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Community Corner

Precious Cargo: Shoes Go a Long Way in Helping AIDS Orphans

Community Christian Church donates 6,000 pairs of shoes to support education for orphans in Tanzania.

Words escape Providence Rubingisa as he closes the back of a Penske moving truck.

Rubingisa is driving off with what appears to be a truck full of garbage bags gathered at Community Christian Church in Naperville. In reality, the 46-year-old Wheaton resident is carrying precious cargo.

The cargo are shoes — 6,000 pairs to be exact. Rubingisa is collecting the used sneakers, boots and heels to ship to Africa to raise funds to educate AIDS orphans in Mbwewe, Tanzania. Once the shoes arrive in Africa, small businesses will sell them to middle-class families that might otherwise wear plastic bottles as shoes.

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Rubingisa's operation doesn't stop there. For every container, which holds about 24,000 pairs of shoes, shipped to Africa, Rubingisa's Schaumburg-based nonprofit, Stuff For the Poor, earns $10,000. The money supports the orphans in Mbwewe.

"We are not asking people for money," Rubingisa said. "We are asking for people to clean out their closet, and then we turn that into money."

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That's exactly what children and families at Community Christian Church in Naperville, also known as the Yellow Box, did.

Kids' City, the children's ministry at Community Christian Church, worked with Rubingisa two years ago. The children's offering, known as "Giving Back to God," collected money to purchase animals, such as chickens and goats, for a village in Africa. The children raised so much money, however, that donating all of it would destroy the bartering system of the village.

"(Rubingisa) asked if it would be acceptable to buy the appropriate number of animals and use the remainder to pay tuition for AIDS orphans," said Dani Seaton, Yellow Box Kids' City director.

The extra funds paid the tuition of two children. Rubingisa, who grew up in Rwanda, knows education is the key to escaping poverty. He earned his college degree in Morocco and owned a construction company in Rwanda. He was forced to leave behind his country, wife, and three sons, however, after speaking out against the 2002 killings in Rwanda.

Last year, Rubingisa's shoe collection supported 50 children. His goal this year is to support all 128 AIDS orphans in Mbwewe. This includes tuition, textbooks, room and board and uniform costs. The shoes collected from the Yellow Box will support 20 children for an entire year. Rubingisa hopes drives by other churches, temples, Boy Scout troops and schools will support the remaining children.

The 6,000 pairs of shoes, however, didn't appear in one day. When approached with the idea of a shoe drive, Seaton knew the back-to-school season was the time to act. She set a goal of 1,000 pairs. The children collected 800 pairs of shoes with time to spare.

News of the drive grew outside Kids' City. A slideshow soliciting donations was shown before adult worship and the church embraced the drive. Church members posted on Facebook asking for shoes. One family, the Edwards, went around their neighborhood with a wagon. They collected 219 pairs. By the next week, 1,000 pairs of shoes were donated.

The 6,000 shoes donated by Community Christian Church is the largest donation in Stuff For the Poor's history. To Rubingisa, that fact isn't important

"It doesn't matter the number of shoes," he said. "What we need is more groups to be involved. The big vision is to make these villages self-sufficient. We want to go back to these villages and build a clinic, provide clean water. That's our goal."

For more information on Stuff For the Poor please visit the organization's Facebook page or website at http://stuffforthepoor.org.

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