Providing decent, affordable homes to orphaned children is why a woman traveled all the way from Lesotho, Africa, to Port Townsend.

Mathabo Makuta, national director for Habitat for Humanity Lesotho, said that one quarter of the country’s 2.1 million people were children orphaned by HIV/AIDS. The problem is exacerbated by poverty and high unemployment, she said.

But thanks to Habitat for Humanity, some progress is being made and lives are being changed for the better, she said.

Makuta has been busy visiting supporters and personalizing her relationships with them during her trip to the United States. She attended the 2017 Habitat Global Conference in Atlanta, Georgia, March 27-30, and then visited Habitat supporters in Vacaville, California.

She visited Port Townsend April 6-9 to meet with Jamie Maciejewski, executive director of Habitat for Humanity of East Jefferson County. She also spoke at a public forum at the First Presbyterian Church of Port Townsend as well as at the Quilcene Habitat Store, reaching more than 60 people all together.

Maciejewski herself visited Lesotho in the summer of 2016. She got to see firsthand how the Lesotho people appreciated Habitat’s help.

The trip was “a remarkable experience.... I never expected to go to Africa. Being there made it very real and very personal,” Maciejewski said.

UP CLOSE, PERSONAL

The landlocked country of Lesotho is surrounded by South Africa. Its lowest elevation is 3,281 feet above sea level, and the terrain was similar to the American Southwest in appearance, Maciejewski said.

The experience helped her see up close and personal how a relatively small amount of money – by U.S. standards – can really change a person’s life.

Maciejewski said the efforts of Habitat of East Jefferson county and its supporters have resulted in 12 homes being built in three different countries: Lesotho, Brazil and Ethiopia. (They plan on doing work in Nepal as well.)

Three of those homes were built in Lesotho – one every year for the past three years.

“It is important for our partners up here in the states to realize how much their support helps us to change people’s lives,” Makuta said.

Supporters are crucial because they make it possible to build small, two-room houses and pit latrines for orphans and vulnerable children living in Lesotho.

The homes are modest, built of concrete blocks with roofs made of corrugated iron, but they represent real improvements for the people living in them. The homes, which cost about $5,000 to build, are more structurally sound and secure with locking doors.

Makuta said the program has served 1,500 families with various housing solutions.

With 40 percent of the population living on less than $1.25 per day, simply putting food on the table was a big enough challenge, and decent housing is often out of reach.

But with Habitat Lesotho, she said, lives were being transformed.