Zenny Ugandan Peace Promise Orphanage (ZUPPO)
This name was chosen with 3 of the 22 children’s names included in the title,
honoring the children and to remind all that the focus of the organization is the
children who were left, without parents, to care for their needs.
Zuppo is a Nonprofit Corporation for the Public Benefit with the State of California registered as a 501(c)3 through the IRS.
Global Orphan Statistics – A Call for Help
Every day, the number of orphans around the world continues to rise. Current estimates show that 140 to 153 million children have lost one or both parents due to war, disease, poverty, and natural disasters. Without adequate care, many of these children face hunger, exploitation, homelessness, and neglect.
To understand the scale: there are nearly as many orphans globally as half the population of the United States—a heartbreaking comparison that brings this crisis closer to home.
Imagine your own life—or your child’s—without parents. For millions of children, this is not a distant tragedy; it’s their everyday reality.
At Zuppo.org, we believe every child deserves love, safety, and opportunity. This is an urgent global crisis, but together we can help. Your support can make a direct difference in the life of an orphaned child today.
The name of our organization was chosen based on the names of three of our children. If we could, we would put all 22 children in the name.
These three children are the namesake of our organization. Each of the children have a personalized hand symbol that relates to their name and distinguishes them, so that you can see a bit of their personalities.
Zenny is on the right, he is our oldest child, he was named specially by our director. Zenny is doing the hand symbol for Namaste.
In the middle we have Peace, and on the left, Promise. Both Peace and Promise were given these names at birth by their biological parents. Peace is doing the peace sign and Promise is doing their symbol for promise.
On this day, the children left their small village for the first time in their lives. None of them had ever been in a vehicle of any kind, or left the area. Also, it was their first time swimming.
Our Team
Susan takes care of all the children’s daily needs. She cooks for 25 people, outside on coals, (not a stove, because they don’t have one yet).
Susan is extremely loving, kind, nurturing and a beautiful soul. These children cherish her, just as your children cherish you.
Susan is 24 and she and her brother Kaweesi, grew up with their grandmother, when they tragically lost their beloved parents in a terrible car accident coming back from the wedding party of their friends.
After their parents passed away, their grandmother became their caregiver. They attended namalimba primary school where they learned the basics of reading and writing.
They grew up in abject poverty. Education is not free in most of the developing world.
They attended very little school and didn't complete studies due to the poor life that they lived.
June Gillam, PhD, lives in Fairfield, California. She is the secretary for Zuppo. She became a part of our organization through a writer’s group our Director’s Mom is a part of in California. June has a loving heart for our children and has dedicated her time and money to our children’s betterment and life.
June is a published author. Her books are both captivating and insightful to our current political atmosphere. Her poetry and stories have appeared in Wild Edges from Manzanita Press, Metal Scratches, and America's Intercultural Magazine (AIM).
She led a Cooperative Inquiry doctoral writing group and tells the story in Creating Juicy Tales, one of the twelve books she has published, available for purchase on Amazon. Please visit her website at www.junegillam.com for details.
Mike Cheshareck is the founding father, because he has financially adopted, fed and housed these children since 2021.
He is an Engineer, who designs the electricity for new businesses, homes and government projects in Northern California.
He attended West Point after attending Salesian High School, in Richmond, California, before attending UC Davis.
His nickname, from some of his friends, is Iron Mike. He is an incredibly strong person - physically, emotionally, and especially in his heart and mind. He is the husband of our director and they recently celebrated 10 years of marriage.
For the last 4 years since 2021, Deb through odd jobs, some friends, family and mostly Mike have given around $600-900 a month for the children and the caregivers to have shelter and food. Here is the link for the receipts for that giving. We do not own a house. We have chosen the care and sustenance of our children, before that priority in life.
Kaweesi is the treasurer our organization. He is in charge of our very small budget, which we hope with your help will increase.
Kaweesi takes the children on the bicycle we purchased to the borehole for water multiple times daily. He is also in charge of communicating with our director multiple times each day, and he is an excellent communicator.
