Wednesday, August 10, 2011


This is Dorcus Bakari she is 39 years old and works with us at our "Women to Work" project, training to make our beautiful sandals. Dorcus is a mother of 3 daughters and a widow of 8 years. After her husband died she was chased off her property by his relatives and had to flee from her village and move to Arusha with no help and no family connections. In Dorcus' tribe women are not allowed to inherit property from their fathers so her 3 daughters had no claim to the land. Most of the time it doesn't even matter if the children are males, if the husband dies then his relatives will fight for the land, threatening, and bullying until they steal it. They almost always cheat the widows out of what is rightfully theirs. Having no advocates to fight for them the women are cast out from the village and left to survive on their own. These widows with no education, no job opportunities and children to provide for, have very few options. Shining a Light is changing that and providing them a way to not only earn a living but exposing them to education, opportunities and skills that they can use to care for themselves and their families.

Dorcus worked as a housegirl for many years struggling to keep her children in school and provide them with an opportunity she never had, an education. She came to work with us not only to earn a decent living but to learn the skills she will need to start her own business. She would like to learn how to make clothing and open a store where she can sell her creations. Shining a Light will support Dorcus in her education and her dream of owning her own store! Please help us to support Dorcus and her goals at www.shiningalight.org

Our training of the women continues to grow. After discovering that they are naturals at beading we moved on to the leather part of the sandals. This is a much trickier part of making the sandal and is usually done by th men in this country. Our women were eager to learn and not just how to make a sandal sole but how to craft leather in general. We realized that there is much more to working with leather and therefore hired an expert to come in and teach the women all about working with this material. So now after their training they will not only know how to make a sandal sole but how to craft many items out of leather, how to sew it and how to finish it. Stay tuned to the many products that will come your way after this training is completed. Are you excited?
WE ARE!
www.shiningalight.org