In the mid-1990s she returned to Ethiopia with US$5,000, which she invested in local improvements to help win the confidence of the community. She supplemented this with a €500,000 grant from the European Commission, and KMG Ethiopia was born. Originally operating in two kebele in Ethiopia, the organization began by surveying community members about practices and informing the community of the results, focusing education efforts on individuals who would then spread what they had learned to others. On request of the United Nations, they turned to hosting "community conversations" encouraging people in the region to talk about these subjects. These community conversations, a concept created by AIDS activist Moustapha Gueye, are based on traditional African conventions whereby communities come together for several hours on a regular basis to reach consensus on matters of communal concern. Hundreds of men and women were trained to serve as facilitators at the KMG community conversations, which initially focused on AIDS education. In 2004, due to its successful implementation of the community conversation strategy, KMG was chosen by the Ethiopian government to train people to lead conversations across the country as a key component of HIV prevention in Ethiopia. Supported by KMG in speaking up, women at these community conversations in the Kembata region first began pressing for women's rights issues such as the right to sit in the presence of men, equal length of education for boys and girls, and a place for women as village elders in making decisions before moving on to female genital mutilation and kidnapping. A video screening of a female circumcision, a surgery locally known as "cutting off the dirt", had a particularly powerful impact. Both men and women in the community responded. Those who took part in conversations formed committees to work on ending the practice, including staging active interventions, with 2,000 trained facilitators across communities. Public celebrations of wholeness followed, with a rally on October 29, 2004 to celebrate intactness being attended by 100,000 people. According to the Innocenti Research Center, as of 2008 local support for female genital mutilation had dropped to 3%. As of 2013, according to a New York Times profile, 85% of area residents were engaged in KMG's community conversations on multiple topics. Those who attend are encouraged to spread what they have learned to those who do not, with the intention of fostering social revolution on the individual level. In addition to