Happy New Year Greetings to Friends of Abha Light (off-topic)
Posted: Fri Jan 13, 2006 4:15 am
Dear All,
Happy New Year to you all. This is just to bring you up to date on our latest developments.
For Abha Light, 2005 was also a year of good activities and "hurricanes" as well.
Thanks to Dr. Robin Murphy, we received a seed grant to kickstart the ABHA LIGHT COLLEGE OF NATURAL MEDICINE. In April we shifted from our old Buruburu HQ to new premises in "posh" (as they say in Kenya) Westlands. We chose this location because it would open up more opportunities for our growth. and for registering the college, proper premises are required.
We thought we had the ideal place- good location, good sized rooms, etc. But in October, our landlord let his true intentions known. He sold the building -as he was planning to all along- and gave us notice. We had no choice but to move.
This event tailspinned me personally and has cost us a great deal of money in the rush to find a new building and bring that building up to par.
However, I can say that -as the Cosmic Plan goes- this place looks so much better than the other and it is a bit cheaper besides. We've got a huge lovely garden and are located just at the gates of U of Nairobi's health sciences campus.
Needless to say, we didn't start in Sept as I hoped and it's been an effort to get our first students (as a "College") About 10 students have signed up. I expect when we open this week we will have a bit of a rocky start. But hey! that's the Abha Light way, yes?
We are going to run 2-year diploma courses in Homeopathy and Herbal/Naturopathy. We are looking into partnering with the foremost university in Kenya - Kenyatta U. If that happens it will be a good thing for both the university and our college. We also plan to run short seminars of different kinds.
So with the possibility of partnering with KU and with UoN as our neighbours, it looks like we are in a good enviornment and flow to see this college off the ground.
Other News:
One very sad news of this year was the passing of Oscar Ogada. We at Abha Light miss him sorely.
On other fronts:
The third group of 12 students graduated in Oct 2005. Already 3 have been placed with Steve Smith's Toru Clinic (Manyanga village) and one has set up in Machakos town. Others are doing mobile clinics and trying to work out their futures.
Through Global Fund support we have been treating about 150 HIV+ patients for free.
The clinics
Juja Rd Clinic (Kennedy Otieno, hom) is moving along well as a free AIDS clinic.
Kariobangi Clinic is doing well. (Rachel Mutinda, hom). Rachel partners with the Medical Mission Sisters' Korogocho project. She treats HIV+ patients there.
Danson Njoroge is at Makutanu and Kitui and doing well.
Annastacia Nthuzi is getting along at Tala, but she's finding it a struggle.
Calvin, unfortunately, due to different obstacles, closed the Buruburu clinic. He will join me at the college teaching materia medica and we look forward to his starting up again somewhere else.
Dennis Kamore, a new graduate, is at the newly opened Machakos clinic.
Toru Health Centre is booming as usual and growing. This year they installed solar power and huge water tanks. They've bought a plot a land nearby to expand the clinic to include maternity and possibly emergency or in-patient facilities.
Sila and Dorcas have been treating along with Steve Smith. Ruth (the "ru" of "Toru") is there as manager and steve's translator.
Toru is expanding all over the Ukambani region. They have opened a new branch at Kambamware and are doing several mobiles around. They've taken in Joseph, Pius and Julias from the recently graduated class.
Mobiles
We've been trying to open up Nyanza and Western provinces. These are the areas in western Kenya around Lake Victoria. This is a most economically depressed area as well as having the highest HIV infection rate. So while our work is badly needed there, it's the most expensive to conduct a mobile and there's little hope of getting patients to pay something. So this is a struggle too.
Garissa in the northeast is another front we are trying to establish. It is an outpost town in the nomadic muslim region of Kenya.
ICASA, Nigeria
thanks to some donors, we were able to send a team Jaddu Rawi, our programme manager and Kennedy to Nigeria to present Great Health Naturally training at the 14th Int'l Conference on AIDS and Sexual Diseases in AFRICA.
