From left, Oray Adan Hussein, who is visiting from Kenya, shares a laugh with Michele Bart and Ellen Linder, both with the Southern Arizona AIDS Foundation. Hussein and four other women from Kenya are on a mission in Tucson, with the goal of empowering women back home.

A.E. Araiza / arizona daily star

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Fatuma Mohamud Mohamed's first trip to the United States three years ago was for her brother's graduation from law school.

Now, this Kenyan mother of nine is back to learn more about how to advance the rights of women in her country, and how to get more Kenyan women into universities there and abroad.

"We're here to learn how your government works so we can implement it back home,'' said Mohamud Mohamed, who is a guest of the League of Women Voters of Greater Tucson and Tucson Vice Mayor Carol West.

This is the second time West, whose ward includes a portion of Tucson's East Side, has helped host women from Kenya.

"Last year, they came from the area on the Indian Ocean and this year they are from the northeast, which is an arid region," West said.

She hopes the visitors will become more active in their own communities.

"In their society, they are absolutely nothing. They cannot inherit, they do 80 percent of the farm labor, they can't file for divorce, but their husbands can divorce" without contest, she said. "Their plight is pretty serious. What we are trying to make them see is that they need to start working together, organizing and working together to make their lives better."

Once divorced and separated from their children, the women often have nowhere to go, West said. And if they are not accepted back into their childhood homes, she said, they often end up on the streets, where they are forced to resort to prostitution.

"And then, of course, there's AIDS," West said.

Mohamud Mohamed and four other Kenyan women who are with her said they are overwhelmed with information and ideas, and they are excited to impart what they have learned back home.

"Women are still very behind,'' said Mohamud Mohamed, who will graduate from the University of Nairobi in July with a bachelor's degree in gender and development.

"We live in a very patriarchal society. No women are elected."

One of the women with her, Zahara Ali Shurie, was nominated to serve with their local government — the equivalent of serving on the Tucson City Council — but the women said it's a token position.

"If she talks, it is overruled,'' Mohamud Mohamed said of her friend's position.

Still, she said, progress has been made. "Ten years ago, we wouldn't have been let out to come here," she said.

In Kenya, girls often wait in the kitchen while the men and boys eat and then are allowed to eat what is left over, said Halima Nasra Mohamed, who is a nutritionist.

And sometimes there is nothing left, she said.

"Most of the children we see who are malnourished are girls," she said. Girls are "left behind," she said.

"That's why we have no women leaders," Nasra Mohamed said. "The focus now has to be on bringing up confident and intelligent young girls so they can be leaders. We can only do this at the household level."

Shurie said she was a bit nervous to visit the United States as she'd heard it was a dangerous and unfriendly country.

But after her Tucson visit and stay with West, she would like to return. "I have made many friends here,'' she said.

Shurie said one of the highlights of her visit was visiting Pima County's Juvenile Court Center.

"I will go home and tell them that I have seen a court and judges that are free from corruption," she said.

Oray Adan Hussein started her own school, the Iqra Elite Academy, and has 120 students, with more girls than boys. But while things are progressing in some respects, she said, there is still a lot of work to be done to improve the lives and chances for Kenyan girls.

"There are low perceptions for the girls. (The idea) is that she'll be married to someone tomorrow and so she doesn't need to be educated," Hussein said.

"The more girls we have on board at the university, the more changes we can make as a community."

Fatuma Omar Buno is amazed at how many women serve in local government here and wants to see that happen in her own country.

She said she is proud that one of her daughters will be finishing a degree in microbiology this year.

"A man wanted to marry her and she said, 'No, I want to get my master's degree,' " Buno said.