Kaweesi Micheal is 28 years old. His ancestors hail from the clan of Ente - which means cow.
Before he and Susan, his sister, established funding to support orphans, he was washing cars while Susan was digging for farming or construction.
“Due to poor life we lived in I got an idea of helping other kids who are orphans like us because I know what it means to be an orphan or without parents mom.”
Deb’s personal life motto is, “Don’t breed, there is already too many in need. Let’s take care of those that already exist.” She feels that not having biological children was the best life decision she ever made.
At 10 years old Deb saw a commercial for an organization that supports children in Africa that were severely malnourished. She immediately decided she would not bring someone to this earth, to suffer such an existence through procreation.
Deb has experience in working as a social work/counselor, and served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Jamaica from 2001-2005. She volunteered in a church sponsored Orphanage in the country of Ghana, Africa in 2008. The caregivers for ZUPPO, are of the best caliber, and she has seen some terrible things such as children under the age of 3 being beaten with sticks there. The ZUPPO caregivers, do NOT beat the children. Deb, Susan, and Kaweesi all love the children, the same way you love your childre
Since 2021, when Kaweesi and Deb connected, 100% of Deb’s income has gone to the children at the orphanage, for their survival. She has worked on a panel for the city she livSes in through the Non-Profit Healthy Democracy. She also worked as a behavior technicion for children in need of guidance behaviroally with Applied Behavior Analysis, and has also driven children that are on the spectrum to school and back as a support transport. She collects cans and turns them in for the organization. She does pet sitting and elder care as well.
She has many children throughout the world that are a part of her flock. There are some children she is currently helping in the US.
One of her dear ones is currently falsely incarcerated and she is fighting to get her released to a proper environment.
There are many in need everywhere she looks and she does what she can as she walks in life.
Her bachelors degree is in Social Work and Masters degree is in International Studies with a focus on Africa and Human Rights.
Please see here posted are some supporting documents, that tell more about her journey to creating ZUPPO. For a more detailed version of the story, Deb will meet with you for an agreed donation to the organization.
Z U P P O - Our origin story dates back to 2021. It is a deeply personal story. So for the short version - We met through the internet.
Beth Nelsen has served Zuppo’s technological needs. A graduate from UCLA , she earned her Master of Arts in Film & Television from the VIctorian College of the Arts at the University of Melbourne, Australia and has since worked as an award wining documentary filmmaker who focuses on raising the volume of marginalized voices. Today she works as a consultant in the political and environmental realms as well as a real estate agent in the State of Oregon.
Our Current Building Tour
Since 2021, Deborah, her family, and a few friends have been making sure that the children are fed and housed. Our next goal is to get them educated. None of them have ever been to school of any kind. After we get them enrolled in school, (which costs $300 USD per child, per year), we hope to secure our own building. This is a tour of the current shelter, which does not have a proper roof nor kitchen. Please watch so you can understand what the living conditions are like for our children currently. We hope that when you see this, you will be inspired to give.
Zenny is our oldest child and his hand symbol is Namaste.
Reagan is doing the hand symbol for Rastafari.
Our Children
With Their Personalized Hand Symbols
P atience
E ffortlessness
A cceptance
C alm/Compassion
E ase
Parvan is our gentle warrior, this is Warrior Arms from yoga.
Promise is our youngest. They are 3.
Precious like a baby, here she is writing her name for the first time in her life.
Angel has a namesake who is also named Angel. She is our volunteer logistical helper.
Noweria - NOW
Neutral, Open, Wow
Muzee likes to use his t-shirt as comfort, he muzzles on it in the night, and it gets torn up, so we have a hard time keeping him in a shirt that isn’t ripped.
Brian is very sporty. So we chose touchdown for his hand symbol.
Daniel is our second oldest and since Zenny is Namaste, Daniel got to be Number One.
Contact Us
Reach out and we can add to our contact list.