Life change through carpentry
Doris, a deaf woman in Tanzania, is learning carpentry and dreams of one day owning her own home.
Photo: Doris pictured in the SAFI workshop on the outskirts of Arusha, Tanzania
Until now, Doris has struggled to earn enough to support herself and her children – she was born deaf and was unable to learn much at school.
She has now become the first female carpentry trainee that mission partners Ben and Katy Ray have known – in 13 years of working with people with disabilities in Tanzania.
As an adult, she worked at a market selling vegetables and braiding hair, but still couldn’t earn enough to live on.
A few months ago she met Ben and Katy Ray, CMS mission partners who provide training through a charity, SAFI, to help people with disabilities to earn a living.
Now, Doris is learning how to make lots of different things with Alan, the SAFI carpentry teacher.
She is excited to be discovering her true value in Jesus and to be on her way to being able to support herself and her family.
Doris’s story in her own words
“I can only remember growing up with my mum, because my father died when I was still very young. I had four older siblings, but they found it very difficult to play with me because I was born deaf.
“My mum sent me to primary school and I made it all the way through to Year 7. Unfortunately, I didn’t learn to read and write properly because no one could communicate with me.
“I felt very alone there, without the friends that everyone else seemed to have. Although my mum was from a Muslim background, I started to attend the Lutheran Church when it got a sign interpreter – it was here that I learned my first sign language and I also got baptised.
“After leaving school, I began to help my mum selling vegetables at the market and braiding hair. This made me just enough money to buy groceries, but when I had my first child (at the age of 17) I needed my sisters’ help to get by.
“The father of my first child was not a good man, he was sent to jail for a few weeks and we’ve not seen him since.
“I now have a six-year-old son too, but he was taken away from me when he was only four months old to live with his dad in Moshi. His mother thought that I couldn’t look after her grandchild properly and now won’t allow me to see him again.
“I currently live in a rented room with my 14-year-old girl, we struggle to get by, but my sisters in Dar help us from time to time from what they get selling fish.
“I would love to earn a living through carpentry, I’ve had a little training elsewhere, but I’m now learning how to make lots of new things with Alan, the SAFI carpentry teacher.
“I dream one day of owning my own house.”
