Text Box: ▪ # ▪ Text Box: The Waltermires’ trip to Ethiopia with The Murulle Foundation (TMF) When we met last year we were strangers; this year we greeted each other as friends. Several of the original women and 12 new ones in the women’s small business loan program gathered in the Dinsho community center to tell me about their successes and problems with their businesses. It was good to be back in the highlands of Ethiopia seeing our old friends and making new ones. The women were excited as they shared their stories. Most of the new women in the program used their loans to start traditional businesses. Several bought a quintal of barley and sold it on market day in smaller quantities at a profit. Some made tella, a local beer, or ariki, a much stronger potion, out of their homes. Another woman opened a tea house so I promised her we would stop by for a cup of tea on market day. She served spiced, sweetened tea with a pastry–it was delicious! All of the loans were being paid back with interest except for one woman who passed away last year. I explained that this coming year would be the last year TMF would fund the project; after that the women would form a cooperative association to train new women on their own. Judging from their past successes, I believe they will be successful in continuing the project. Several women approached me with the idea of opening a new bread shop in Dinsho (TMF will consider funding it later this year). I was pleased they were thinking like entrepreneurs. Other businesses we have suggested are making candles, sewing cloth carriers for water bottles, and a building a tourist shop to sell their handmade goods. In the meantime, Bob was teaching a weeklong computer mapping course to the park’s forester, biologist, and tourism officer. Some major problems had to be overcome but Bob can tell those stories when we present a program later this spring. Together with Mr. Addisu, the warden for the Bale Mountains National Park, we selected the first three schools to receive textbooks for the students and teachers. Several other possibilities for new projects were explored. We visited a village near Dinsho to examine the feasibility of drilling a well to give them clean water. Bob also interviewed several women who were using a fuel efficient wood burning stove and discovered it had some limitations. Bob hopes to work with the person who designed the stove to make the needed improvements. On our last day in Dinsho we met with members of a local non-profit organization (the first one in the area started by Ethiopians) to hear their proposal to build new sar bets (grass huts) for some of the poor and elderly. We hope that TMF can partner with them in the future. The small business loan program and the new projects would not have been possible without the generous support of the members of Trinity. We are humbled to be a part of this giving congregation. We worked hard while we were there, but we will remember the gratitude of the people TMF has helped, the time we spent with friends, and the joy being in a place we love. Sincerely, Bob and Karel