NFL stars hand out hearing aids in Rwanda Hearin

(AFP)
–
15 hours ago
KIGALI — A group of National Football League stars has spent the past week travelling through Rwanda and Uganda fitting free hearing aids on people too poor to afford them.
Notable NFL stars on the trip included: Tennessee Titans’ Derrick Morgan, Tampa Bay Bucs’ Gerald McCoy, Cincinnati Bengals’ Roy Williams, former Chicago Bears’ Tommie Harris, San Francisco 49ers’ Vernon Davis, Miami Dolphins’ Vontae Davis and Minnesota Vikings’ Bryant McKinnie and Adrian Peterson.
They travelled through remote areas of Rwanda as well as the capital Kigali as part of an effort to distribute more than 22,000 hearing aids to needy people in Africa.
The initiative was organised by the Eden Prairie, Minnesota-based Starkey Hearing Foundation and Pros for Africa, a non-profit organisation based in Okhlahoma City.
The players worked with Rwandans labeled as deaf, though most of them simply have severe hearing deficiencies and could not afford hearing aids.

“Back in the states a hearing aid like this would cost $1400. That?s maybe two or three years of income for a family here,” said Larry Fitzgerald.
All of the players were moved by their experience. Many had not been to Africa before this trip. None had visited Rwanda before and some commented that the experience was enlightening.
“People don?t understand the needs people in Africa have. People question why I go to Africa and help but you won?t ever know the need if you?ve never been. The poorest city in the US would be one of the richest cities in Africa,oakley lunettes,” Roy Williams told AFP.
“I don?t care where you are in the US, you can go up to any faucet and the water is cleaner the water the kids have to drink here. We don?t have to share our drinking-water with livestock. We don?t have to worry about parasites in the water,” he went on.
“We’re not just coming out here and dropping money off; we?re actually helping,” Willaims said.
Copyright © 2011 AFP. All rights reserved.
More »

Article source: