After a long unprecedented two years, here is your update on what is new with NB. 

Way back in April or 2020, shortly after the novel Corona Virus had made its global debut, New Beginnings had to shut its doors down. I knew this was going to be extremely devastating to a community like Kibera and I anticipated the worst. Our team and NB, decided to brainstorm on the best way we could continue to provide aid to those in need during this time. After some thought we decided on a temporary feeding program. We knew that the economy took a huge hit in Kibera, so we decided that we would help feed our kids and their families for the unforeseen future. This was a way we could not just ensure New Beginnings families would continue to eat during ungruling times but to enable to share some hope and security during this economic crisis. Since April 2020, all donations that would have been put towards running the program were allocated to feeding over 100 families during the course of the pandemic. This has taken a huge burden off of these families and truly made a huge impact on the people of Kibera. As you can imagine, Covid brought anticipated chaos and panic to the slums of Kibera, much like what we all experienced around the world. People lost their jobs, there were riots in the streets, people desperate for a meal and of stealing food to survive. New Beginnings was honored to be able to provide some form of stability in these families lives. They had some ease knowing they would receive food for the month to feed themselves, their families, and neighbors. It was just the best way we could have helped our community. During the course of the pandemic we were also able to continue to pay our employees their full salary each month in hopes this would help them manage through these tough times. Your monthly donations were a true necessity and truly changed lived throughout the pandemic. 

Monthly donations were also allocated to other unexpected events that occurred over teh course of the last two years. As a family, we suffered great loss. One of our students tragically passed away. Covid also took the life of one of our staff members’ mother. Employees’ children became ill and yes, we lost another young life due to lack of access to proper medical treatment in Kibera. Some of our team lost their homes to renovation in the slum. NB kids faced illness and injury and loss of housing due to not having funds to pay rent. You name it and our little family went through it. Because we were not operating as a day program during this time, we were able to help support funerals, medical bills, therapy, housing, and food during these last two years. I don’t know what would have happened if it weren’t for your contributions and for this I am so very grateful we were able to help so many in such a dark time. 

While it took some time for us to get back on our feet again, we were finally to open our doors back up in November of 2021. We had lost our original facility due to renovation in the slum at the beginning of the pandemic, so we were on the hunt to find a new location to call home. We partnered with a non-profit in Kibera called Acacia of Hope. They were generous enough to allow us to rent out their brand new facility they just built. It’s absolutely perfect for us and we are so happy to be able to share this space with them. 

SInce reopening the program, we have welcomed some new faces to the program. We currently serve 6 individuals. Due to the location of our current facility, we have not been able to get Elizabeth and Gertrude back in the program yet. Kibera roads are very tricky to navigate and sometimes impossible if you are wheelchair dependent. We are in the process of obtaining transportation for our wheelchair dependent individuals and getting them back into the program as soon as possible. 

We have done some exciting projects in the program including making floor mats and soaps. Our instructor Susan has done a wonderful job helping each individual explore their talents as well as teach them new skills. As we had done before, each individual gets fed two meals a day. This time around we outsource out meals and have them brought to us via motorbike. This way we can free up our assistant Julia to help assist Susuan around the program and also give some income to another local in the community by buying their food. 

Some of our goals are to be able to buy our own permanent location. We are working hard on getting all of our clients back into the program on a daily basis. We hope to be abel to fundraise for emergent funds including those to help pay for some of our clients medical needs, therapy, medicine ect. We currently just had a donation to purchase a water tank so our kids can have clean drinking water at the facility. Something we are happy to be abel to share with our friends at Acaia of Hope.