Anthill Foundation

One of the things we love about traveling is meeting new people from all over the world.  We were lucky to spend an entire day with two lovely ladies named Mary and Pat. Mary is a nun from Ireland who has lived in Zambia for 18 years.  Mary helped to build out the town of Pemba where she provides a stable environment for Zambian families to live and learn how to work in the community. Mary empowers the community members by providing them with the resources they need to live a healthy and productive life. For example, the community members who live in this village must build their own houses, learn how to farm their own land and develop other skills in order to make them successful contributors to their community.

Pat, her friend from Portland, Oregon, is visiting Pemba to teach the women of the village how to sew. The goal is to teach women a skill that they can use to build self-confidence and move beyond the traditional roles of having multiple children and staying home to do chores.  With Pat’s instruction, the women can now make their own clothes, and use them to trade for other goods such as vegetables, beans, meat, etc. 

Mary and Pat hope that by teaching women new skills like sewing it will give young girls -- who are vulnerable to early pregnancy and marriages – motivation to stay in school and get an education. Education is another area that Mary works hard to make a reality for the girls of the community. She set up a scholarship program for young girls in Pemba. They must meet a specific grade requirement before they are given the scholarship to attend a day school or a boarding school, depending on the amount of funds available.

You can check out what it’s all about by visiting this website called the Anthill Foundation.