Last spring our Coordinator, Memunatu Kamara, used her own funds to travel to Sierra Leone to oversee our projects in Romano Village. A local film maker, Rosie Dransfeld who was interested in our work, raised her own funds to send a camera man with Memunatu.  Her colleague Jimmy Bustos was chosen to make the trip because of his experience filming overseas. Jimmy accompanied Memunatu for 2 weeks after which Memunatu hired a local cameraman to continue filming.

Memunatu’s arrival home after over 12 years of absence generated a great deal of excitement!  She was greeted like a queen with local committees organizing a gala event for government and school officials to welcome her and to show off the development of the schools including the completion and official opening of the junior high school, the children’s learning and their arts presentations, observe the flourishing vegetable gardens and photograph the official beginnings of the well digging project.

While in Romano, Memunatu worked with local leaders to secure all the paper work to have the Sierra Leone branch of the Tamaraneh Society for Community Development and Support be raised to the status of International Non-Governmental Organization with an acting executive. She oversaw the digging and completion of the first water well to bring clean water in almost 15 years. Land for the school and for a health centre was surveyed and deeds produced, supplies and clothing from Canadian donors shipped in and problems with managing the school discussed and resolved. We are grateful for Memunatu’s sacrificial work to oversee the project and are working to secure funds for her to do this again on behalf of the Society every year. Memunatu’s two youngest daughters accompanied her on this trip and have become avid supporters of their mother’s work after seeing first hand how necessary it is to the survival of the people there.

The Tamaraneh Society had a couple of pot-luck suppers to hear from Memunatu and also met with Jimmy to hear his impressions of the project. Since the summer, we have applied for another grant with the Wild Rose Foundation International Grants and have begun a separate application with Change for Children and CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency) to dig five more wells in the region. The well we dug last spring, thanks to a private donor known to one of the board members, can only serve the needs of the 1,300 students in our two schools. The village requires a well, the upcoming health centre will require another well and the surrounding villages that send us school children require three wells. Together thousands of people in the region will benefit from clean water. They currently use water from a small polluted stream or from local swamps which is full of disease.

Currently our board is working on creating a spectacular fundraiser for the end of January. Any visitors to the website who are interested in donating or participating in our fundraiser can contact us at info@tamaraneh.org or via our Contact page.