Alwar in northwest Rajasthan, India is an area that holds some of the poorest women in India. These women have dealt with poverty, little to no education, no health services, etc. Heifer International, along with BLT Helps, is working to empower and help these women, so that not only their lives can be phenomenally changed, but the lives of their children and communities can, as well.
Women are provided goats, but with the goats come education, nutrition, financial empowerment, etc. The women whose lives are forever changed are now wanting to pay it forward to other women who are struggling/trying to survive.
Recently two teenage girls, Paris and Paloma, traveled over to India to work with Heifer. 
They had the opportunity to see, up close and personal, the devastation that poverty and oppression have wrought….but they also had the opportunity to hand out goats to women in India and to see the positive outcomes and possibilities this creates for these women and their villages. 
Heifer International provides goats, educates the women on how to care for their goats and milk them, and in turn, women are empowered to help their communities. Women are also now learning how to read and write; they now have opportunities that they’ve only been able to dream of.
Imagine being a woman in Rajasthan….imagine not being able to choose what you can wear….on a bigger scale, imagine never being able to read a book….imagine not being able to give your children the education that you so long for them to have….imagine not being able to feed your children….as a blogger, imagine not being able to have a voice.
Heifer International provides community service opportunities to young people, so that they can go and work and experience things that many teens can’t even imagine. 
I’m excited about these opportunities….I’m excited not only for the women in India whose lives are forever changed when they are handed the ropes to their very own goats….but I’m excited for the youth volunteers who get to experience the power of handing those reins over, to experience the life changing force that Heifer International brings.
Support Heifer International today….read the stories, and educate your children as to the difference that even they can make, the impact they can make on lives. Shine your light!
(Photographs used with permission of BLT Helps. Some photographs taken by Brigitte Lacombe; other photographs taken by volunteers/team members.)
