My phone rang this morning and my friend/tour operator in Addis Ababa, Osman Ahmed of SORA Tours was on the line. After reviewing the trips that we conducted over the last two months and had many laughs he read off the statistics. Myself and photo leader Jeremy Woodhouse personally purchased and donated over 1,800 pounds of food to the Kara and Arbore tribes. The Bennett family of McKinney, Texas helped us buy 400 pounds of cornmeal. We donated 325 t-shirts collected by New Canaan Country School and the Brett Brown Baseball Academy. Trip members Michele Zousmer and Isabel LeCuna paid for the treatment of a girl whose foot was severely sliced by a machete. The November group of ten, donated school supplies that were warmly received in an Ari village school.The Konso village school received 500 pens graciously donated by my friend Alex the branch manager at TD Bank, 68th Street, NYC as well as 50 notebooks. Nancy Wright, product manager at Clif Bar, supplied us with boxes of protein bars to hand out. Nancy Brandt, a December trip member made a sizable financial donation to Omo Child. Osman summed it all up by saying that our groups were truly ambassadors of peace and goodwill. As Gandhi said;" Be the change you want to see in the world". Happy Holidays to all!
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