Great Health Naturally
Great Health Naturally Part 2 - Nutrition Handbook was published in Dec 2004. It too has proven to be a popular book. We now have on CD both books and accompanying training presentations.
I've begun work on GHN-3 which will be a therapeutics book for HIV and related conditions. B.Jain Publishers has shown interest in the book, so let's see when/if it comes out....
We got a lot of donations of books this year. many individuals sent us boxes of books. Most notable was 20 books Yaskur's Homeopathic Dictionary from Jay Yaskur and Robin Murphy sent us a huge number of his MM's and Reps. Sorcha Sickinghe arranged 10 boxes of books sent from NL.
Other FANTASTIC people who have supported ALF this year:
Sorcha Sickinghe (NL) - Rotary NL + Cordaid
Fiona & Bruno McKenzie (UK)
Samuel Storey Family Charitible Trust
AMURT (Italy)
AMURT (USA)
SHEAF Trust (UK)
Vinton McCabe (USA)
Through MAYE (Canary Islands, Spain) we got Toru's solar power system donated.
Jill Sowerby (Nbi) organised a lovely "Hootenanny" fundraiser for us. The Hootenanny are a local ex-pat amateur musician group of folk & 60's music and they were good!
Hilde Jacobsteen and the Latin Group (Nairobi expats, diplomats, etc) organised an art auction and raised a good sum of money for ALF.
Amina Ishani (Nairobi/ UK) and the Diplomatic Womens Club (Nbi) donated money for text books
Volunteers:
many thanks to Shawn Mehu, Wendy Grace, Gaori Guher Suloglu, Audrey Van Rooyen and Danny Hill (2004) for their wonderful contribution as volunteers to the work in the last 15 months.
Well, that's all for now.
Naturally, your continuing support will help establish ALF's goals of affordable alternative medicine in Kenya and E Africa. You know how to contact us if you want to donate!!!
Sincerely,
Didi Ananda Ruchira
Director, Abha Light
visit: www.abhalight.org
tel: +254 20 445-0181 / cells: 0733-895466 / 0723-869133
Happy New Year to you all. This is just to bring you up to date on our latest developments.
For Abha Light, 2005 was also a year of good activities and "hurricanes" as well.
Thanks to Dr. Robin Murphy, we received a seed grant to kickstart the ABHA LIGHT COLLEGE OF NATURAL MEDICINE. In April we shifted from our old Buruburu HQ to new premises in "posh" (as they say in Kenya) Westlands. We chose this location because it would open up more opportunities for our growth. and for registering the college, proper premises are required.
We thought we had the ideal place- good location, good sized rooms, etc. But in October, our landlord let his true intentions known. He sold the building -as he was planning to all along- and gave us notice. We had no choice but to move.
This event tailspinned me personally and has cost us a great deal of money in the rush to find a new building and bring that building up to par.
However, I can say that -as the Cosmic Plan goes- this place looks so much better than the other and it is a bit cheaper besides. We've got a huge lovely garden and are located just at the gates of U of Nairobi's health sciences campus.
Needless to say, we didn't start in Sept as I hoped and it's been an effort to get our first students (as a "College") About 10 students have signed up. I expect when we open this week we will have a bit of a rocky start. But hey! that's the Abha Light way, yes?
We are going to run 2-year diploma courses in Homeopathy and Herbal/Naturopathy. We are looking into partnering with the foremost university in Kenya - Kenyatta U. If that happens it will be a good thing for both the university and our college. We also plan to run short seminars of different kinds.
So with the possibility of partnering with KU and with UoN as our neighbours, it looks like we are in a good enviornment and flow to see this college off the ground.
Other News:
One very sad news of this year was the passing of Oscar Ogada. We at Abha Light miss him sorely.
On other fronts:
The third group of 12 students graduated in Oct 2005. Already 3 have been placed with Steve Smith's Toru Clinic (Manyanga village) and one has set up in Machakos town. Others are doing mobile clinics and trying to work out their futures.
