We are in Congo UPDATE !

Here for the people

Peace & blessings family…

A huge I heart africa filled thank you to each of you who have continued to show support for this project by raising awareness, donating money, offering resources and connecting us to great people.

As you will have seen, in December of last year we completed the initial stages of the project which was to build, furnish and power 4 houses for 4 families that had lost their homes, businesses and livelihoods to the volcano eruption.

We selected 4 families who would go on to be employed by iheart africa to help us take care of the 20 children that we adopted and have become vital members of our team on the ground, they help nurture, care, educated and guide the children.

Nearly 1 full year along and the program has grown from strength to strength and our children are developing beautifully into well mannered, charismatic, enthusiastic, loving children who will become the future leaders of their communities. With your help they attend school, eat everyday, play in a safe environment, visit the doctor regularly, wear clean clothes, have shoes and generally get the ability to be kids.

But, that’s not all that’s been taking place this last year. We knew that we could do more than just build 4 houses, we knew 20 children could not comfortably fit into these houses. So we embarked on a project that even the local authorities are not engaging in, despite the fact that 18 months after the eruption there are still a conservative 30,000 displaced people in such a small area.

We decided that we would purchase more land and begin building our own village. As it stands we have managed to build, furnish and power 20 houses, each with their own, kitchens and  bathrooms with toilets & showers. There is also a central community area where village meetings, ceremonies and celebrations can take place.

Now that these first set of houses are completed, we are preparing to relocate the children we adopted out of the temporary camps along with the families of their current carers into these new homes over the corse of the coming weeks. The children and their carers have absolutely no idea that this is happening and we’re extremely excited to be able to provide this opportunity for them as it provides a safety net that allows them to continue pouring into the children the attention love and care they need to grown.

But, we are not stopping there, our next milestone is to raise enough funds to build another 20 houses and some communal spaces such as a medical facility, school, library and other things such as a market space which will help stimulate the minds and the local economy so that people can once again become self sustaining.

This means we need your help again. We genuinely can’t thank all of you reading this now enough for your support, but let’s continue to raise awareness, donate where we can and find ways of supporting our brothers and sisters in places typically forgotten by the rest of the world.

The best way for you to get continual and consistent updates about the progress of the project and the building works is to follow our Instagram page @iheartafricadotorg and to check in on the kids check @heartofkongo.

Link to donate #Give2Goma

Peace & Blessings