We Celebrated Western Christmas in Our Friend’s Home

These 7 youth celebrated our western Christmas with us in our home. They graduated from a training program mentioned in our previous post and we wanted to reward them. They are now living securely in their rooms and paying their own food and rent costs, even saving money for their next desired purchase. We gave them their transportation money to visit their families over Ethiopian New Year and they promised to be back 3 days after Ethiopian Christmas beginning on Jan. 7,2015 on the western calendar to continue their education here in Hawassa. They are still happy to be attending government night school and as donations and work permit, may begin attending half-day school soon. We are hoping some of them will want to help the 2nd cycle of boys coming through the new-and-improved training program but at this stage they really don’t understand the accomplishment they have achieved in becoming self-sufficient.