Penina Kangai

Penina Kangai is a busy mother of three and business owner in the village of Karia located in the Meru region of Kenya. While her husband, David, works as a security officer in Nairobi for all but two days per month, Penina sells clothes and helps run a small restaurant. In addition, she cares for her family’s farm where she grows pineapple, sweet potatoes, nepia grass, corn, coffee, sugar cane, avocados and more to feed her family. Penina is also HIV-positive.

In 2006 Penina discovered she was HIV-positive while she was pregnant with her third child during a pre-natal care appointment. Luckily, the diagnosis allowed Penina to access Kenya’s free nevirapine shots for HIV-positive mothers and protected her daughter from contracting HIV. However, Penina was not tested while pregnant with her second child, Maureen who is also HIV-positive. Since discovering her status in 2006, Penina has continued to lead a busy and hardworking life.

Penina is a member of Mwipelwa, a group of 12 HIV-positive people awaiting a Village Hopecore loan. Mwipelwa has successfully completed two rounds of the merry-go-round lending system. The first time Penina received the money she bought five chickens to provide more protein to her family. During the second round, she used the loan to improve her business by buying more clothing to sell.

Penina has worked hard to provide for her family and improve their quality of life, but knows a loan could tremendously improve their livelihood. She believes a $400 Village Hopecore loan would allow her husband, who is also HIV-positive, to live at home instead of in Nairobi since she would be able to significantly advance her clothing business and restaurant. Presented with challenge after challenge, Penina has showed determination and strength of character. She works hard to provide for her three children and to diligently care for the health of herself and her family. Everyday she consistently takes her ARV’s and attends all doctor appointments.

Agnes Maiti

After a bumpy ride in a packed jeep up the rolling green mountains of Chogoria, Kenya, I arrived at the quaint home of Agnes Maiti. Agnes greeted me with a smile from ear to ear and her three-year-old daughter Ivonne by her side. From the moment I arrived she welcomed me into her home and answered all my questions openly and kindly. Her story was fascinating and heartbreaking.

Agnes is a single mother of two who struggles to support her family while caring for herself and HIV-positive daughter, Ivonne. Agnes’ older daughter, Mercy, is seventeen years old and currently in the Form 3. In 2007 Agnes first discovered she had HIV after she had been very sick for 5 years with malaria, amoebic dysentery, pneumonia and more. At the height of her illness Agnes’ weight dropped from 64 kg to 41 kg. In February 2007 Agnes began her ARVs and today she is doing much better. Since she began her ARVs she has been able to do her normal work and live healthily. In addition, her CD4 count shot up from 100 back to 500.

However, Agnes’ life has not been defined by a few years of illness. She makes a living selling fruits and vegetables at a local market and before that she worked on her brother’s farm. She was married until 2004 when her husband passed away of what she believes was AIDS, although he was never tested for HIV. Agnes has also been participating as a member of Sihag, a Village Hopecore group of 12 HIV-positive people awaiting a loan. She used the merry-go-round money to expand her business by buying more fruits and vegetables to sell at the market and she believes a loan would be life-changing. A loan would allow her to travel to farms to buy her fruits and vegetables more cheaply so that she could make a larger profit at the market. As a result, the increased profits would allow her to buy more food, especially protein, for her family to enjoy. Her family has struggled to get by, especially during the recent drought which caused many crops to fail leaving her family without enough money to buy food or even have enough to eat.

Asenath Muthoni

Asenath Muthoni; age: 47; marital status: widowed; 2 children

Asenath has 2 children and lives on a 1/4 acre farm in Inwanjau about an hour outside of Chogoria. She tested positive for HIV in 2005 after her husbnad told her that he was in the last stages of AIDS. Her CD4 count at the time was 107, but she was able to pull it up to a stable level with the help of good drugs and family support. She is now healthy and optimistic about her HIV status and enjoyes singing and working on her farm.

Her husband's AIDs had progressed too far, unfortunately, by the time they caught it and he died late in 2005. His grave is a single tombstone that lies between the house and the corn fields that he once helped with. Her husband Lened's full time occupation, though, was a traveling salesman, and, as such, brought in a comfortable income. Times have been difficult financially since his death, forcing Asenath to sell at market the beans, corn, and bananas that they normally would eat. Her parents have also been very helpful in paying for her children's school fees and supplementing their food. They have been a great source of inspiration as well as her VHI group.

Asenath's greatest hope lies in her sewing. As a little girl, her mother taught her how to sew sweaters which she give to her family. Her father recently bought her her own foot-powered sewing machine so that she can increase her sewing and perhaps start a business. Asenath buys fabric for 500 Ksh, sews for 2 hours, and then can sell it for 700 Ksh. Currently, Asenath waits for someone to commission a sweater so that she has the initial money to buy fabric. If given a VHI loan, she would invest in fabric and threads so that she could make ready-made clothes that she could sell in the market along with her produce.

When life gets better and her cash flow increases, Asenath first wants to buy a water tap for her home for drinking and irrigation . For now, she walks 1/2 hour to the river and back 4 times a day to have enough water for cooking and drinking; she hopes to cut down this time so that she can devote it to sewing and working in her farm. Also, she wants to help out her aging parents by assisting with her children's school fees. Her son Kent is 18 and wants to become a teacher; her daughter casty is 14 and wants to go into nursing. Her children's future is the most important thing to her, so she encourages them to go to school even though she doesn't know how much more education she can afford.

Asenath has been a responsible member of her merry-go-round group and really enjoys both the financial and moral support from her group. Being in an all HIV positive group allows them to encourage each other and fight stigma. July was her month to receive money from the group which she used top buy fertilizer for her nepea grass and a couple of colors of thread. She is very excited to be a part of VHI and looks forward to the day when her group will get loans.

Bernard Michen

Bernard michen; age: 35; occupation: farmer

bernard is HIV positive. he lives on a dust road about 30 minutes from the town center of chogoria on a 1/4 acre far. He grows mostly tea and nepea grass to feed to his single bullock that he has been raisin. He bought it 4 months ago, newly-born, and hopes to sell it when it is full grown. Until he can start a full-time bull-raising business, he and his wife supplement their income by selling theor own tea and assisting with the harvest of friend's tea.

he doesn't have muchg money, and was thus eager to join village hopecore to raise a bit of captial to start his bull business. Since receiving the $120 in his month of the merry-go-round, he has bought more food for his bull and improves his tea far with fertilizer. this is oinly the beginning though, since he is waiting for a $400 loan that will let him pursue his dream career of bull-raising. With a business like this, he could increase his income to substantially over a dollar a day thus pulling himself out of poverty.

He is going to need this money since he fiound out that his wife of 1 year is pregnant. Now in her 8th month, she is being treated at the clinic to make sure that she has a happy, healthy life, and that her baby is AIDS free. They haven't picked out a name yet because they aren't sure of the gender and want to be surprised!

Bernard and his wife prisca live in a less than 100 squ foot, plyboard home. There is a single bedroom and bed which has a malaria net donated by pepfar, and a single living room with a wooden table and chair. Comics from the newspapers line the walls. Bernard says that reading the football cartoons is his chief enjoyment when he is not working. When his bull business takes off, he hopes to expand his house for his new daughter.

It has been difficult to secure a loan from the large regional banks due to his HIV status. After having 2 cases of TB in the 90s, bernard got tested in 1995 and found out that he was hiv positive. His then girlfriend and now wife also tested HIV positive. he's not sure where or when he was infected, but he suspects that is was while he was working as a minbus conductor in the 80s and 90s. HE says that manyt people are afraid to be tested and share their results with the community, even though he has. Fortunately, his family has been extremely supportive of him and his illness as with his wife. He derives great strength from the other members of his village Hopecore group who share their storieds about medicine, courage in sharing their status, and overcoming an illness that cripplles many people physically and socially. Both he and his wife see the clinic every 2 months for AIDS check-ups and have their CD-4 counts under control.

His family has lived on his current farm since 1976, and he proudly shares it with his 10 brothers and sisters who form a close community on the hill. He hopes to one day give this land to his soon to be family if he has the good fortune to secure a loan from VHI.

Welcome to the Kenya Course Blog! - posted by Josh