Community Corner

Local Woman Aims to Build Orphanage in Africa

Eileen Koff, a 20-year resident of Three Village, hopes to help orphans in Uganda.

Eileen Koff's first trip to Uganda yielded a hard lesson in the differences between America and rural Africa.

"Things that we don’t even think about, they deal with on a daily basis," she said.

Among those things: Shoes. Going to school. Electricity to light their homes.

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Having parents, grandparents, or parental figures to raise them.

Koff said she first accompanied her husband on his work-related trip via the International AIDS Vaccine organization. There she met Samuel Mukisa, who is approximately 20 years old – though no one knows for sure how old he is – and who takes care of children who have been orphaned. Oftentimes parents in the region who can no longer care for their children will take them to the shores of Lake Victoria in Uganda and Kenya, where thousands of abandoned children live in what Koff described as "a Lord of the Flies scenario." Children whose parents have died often end up there, too – many of them victims of AIDS.

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Koff, who has lived in Three Village for 20 years and runs her own business as a professional organizer, said she saw the immediate need in a village outside the city of Entebbe, Uganda, was for lights to brighten the night inside homes, where there was no electricity. She was able to pull together enough donations to send 20 solar lanterns. Another immediate need in the village was for shoes, so Koff said she appealed to the organization Soles 4 Soles to send 20 pairs of shoes to Mukisa for the children.

"Upon meeting him, as an organizer, I was able to immediately understand the priority and the immediate need for the kids," Koff said. "I was able to separate my emotions at that point and go immediately to what the needs were."

Koff's next effort: to build an orphanage, a project which is still in its infancy. To fundraise, she has begun selling beaded necklaces and handbags made by Mukisa and the children, and has raised $800 so far within the last couple of weeks. Building the orphanage – to be named the Peace Island Children's Centre – will cost around $25,000, she said, to purchase land and construct the building.

"It’s so that they’d be protected and that peace would reign in Samuel's home," Koff said.

She said she is also helping Mukisa get a passport and visa in the hope that he'll be able to come to the U.S. and speak to various organizations; she also sent a camera for Mukisa to be able to take photographs, and is helping him attend art school so he can master the craft of beadwork. But beyond that, she has hit a road block: she intends to set up a 501(c)3 organization, but she'll need legal help to do it. And legal help is expensive.

"I’m looking for a lawyer to help me set this up," Koff said. "It's a lot of paperwork and a lot of stuff I don’t have the know-how to do."

Koff said she is hopeful that she'll find an attorney who will offer services for free, which will enable donations to be tax-deductible. Until then, she said, she'll continue to help Mukisa care for the orphans in any way she can.

"It’s never ending," Koff said, "but it’s been a blessing to be able to do this."


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