Between December and February, a dry, dusty wind brings colder weather to Nigeria. This season is called “Harmattan.” Temperatures can range on any given day from the low 50s to the high 100s. While most of the year Nigeria is simply hot, Harmattan's cold weather can catch some Nigerians without weather-appropriate clothes.

Taraba State YES Alumni Butu Selumun Faith (hosted by AFS in Ann Arbor, MI), Faith Felix Daloba (hosted by World Link in Colorado Springs), and Favour Daniel (hosted by YFU in Tiffin, OH) organized a clothing drive in January for children in Kpantinapo village. In most small villages in northern Nigeria, community members are farmers who live off the produce they grow and sell. This subsistence living often means there are not enough funds to regularly purchase new clothes. Until recently, several children in Kpantinapo didn’t have adequate clothing for the cold season, leaving many of them exposed to the milder temperatures. Alumni noticed this and decided to do something to combat the poor living conditions. Faith said the alumni reached out to the elders of Kpantinapo to request permission to carry out the clothing drive. With families in mind, alumni took due diligence in making sure all the children of the village had adequate clothing.

YES alumni reached out to parents, friends, and churches from their respective communities to gather warm clothing for the children of the village. From just one day of taking donations, alumni gathered 10 sweaters, 20 warm jackets and 15 other items of clothing in various children's sizes. Monetary donations were used to buy bath soap, detergents, toothpaste, toothbrushes and body creams for children.

About 40 children benefited from this clothing drive. Alumni noted that clothes donated were used to keep children warm during this cold, dry Harmattan season, as well as provide them with nicer, newer clothes.

Faith hopes to do more clothing drives for other villages, as many of them are remote and do not have readily available clothing for when the seasons change.“There are many villages in need of clothes, for both adults and children,” Faith said. “I have plans to do more clothing drives in the future for these villages around my community to help them.”

Alumni hope that for the next clothing drive they will receive larger donations to help even more people in need. They also plan on informing people about upcoming projects through the local TV station to reach more community members and alumni.