Enough raised for first shipment of books

Donation Updates:

The total has already surpassed my hope for the first section at $257.00. I am so excited, and will begin the process of purchasing books in the next couple of days for the $257 dollars. I will post a list of all the wonderful books purchased with the donations as well as updates. Once these books have been received by the center (as well as any feedback), I will work on continuing to raise the remainder of the funds for the project (At least an additional $250)

Updates:

5/31/2011, 11:40 PM-- a generous donation of $100 has been made. What a generous heart and an excellent start! Thank you!

6/2/2011, received a $50 donation, thank you!

6/6/2011, received two donations in the maill today, one for $7 and one for $100, thank you so much!

Total so far: $257.00

First shipment to be made in the next couple of days, a list of the books purchased will be posted.

Books, Books, Books!

The following blog details the community fundraiser started for impoverished children living in the slums of Kolkata. This fundraiser will provide their community center (run by Children International, a secular non-profit organization) with many amazing children's books in Hindi, Bengali, English (and hopefully Urdu), giving children a change to enjoy books in the languages that they speak at home and study at school. Most of these children do not have their own books, and this will be an opportunity to foster a love of reading and increase literacy in the area. Please read the story below, and click here to see how to help.

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During my time in India, I have noticed a lack of appealing, good quality children's books in most local bookstores (non-chain) and a lack of books in languages other than English in large-chain bookstores in India such as Crossword (which are too expensive for most families as well).

So I was thrilled last fall when someone discovered this great publisher online Tulika--selling children's books in many Indian languages as well as English, including a huge amount in both Hindi and Bengali, two of the three languages spoken by the children served by Children International. The books also had vibrant artwork, drawing from many talented illustrators as well as often using various local art styles from across India. The books are high-quality and appealing to read. Best of all, the book publisher is in India and the rates are extremely fair and the shipping is free to Kolkata.

In the fall, I decided to order some age-appropriate picture books from Tulika for my youngest sponsored child in India Neha, who is 4. I ordered seven books, and was amazed that the total came to only $16. The books arrived quickly, and Neha was thrilled to receive them, as was her father. She will share these books with her little brother Harsh and cousins Mahi and Karan, who live with her. (below: Neha receives the books)

In January 2011, I was able to visit Neha at home. I asked about the books and found that Neha kept them carefully stored in her school bag with her notebooks, pencils and drawings (below: Neha carefully takes out her books to show me). She carefully brought the out for me to see, and showed me her favorites again. Holding them in my hands, I was able to confirm that the quality of the books was excellent. The books have thoughtful and interesting storylines and great illustrations. I knew I would love to order from Tulika again, and imagined sending more books to children in India-- children who otherwise may never have any fun books at the appropriate level to enjoy. I often spend time looking at the site, finding great books celebrating girls, curiosity, and exploring the world.

Neha's community center is the hub for the case workers, staff, volunteers and children of her slum community. The CI center has a doctor and dentist to provide the children with health care, and it also have a place to feed children in need of an extra meal. It also has a playroom with toys and games for the children to use, and areas to study and write letters. (below: the entrance to the community center)

I recently inquired through Children International as to whether Neha's community center would like to have some of these great children's books donated to them, so that all of the aproximately 3,000 children using this center will have a chance to be enchanted and inspired, as well as fostering a love for reading. The response was an enthusiastic "YES!", and here are the further details from CI:

"The Education Coordinator was VERY excited at the prospect of a future fundraiser to purchase several hundred dollars worth of books. Books are always needed, they get so much use that they can wear out quickly and keeping a new range of titles can be expensive. We try and get as many books as we can through Gifts-In-Program, but I must admit it is hard to find shipments of free books for younger children in India who do not yet speak English."

I am now beginning a campaign to raise funds to donate books for the center. Since the books will be purchased and shipped within India, most books will cost between only $1.25 and $4.00. (above: the playroom at the community center, with some of the toys and books they do have. Children will come here after school hours)

The books chosen will be for a variety of age levels, and in the different languages that the children speak. The Center has requested the following for the language breakdown of the books:

"Breakdown: 30% Urdu, 30% Bengali, 20% Hindi and 20% English. The English would be best for the older children."

Unfortunately, I have searched far and wide for Urdu books for children, but have found very few. Tulika carries only a couple of Urdu titles. I have found that my Urdu speaking children struggle more in school, and often wonder if this is in-part due to the lack of available books in their language.Since this fundraiser will result in quite a large amount of purchases from Tulika, I hope to continue to encourage them to publish more of their books in Urdu as part of this project. If that goal is met, then more books can be purchased for the CI center which serves my children Saba, Shamrin, and Semran, as that center serves a very large number of Urdu speaking children.

