Securing a better future

When I was preparing for my trip to Africa, the thing I was most excited about was that I was going to get to interact with the children there. Being able to help those that will be the future of our world is awesome.

One of the things that we did while we were there was to pipe a water line into the village so that there was an area for the villagers to get potable water.

There was usually children bringing their donkeys to the water spigot to fill up buckets for their families.

Other times you would just see children or others with old water bottles on their way to get some water.

Why do I care so much about service?

Throughout my adult life, I have been through some pretty horrific experiences and seen humanity do horrible things to each other. Have you ever stopped and thought about what people would say about you after you are gone? I have known a lot of great heroes in my time that have left this world and left their mark, but what mark would I leave?

I have thought about this a lot and wondered how I would be remembered. Everyone wants to be remembered as a kind person that did a lot for their fellow man, but how many people actually pursue that? When I was looking into these children's faces in Africa, there was so much that I wanted to do to help them, but I was only able to do so much.

My time in Africa with the Maasai changed me forever and left a burning desire to make the world a better place. I will eventually return to that small village outside of Arusha, Tanzania and visit everyone again. When I do, I am hoping to be able to serve those wonderful people even more.

What am I doing now?

During my short time here on Steemit, I realized how much power this platform has to be able to help people all over the world. When I created the Deranged Photography Contests, I did it as somewhat of a humanitarian effort to give back to people all over the world that were sharing pictures of where they lived, but may be struggling to make it in their every day lives.

My end goal here on the platform is to be able to use what I have gained from Steemit to travel the world providing humanitarian work with my wife @faitherz33. Our kids will be out of the home soon, so my wife and I am planning on traveling and using Steem to fix up orphanages around the world.

The first stop we will be making for our humanitarian work will be Tanzania to work in the orphanages there. There are so many children that are in desperate need and the orphanages do not have the funds needed to provide them with everything they need.

Most amazing woman

I have written a few months ago about this amazing woman, but I am sure that the majority of the people reading this now have not read that old post. This woman adopted a young boy from the orphanage about 20 something years ago. The significant thing was that the boy had was positive for the AIDS virus and had been pretty much discarded by the orphanage staff.

This woman knew how important this young boys life was that she took him into her home and raised him by herself up until present. We spent a few hours learning about her and her life and meeting her son. Her life had been one of devotion to this young man so that he may live and she was truly an inspiration.

I had many great experiences while I was in Africa, but that day meeting her ranks up there as one of the best times I had.

I am not really sure where I was going with everything in this post. The main thing I wanted to express was how grateful I am to the Steemit community as a whole for the response I have gotten over the past 3 months so that I can fulfill my dreams of making the world a better place. There is so much good that can come out of a platform like this and I am hoping that more people see the value of the humanitarian opportunities that it can provide.