October 2013 brief update

All our students have started in their new year at school, and our latest shipment arrives in Banjul this week which Sankung (our project manager and co-ordinator) will then collect and distribute to the villages, schools and hospital. All the boxes are labelled and will be delivered accordingly. Thank you so much to everyone who has contributed! Sankung always makes sure that the school and hospital committees are present when the supplies are handed over, and if possible takes photographs as well.
Our July newsletter was distributed a little late this time - August\September, due to some printing problems, but if anyone other than on our distribution list would like to receive one, please let me know and I will forward one on to you.


Sue, 01296 688039, or email sjones@friendsofsikunda.org

Daisy and Aiden's Garden Party

29th June we held a garden party, initiated by Daisy who made sure that it happened and helped with all the planning of it. Aiden was a fantastic help on the day, and did a great job along with Ruby who made invitations for her schoolfriends, and some of Daisy's friends also helped out when needed on the craft stall in the afternoon. We were very proud of them all, they raised the fantastic sum of £286.30!! The weather was great,  and it was very well attended, very many thanks to everyone who supported them and helped to raise this money which will go towards supporting Si-kunda Village School.

Updates

Our Projects page for 2013 has just been updated, please check it out for our latest news.

We will be producing another newsletter for our supporters in July, which will also be available for anyone wishing to read it. Let me know if you are not already on our distribution list and would like to receive a copy.

Fran's grandson Aiden and my grandaughter Daisy are going to have a small garden party 29th June, they want to raise funds for Si-Kunda Village School.  They will have a stall of African crafts, a tombola, lucky dips, and refreshments. This will be held at 3 Moorlands Road in Wing, LU7 0RD, 2pm - 4pm.

Sue

Sponsorship

We are currently looking for four sponsors,
Two boys need sponsoring through school, one of them is pictured here, Omar.
To sponsor one of these boys would be £10 a month, this will pay for uniforms, school bags, school shoes, school books, school fees and anything else they need to help them progress through their education.

We need to have an extra teacher to start in September at the Sikunda Village School, so would very much like to have a sponsor her - we intend to have a lady teacher to join Saine and Modou. To sponsor her salary would be £15 a month

And lastly, if possible we would like to find a sponsor for a mature student who very much wants to do the next level of computer studies starting in June, for six months, the cost will be £140.00 as a one-off fee.

In fact any amount no matter how small, from as little as £1 a month does really make a difference, and all the donations go to what they should go to, and none taken for administration costs.

Gift Aid if you are a taxpayer also boosts the donation by another 22%
If you are interested, please contact me, Sue, either by telephone, 01296 688039, or email sjones@friendsofsikunda.org

Please see the next blog below for the latest pictures and news from our trip this month.

April 2013 trip to Gambia

We will update the projects page soon, but meanwhile here are a few pictures from last week: 

The Women's Garden Project, this is looking really good, lots of vegetables being grown, the women were really pleased with the produce so far this year and say its the best year yet!

The Skills Centre has a lot of young girls starting to sew and crochet. Syah is doing a great job managing them all

Suwado with some of the children from her compound in Si-Kunda

Dan taking Ansu's nursery class in Toniataba School!

Unloading our luggage after our journey back to the coast

With Abdoulie, Paseedy and Fatou

Trip to Si-Kunda, April 2013

I 

I shall be going to Gambia again in April, on the 12th. This time my son Dan is coming with me, so we will be updating this website with news and photographs of our projects when we get back.

February 2013 Trip to Gambia

Gloz, Marje and I have just returned from a trip to The Gambia. We had a wonderful time, and achieved quite a lot in the time we had. The compound in Busumbala is well on the way to be habitable, the ceilings done, floors tiled, doors and windows in, hopefully it wont be long now till Sankung and his family are able to move in. We met quite a few of our older students who are in further education, and all seem happy and well. We intend to send out updates of our all our students to their sponsors in the next few weeks. We are providing further excercise books to Toniataba and Fonkoi Kunda schools to see them through to the end of the school year. While we were in Si-Kunda we had the well pump repaired, it had become very difficult to draw up water, so need some replacement parts. The workshop is being managed by Syah, and they need some sewing needles, both hand and Singer machine, also some very thin (ideally cotton) materials to practice their 'cutting out' skills with and basic sewing for those wishing to learn. If anyone can help we would be very grateful! There are currently 88 children registered at the Sikunda Nursery School, they would like some new toys, but nothing to bulky that would be difficult and expensive to send by shipment. We always need pencils and colouring pencils, rulers, erasors, biros and excercise books for the schools we support if anyone has any spare? We managed to get to the Independence Day celebrations in Banjul stadium. The first time any of us has been and we were very glad we went, it was the 48th year celebration of Independence. It was quite an event with the military, schools and cultural groups all represented. The Gambian president was present, also a few other African leaders. I do realise that the website really does need updating, and that is on the list of things to do, so watch this space. Many thanks to all our supporters, and the Bonus Ball continues to roll on which really does help with our revenue. Sue

Newsletter no.19

Our latest Newsletter (no.19) has now been distributed, so all our sponsors should receive one any time now. If there is anyone reading this that would like a copy, please let me know, either by phone 07717 821 604, or email sjones@friendsofsikunda.org