Thursday 11 November 2010

Update on Gambian Projects Fundraising Fortnight

A huge thank you goes out this week to the following people:

Catherine and Tim Hamlyn for collecting items, packing boxes and
transporting them.
Reg Hackworthy and his team at Plymouth Self Storage who have loaned us
a storage unit while we collect all our donations together.
Bandvulc who have agreed to collect children's shoes at their tyre
factory.
Trevor Anderson for lending me his white van and for continued support
with collecting books to ship over to the schools in the Gambia.
Eve-lynn Weekes for knitting her socks off!
Paris, Vienna and Owen Read for fund-raising by organising a Where's
Santa competition.
Shirley for her continued support in many ways.

A special thanks goes out to those who have pledged to sponsor a child
throughout the year. Just £2 a month will enable a child to go to
school, have uniform, school bag, exercise books and pencils. Regular
updates on the children's progress and photos will be sent to keep the
sponsors informed of their child's progress. This is a great way for
children in this country to learn about the lives of children in Africa
and have real contact with them. Please don't hesitate to get in touch
with Debbie on 07596 249987 for further information on sponsoring a
child or email her at dwdebs@aol.com or visit the website at
www.gambianprojects.com.

Pictured are Paris, Owen and Vienna Read packing boxes into Trevor's
van and some of the girls at Debbie's school proudly wearing their new
school uniforms

Friday 5 November 2010

FUNDRAISING FORTNIGHT Call Debbie on 07596 249987 or 01752 670858

Hi everyone, today we have launched a two-week fundraiser to raise
money for Gambian Projects with three particular aims in mind:

1) Sponsorship of individual children. This will help children attend
school and pay for their uniform, exercise books pencils and a school
bag. Just £2 per month or £24 a year will fund this and sponsors will
be kept up to date with their child's progress, receiving news and
photos throughout the year.

2) Having a school lunch is a luxury for some village children, so we
want to ensure as many as possible can have one. Just 50p will feed a
child for a week so please consider this option when you donate. It's
awful visiting local schools and seeing some children eating and some
going hungry.

3) Our third aim is to raise funds to be able to ship out to The Gambia
all the items people are kindly donating to us on a daily basis. We
currently have lots of children's clothes, shoes, books and toys ready
to go. It costs £130 per cubic metre (actually quite a lot of boxes,
works out to about £15 per large box and does not depend on weight) to
send them via an excellent company called Wynot in Exeter. If we could
raise enough money we could send out another container which works out
to approximately £50 per cubic metre which is much cheaper but costs
about £2500 in total.

Any donations, even a few coins will help us to achieve these three
current aims and really do something concrete, visible and measurable
to help these wonderful children. I will be heading back to the Gambia
on 21st November, please help us to achieve our aims by doing something
really worthwhile today. Pick up the phone and call Debbie on 07596
249987 today. MAKE A DIFFERENCE!

Thursday 4 November 2010

Some Pics To Cheer Us All Up!

The front page of yesterday's Herald carried two stories, one of a man
accused of being a paedophile and the other of a school dinner lady
accused of stealing children's lunch money. Here are some photographs
from The Gambia simply to spread a bit of happiness in this current
climate of doom and gloom. These people are incredibly poor and are
getting on with their lives the best they can.

Life In The Gambia Is Fragile

Life In The Gambia Is Fragile

Life in The Gambia is more fragile than here in the UK. This hit home
to me more than usual when I was informed two days ago that my 16 year
old next door neighbour, Musa Touray, had suddenly passed away. Musa
was a wonderful boy, polite, respectful and highly intelligent. He was
always offering to help in the school compound, was so gentle in nature
and had the most amazing smile. Age expectancy in this country, one of
the smallest in Africa and about five times the population of Plymouth,
is low, around 54 for men and 57 for women. Around 8% of new born
babies don't make it to a year old, and approximately 10% of children
die before their 5th birthday. For this lovely boy to die at 16 of
unexplained causes is just so sad for Musa's extended family and many
friends but death is such a common occurrence in The Gambia that people
accept it as part of life and Allah's will. I am lucky to have a deeply
strong belief in a life after this one as have the vast majority of
Gambians and Christians in this beautiful but hard country. I am eager
to get back to The Gambia to give my support to those close to Musa and
to try to make life better for the children who are there. I know many
of you read my blog and I would love to hear your comments. Until next
time, love Debbie xx