Please click here to see how to help!

Some Sad News, Some Happy News

As some of you know, today I have been struggling to make a decision about the other organization that I sponsor at. Over the summer I started sponsoring one girl in Haiti, Sandia. Things seemed to be going well, so I recently added Midielande. Unfortunately, things have not been working out with the organization to the standards that I hoped, and that they seemed originally. I am not sure what is going on, but I feel like I have just lost some trust and confidence. I have been debating what to do, and decided that I will cancel my sponsorship of the new girl, Midielande. I haven't spoken to her yet, and I started sponsoring her because I wanted her to go to school. I found out that she would not be starting school (until January) and I just felt, well, upset, because my sponsorship fees were supposed to cover that, but apparently are not enough. I'm not sure what is going on, and I know a lot is going on in Haiti right now, but for now I think it is just better to cancel this rather than start a new relationship with a child when I am not 100% of the organization.

For now, I am keeping Sandia, my other child there, who I HAVE developed a relationship with, but I decided not to do the IGP I was planning. I will see what happens.

I'm not sure what is going on with the organization, but I really hope it turns out well, because they have great ideas, but seem to have trouble organizing. I'm not sure. I feel really sad cancelling the sponsorship, but I just don't know if my sponsorship would really be benefiting her right now.

On a happy note, I got two letters today from 2 CI kids, Neha (my newest) and Saba. I posted both of them. And additionally, the other organization where I sponsor one child in India finally posted an update on Ghousia. I know little about Ghousia and the organization is run very differently, but I am very happy to say that her report shows that her grades have improves drastically (from pretty fair/poor to excellent looking grades!) She also got a "double promotion" in school, which I think may mean skipped up two grades? Though I haven't been able to develop a relationship with her, I am so happy to see these improvements!

Here is her report:

Overall Academic Performance
Ghousia s performance in annual exam is excellent. Since she has also performed well in internal assessments and academic support center she has been given double promotion in school.

Extracurricular Activities
She has enthusiastically participated in various sports and academic competitions organized in her school. On “Children’s Day”, a cultural event and a few outdoor games were organized in the school. She was an enthusiastic participant in this program.

Social Skills
She is a well-mannered girl and comes to the school neatly dressed.

General Health
She generally keeps good health. School health programme and midday meal programmes helps her to be healthy.

General Comments
We have started rigorous academic support classes called Balala Vidya Vedika held daily after school hours and during vacations by community youths trained on both pedagogy and joyful learning methods to reinforce the concepts learnt in the class.

Academic Year: 2009-10 Results of : Annual

Subject Marks / Telugu 75 Urdu 85 English 80 Mathematics 86 Science 87 Social Studies 78 Percentage : 82.6

Days Present: 175 Out of 220 days

An Income Generating Project for Sandia's Family in Haiti

Sandia, my partner through People in Need Partnership, and I have been talking a lot online these days (above, before I became her partner). One thing I had noticed was that she was always talking about plants, drawing plants, and asking about gardens. I thought it might be nice to help her start a small garden-- I had the PINP people talk to her family but they came back with another idea. Sandia's mom used to run a small shop outside the home, but was not able to anymore. The family is very interested in having her restart this business-- her mom even added that they could plant a garden with some of the profits. I thought this was a great idea. I was told they needed atleast $200 to get everything together, so now it's time to fundraise for Sandia and her family!

Sandia is 10 years old and lives with her mother, Maristima, who is 40, and her father Nazaire, who is 42. She has four siblings, her brother Sonson is 16, and sisters Junia (19, living in the countryside), Monise- 8, and Nadia 4. Nazaire is a porter and works 6 days a week, making about 0.25-0.64 cents per day). This as you can imagine, is hardly enough to feed the 6 people living at home.

Sandia is doing well (picture from July 2010 to the right)-- since she has a partner she was able to go to school and she completed 1st grade and is now a second grader. I am not sure if any of her siblings go to school. I know from my conversations with her that her family often has very little to eat, and I have arranged for her to have a few extra meals per week after school, and send food baskets (these include rice, beans, oil and some meat that makes about 20 meals and usually lasts a few days) for her family, but I think that restarting this business will really improve life for them-- they will have a greater income and have more food security, rather than relying on what little they have plus donated food.
Additionally, the business could provide further income to help them improve their home (it is made of sheet metal with a dirt floor, and is often wet and muddy in the rain) and send more of their children to school.

