Help street Kids in, St Louis, Sengal

While in St. Louis, Senegal, my wife and I spent time volunteering for an association called Bonheur D'Enfant D'Afrique ( https://www.facebook.com/Bonheur-dEnfants-dAfrique. We greatly enjoyed or time in a town that felt like a little bit of New Orleans, and alot of the news we see in Africa (in general). We had a great time, and value the work of the Bonheur D'Enfant D'Afrique and would like to continue support.

The association provides medical aid and fun to children of the daaras- schools that teach the Quran.

These kids are sent by their parents to attend one of the many Quranic schools in St. Louis. They come from as far as neighbouring countries as Guinea Bissau, Mali, and many villages throughout Senegal. Most of the Quranic school are two rooms: one for learning and one for sleeping/living. Because most of the Quranic schools cannot provide food and minimal basic necessities, these community norm is to save food for the quranic school kids who have to beg for all of their meals.

Because the kids all sleep in one room, sharing blankets and mats, they suffer from all kinds of diseases with no medical attention, except the association.

What the Bonheur D'Enfant D'Afrique Association provides for the children of the daara's:

- Providing first aid (most of the kids suffer from untreated wounds and contagious skin conditions and mosquito bites),

- Working at Quran school to clean and make the living conditions better: (IE installing roofs, toilets, drainage)

- Maintain a center for the kids to come learn, play and be entertained

- Provide clean clothes

- Provide a shower facility to enhance healthful conditions

In our time there we helped in putting a new roof for the center, teaching, treating their wounds, cleaning and putting fences in some of the Quran schools and playing with the kids. It was nice to see smile on those kids faces and we want to do more than some volunteering work to help these beautiful smiles, keep smiling.

There is so much the leadership in the association want to do for these kids, but funding is limited. So we want to share our desire to help, and hope you can as well. Your help would be very much appreciated by the kids of the daaras in St. Louis, Senegal and us as well.

We will post more pictures of our time in St. Louis and the kids at www.nomadic9to5.com soon.

Thanks and peace,

Anteneh and Alissa Maru