coma district in the Southern province of Zambia with a population of approximately 8000, villagers need to walk a distance of 40km to collect water, and children are taught from the age of 3 to carry a large bowl of water on their heads.

To alleviate this circumstance, Happiness Initiative lead a project to build a borehole in Mapanza. With the donation of $2000 USD from sponsors, this borehole is now allowing 1500 village members out of the 8000 to have access to drinking water at a closer distance.

On the morning of November 12, 2016, around 11am, I participated in an educational talk show that is locally aired in Zambia through the non-profit organization, Families are Nations. Hosted by Judith Anne Mwila, she is bringing awareness to the social issues of Zambia. Mainly, the issues on early marriage and early pregnancy. She is also a strong advocate in women of Zambia continuing their education. As mentioned above, there is a vicious cycle of early marriage, 80% divorce rate, and trash that are carelessly being thrown in the streets from the lack of public awareness on clean streets. Young girls are left stranded with children, when they themselves are still a child, and these young girls cannot find a path to care for themselves.

During the talk show, we got one phone call from a 14-year-old single mother. Being a mother of triplets, she desperately asked for help. She was in a situation where she could not afford food to feed her children. On top of that, no diapers or even toilet paper. In the conversation, she mentioned how she was at the brink of throwing away her children to the streets.

Hearing this call, Judith and I visited her and bought her bread, jam, dry milk, and one week worth of food. The place this young girl lived was a room smaller than the standard walk-in closet. The room was small to the point that if one person lies down, there would be no more space. The young girl explained that she and her family would sleep outside in the scorching heat because there is not enough space in her house. Encouraging the young girl to continue studying, we said our farewells to her.

Later in the afternoon, I headed out to meet the chief of the village of Mapanza where the borehole was to be dug. Round trip to visit this village from where I was staying was a total of 6 hours.

Meeting the chief, we talked about the donation being offered to the community and on where the borehole would be placed. The chief talked to me about how we need 40 boreholes to accommodate all the villagers to have access to water at a closer distance. During the meeting, I received a letter of request from the chief to help support the village further develop this borehole project.

On Nov. 13, I visited the village again, but on this day, I received a thank you letter, and with the villagers, we had a banner ceremony to signify the first borehole being made in the village of Mapanza initiated by the Happiness Initiative along with the partnership of Families are Nations and Family Federation for World Peace.

Creating one well costs about $2500~$3000 dollars, a reasonable amount to have more than a thousand people have access to drinking water. Without a river, farming is difficult, and without education, there is lack of awareness to consider a greater picture than my own.

Developed nations such as the United States of America have excess materials that can be shared with countries that lack those excess.

Why don’t we bother to take such an action? As a society, we are forgetting how one human being, I, can make an impact, a difference. We are being pulled into the way of thinking that someone else, or an organization will do something about the problems of this world, and we ignore the responsibility that I as a human being hold. This responsibility, is in other words, for me to create and nurture love, live for the sake of others. It’s not just to sit, wait, and hope for someone to do this. Everything begins from me. I make the difference.

Happiness Initiative is calling for sponsorship in creating more of these boreholes. In addition, Happiness Initiative wants to collect excess diapers, containers, and menstrual pads to send.

Let us consider our responsibility as another human being and create true happiness.