Day 1 of The B1G1 Study Tour – Nairobi to Kisumi

After a very early departure from our hotel in Nairobi (3.30am) we headed to the airport to take a flight to Kisumu.

Kisumu is the largest city in Western Kenya and is the capital city of the Lake Region Economic Block which encompasses 15 out of the 47 counties in Kenya.

After a swift exit from the airport, it was just a short drive to our accommodation, Impala Eco Lodge. What a beautiful place with amazing view over Lake Victoria. We were so lucky to have the entire lodge to just our tour group. We decided to take a walk around the rescue centre, but sadly, it seemed more like a zoo than an eco-lodge.

After our walk, we were met back at the lodge by Fred, a local community leader from the village of Odede and a part of World Youth International whose projects we will be visiting in a few days time.

Fred spoke to us about the history of Odede, how it was decimated by HIV leaving hundreds of orphaned children, and how he had founded the Child Development Centre)

Soon after this was opened, Fred realized that an even bigger problem was the lack of medical care available, where those suffering illness, expectant mothers and the like would be taken by wheelbarrow to the nearest clinic over 20 kilometres away, with many not making the journey alive. This man is a giant among men, having taken in over a dozen orphans into his own home, as well as making Odede somewhere people are proud to live. It will be so wonderful to visit Odede in a few days to see the work he is doing.

After a few hours of rest, we met down at the lake to end the day with a sunset hippo-spotting cruise on Lake Victoria. We saw some locals fishing and young children collecting water.

It wasn’t looking promising at first, but just as we were about to give up on the Hippos, we saw the most amazing Hippo take big yawn above water. Wow!

An amazing first day, ending with a beautiful sunset and incredible dinner down on the dock. I can tell we are going to make some amazing memories on this trip.

Day 2 of The B1G1 Study Tour – The Mango Tree Projects

After breakfast we boarded the bus and headed to Kosele, where the Mango Tree Orphan Support Trust has its head office.

Consolata, the Program Director (and possibly one of the most amazing woman I’ve even met), explained the work they do, which includes supporting an unfathomable 7,700 orphans through school, paying for uniforms, sanitary towels, and school fees while also ensuring they have enough to eat every day. That is all within a 50- kilometre radius of the centre, and it’s a pretty rural setting, which gives an insight into the size of the problem of orphans in Kenya. Less than 3% of the population are over 65, and over the next few days many of the local were fascinated with my enegetic Mum, who is in her early 60’s something that is very rare here.

Learning about The Mango Tree’s work has been amazing – I’m bursting with admiration for all of the staff here.

A fundamental pillar of African society has always been the duty of the extended family to support any members of the household in need of help. But this traditional strength has, in rural impoverished societies, been put under immense strain as a result of the AIDS crisis.

For more than a decade now communities have been collapsing across the continent as too many children, who have lost one or both parents to AIDS, overwhelm family members already struggling under the burden of persistent poverty. The result is that whole families are dragged too far below the poverty line to survive. Severe malnutrition, preventable diseases and infant mortality rates increase. School attendance rates plummet, and many are forced to migrate from their villages to become urban street children, creating many challenging social problems.

The Mango Tree Orphan Support Programme believes this snowball effect to be one of Africa’s most appalling problems. Over 12 years we have developed what we think, is an innovative, effective, sustainable and cost effective way of tackling the issues at their root.

Since 2002, The Mango Tree has been driven by several central principles. One of the most important aspects of The Mango Tree is the all encompassing psychosocial support for our orphans throughout the entire project. The Mango Tree is the only agency operating in the 120 rural communities where they work, establishing trust through partnerships working with local leaders. Their in-country teams are made up of local people who, over the years, have been seen to support and nurture the orphans, their families and other vulnerable members of rural societies and to uphold a feeling of belonging. 

The Mango Tree has been supporting communities through small agricultural projects, agricultural development and micro-enterprise schemes. This work initially targeted the guardians of the orphans that we were supporting in education, but now also supports people living with HIV, guardian families, or adults with long-term health needs.

We were given a guided tour of the Mango Tree grounds, where they bring local farmers to train them on how to achieve the best possible yields from their crops and livestock. They also teach farmers to keep bees, which provide a harvest of honey and helps to save our planet.

Read a case study here: http://www.themangotree.org/About-the-Mango-Tree/Case-Studies/Sanudy

On this tour around the grounds we larked that they have bred a variety of mango tree that fruits in only two years instead of the usual 7 or more, and produces two crops a year. They are also very low to the ground which is unique and we were able to see a tree that they have now fondly named the ‘Anthony’ tree after a good friend of mine who I travelled to Borneo with last year.

Anthony, travelled to Kenya in 2018 on a former B1G1 Study Tour so it was so lovely to see his face in the foreign land.

We heard such incredible success stories, the innovation here is making local communities self-sustaining and bringing entire families out of poverty. I’m so impressed – its actually a bit overwhelming to thing about.

After our tour of the grounds, we drove to see a girls’ boarding school under construction near Kosele, funded primarily by Mango Tree and their supporters worldwide (A huge thank you to all my clients who have enabled me to be a proud contributor to this through our #1MillionDays Initiative).

Education, especially for girls who are traditionally the ones fetching water and doing almost all household chores, is one of the key foundations upon which the success of the Mange Tree projects is built.

We also got to plant trees here – so cool to be able to contribute to something that will be changing the lives of the young woman who will attend this school. Consolata’s amazing husband, also promised to geo-tag our trees so that I can watch via Google earth how it grows and develops.

In the afternoon we visited a group of women (all widows) who had gathered their goats, donated my Mango Tree to help them generate an income, to hear about the impact it has made in their lives. The Mango Tree have developed a breeding program which mixes the local, hardy breed with a far more milk-productive Alpine breed, which not only dramatically increased yield and income, but also enables them to share more goats around to others in the community. This is just one example of how well-thought out these projects are – almost nothing has just one positive impact. The rule is that, if you are gifted a goat, the first kid but be given to a neighbour to help those nearby to improve their livelihoods also. These amazing ladies told us how their lives have been improved since receiving the goats and how they plan to enhance their goat milk and breeding businesses.

This income Generating Goat Project teaches the recipients how to raise animals, breed, handle milk products, and sell the products at the markets.
Goats are practical animals and flourish in harsh climates while producing valuable manure to fertilise crops and vegetable gardens.

After leaving these woman, we made a stop at the charismatic, passionate and deeply wise Consolata’s home. Not only is this woman the Program Director of Mango Tree Kenya, she also houses so many of the community members with her husband and children. At times she has had up to 20 people in a 3- bedroom house with two dorms in outbuildings. She truly lives and breathes this community and is one of the most incredible leaders I’ve ever met.

Once returning to our dormitory, we helped to make dinner, light the bonfire and were then spoiled with yet more dancing and singing.

I spent the evening in conversation with two 17 year old boys who dreamed of studying engineering. They were fascinated with business and both myself a few other’s on the tour were bombarded with questions on how to start, grow and develop a business – so impressed with their questions and considerations on supply and demand.