Photograph by Michele Zousmer
On Epic Photo Tours/Pixelchrome Photography Tours we always try to give back to the communities that welcome us and allow us to get a glimpse of their way of life. In November of 2015 the adventurous, friendly and socially aware Omo Valley group of ten, visited a school and observed a complete lack of school supplies. Within an hour of leaving the school, they all reached into their pockets and took out piles of Ethiopian Brr and suddenly we had money for school supplies. Yes, you can buy supplies in Ethiopia but as the teacher told us; "the pens dry up after a week and the pages fall out of the book after a month". So given marching orders by trip member Ginna Fleming, I returned home and used the donated money to buy notebooks, rulers, staplers, scissors and dry erase boards. TD Bank donated 500 pens. Once back in the Omo Valley in December I donated the school supplies to the Ari tribe village school. This small, somewhat forlorn looking one room school was closed, but we were able to find the teacher who let us in and proudly showed us his classroom. We gave him the school supplies and he thanked us. Our guide/translator Eyob beamed with happiness as this was happening. Later on that day Eyob told me that the teacher asked him if we could return next month with more notebooks. Hopefully next December I will return with twice the amount!
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