Through Global Fund support we have been treating about 150 HIV+ patients for free.
The clinics
Juja Rd Clinic (Kennedy Otieno, hom) is moving along well as a free AIDS clinic.
Kariobangi Clinic is doing well. (Rachel Mutinda, hom). Rachel partners with the Medical Mission Sisters' Korogocho project. She treats HIV+ patients there.
Danson Njoroge is at Makutanu and Kitui and doing well.
Annastacia Nthuzi is getting along at Tala, but she's finding it a struggle.
Calvin, unfortunately, due to different obstacles, closed the Buruburu clinic. He will join me at the college teaching materia medica and we look forward to his starting up again somewhere else.
Dennis Kamore, a new graduate, is at the newly opened Machakos clinic.
Toru Health Centre is booming as usual and growing. This year they installed solar power and huge water tanks. They've bought a plot a land nearby to expand the clinic to include maternity and possibly emergency or in-patient facilities.
Sila and Dorcas have been treating along with Steve Smith. Ruth (the "ru" of "Toru") is there as manager and steve's translator.
Toru is expanding all over the Ukambani region. They have opened a new branch at Kambamware and are doing several mobiles around. They've taken in Joseph, Pius and Julias from the recently graduated class.
Mobiles
We've been trying to open up Nyanza and Western provinces. These are the areas in western Kenya around Lake Victoria. This is a most economically depressed area as well as having the highest HIV infection rate. So while our work is badly needed there, it's the most expensive to conduct a mobile and there's little hope of getting patients to pay something. So this is a struggle too.
Garissa in the northeast is another front we are trying to establish. It is an outpost town in the nomadic muslim region of Kenya.
ICASA, Nigeria
thanks to some donors, we were able to send a team Jaddu Rawi, our programme manager and Kennedy to Nigeria to present Great Health Naturally training at the 14th Int'l Conference on AIDS and Sexual Diseases in AFRICA.
Great Health Naturally
Great Health Naturally Part 2 - Nutrition Handbook was published in Dec 2004. It too has proven to be a popular book. We now have on CD both books and accompanying training presentations.
I've begun work on GHN-3 which will be a therapeutics book for HIV and related conditions. B.Jain Publishers has shown interest in the book, so let's see when/if it comes out....
We got a lot of donations of books this year. many individuals sent us boxes of books. Most notable was 20 books Yaskur's Homeopathic Dictionary from Jay Yaskur and Robin Murphy sent us a huge number of his MM's and Reps. Sorcha Sickinghe arranged 10 boxes of books sent from NL.
Other FANTASTIC people who have supported ALF this year:
Sorcha Sickinghe (NL) - Rotary NL + Cordaid
Fiona & Bruno McKenzie (UK)
Samuel Storey Family Charitible Trust
AMURT (Italy)
AMURT (USA)
SHEAF Trust (UK)
Vinton McCabe (USA)
Through MAYE (Canary Islands, Spain) we got Toru's solar power system donated.
Jill Sowerby (Nbi) organised a lovely "Hootenanny" fundraiser for us. The Hootenanny are a local ex-pat amateur musician group of folk & 60's music and they were good!
Hilde Jacobsteen and the Latin Group (Nairobi expats, diplomats, etc) organised an art auction and raised a good sum of money for ALF.
Amina Ishani (Nairobi/ UK) and the Diplomatic Womens Club (Nbi) donated money for text books
Volunteers:
many thanks to Shawn Mehu, Wendy Grace, Gaori Guher Suloglu, Audrey Van Rooyen and Danny Hill (2004) for their wonderful contribution as volunteers to the work in the last 15 months.
Well, that's all for now.
Naturally, your continuing support will help establish ALF's goals of affordable alternative medicine in Kenya and E Africa. You know how to contact us if you want to donate!!!
Sincerely,
Didi Ananda Ruchira
Director, Abha Light
visit: www.abhalight.org
tel: +254 20 445-0181 / cells: 0733-895466 / 0723-869133