For the past nine years, The CIS Charity Club has sponsored a micro credit and nutrition project near the market town of Kasoa in southern Ghana. The Talented Women’s Club, a registered NGO in Ghana, consists of petty traders who sell goods door to door or from their shops. Some are hairdressers and seamstresses. This has enabled forty women to take small steps out of poverty and improve the lives of their families.

We will be staying in the village and participating in the daily lives of these women. In addition to getting a first-hand experience of daily life in African families, students will also gain insight into the limitations and successes of micro-credit on a global level.

At the Hand in Hand Orphanage in central Ghana we will volunteer as assistance in the care of the many physically and mentally handicap children who reside at the centre. Among them is Emmanuella, who was born with no arms and legs. When this happens, some people believe that the child was one that the spirits of the forest do not want to give up, and keep part of it with them when it is born. The parents then feel obliged to give the child back to the spirits by leaving it on the ground under a large tree. Luckily for Emmanuella, missionaries found her, and she came to live at Hand to Hand. Today she is learning to write by holding a pen in the mouth.