So far $45.00 has been raised towards the goal of at least $200. If you would like to help Sandia's family you can either contact me at lindseyrieder@gmail.com or if you prefer to pay by paypal, you can send a donation as a "gift" to the same email address without a fee. If you do so, please let me know so that I can add you to the list of donors. I will email everyone with the updated information and any photos or videos they provide one Sandia's family gets their small business up and running.

Above are pictures of Sandia at her front door, and her home. Her home is situated in a large slum in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

Saba's SNG- received Oct 16, 2010

Hooray! After much torturous delay (well not really, but it felt that way to me!) I got my report form Saba's SNG which I sent in about 1.5 months ago. I asked that the money be used as needed for 1.) Saba's school needs, 2.) siblings school needs and 3.) anything else the family needs.

The family got:

4 months private tuitions for Saba (grade II)

1 Steel Almirah

1 detergent soap bar and 1 candy for the child

Child/Family Comments:

The child said, "Thank you Sponsor for the gifts and also for providing me with tuition support in my studies, which I needed."



How will the gifts benefit the child and/or family?

The child is in grade-II at present. She will be promoted to grade-III in Jan'11 only if she fares well in her grade-II final examination in Dec'10. The child and her family will use the steel almirah to keep their clothes, personal items and other valuables in a safe and proper manner. The family will use the detergent soap bar to wash their clothes regularly. (LOL, thanks for clearing that up about the soap! Wink)

Additional Comments:

The child has been provided with school fees, school bag and other school supplies from the Sponsorship Program funds. The siblings also did not have any immediate need for educational supplies. Hence, the family used the donation partly to provide tuition support to the child and partly for household needs.




P.S. I was quite surprised by the headscarf-- I had never seen Saba wearing one before, and as you can see in the picture, her mom doesn't wear one. My guess is that it is what she wears to school-- she switched school and studies at an Urdu school so I am guessing it is a Muslim school and requires a headscarf.

Khayrunnesh'a Special Needs Gift (SNG) and Educational Support

Update (Original Post is here):

I just got the pictures, report and letter from Khayrunn today for her SNG and educational support. To recap, I sent in an inquiry about how best to help her with school and also if her family needed anything special. She is 17 and I wanted to make sure she gets all the support she needs these last few years (Kids graduate out of Children International at 19). I got back a report for educational needs for this year (Grade X) and the next two years, as well as an SNG.

Falling at a bad time, but needing the funds now to start the school year, I was lucky enough to have 3 fellow sponsors willing pool with me to donate towards her educational needs and SNG for this current year.

With this donation, she received tuitions (tutoring in 2 subjects) for 7 months, a school uniform, a lovely red bicycle to ride to and from class and tuitions, and aluminum cooking vessels for her family. The report is below:



Additionally, here are a few photos of her with her new goods. I have to point out that Khayrunnsha always has the most adorable salwaar suits and I would love for her to take me shopping sometime. She just picks beautiful fabrics and combinations.





And last but not least, the letter from Khayrunn herself to me and the others who donated for this:



Drawing on the back (Khayrunn has been drawing lovely village scenes for quite a few years now):


Now I need to start saving up for her school fees and tuitions for the next few years! (These are a bit more because they are higher education). :)

Sandia's Package

At the end of July, I contacted PINP about sending a package to Sandia. I thought I would have to send it to Haiti (and wondered how well the mail system worked) but as it turned out, one of the staff members was about to travel from the U.S. to Haiti. I was told that as long as the package was under 3 lbs, I could send it to her in the U.S. and she would bring it with her to Haiti.

I inquired about her clothing size, and then began shopping. I always find it difficult to buy things for sponsored children for many reasons. I want to get them something useful, but also fun. I want it to be something they can enjoy. Another concern though, is going overboard. I always get worried about sending too much at once, because it may be overwhelming for a children, especially if they have always had very little. I toyed with the idea of sending gifts for everyone in her family, but then was unsure what I could get that would be small enough to fit into a 3 lb. package. In the end, I decided to just send some things for her this time, and plan on sending some more stuff for the family later.

After much shopping and wandering, and thinking, and putting outfits together, and wandering, and thinking (I am a very indecisive shopper) I ended up with a small photo album (I printed out some pictures of her, of me and my friends and family so she can see the things I talk about). I got her a butterfly keychain (random but cute), colorful barrettes, three t-shirts, a pair of comfy shorts (for sleep and play) and some denim shorts. I also got her a cute pair of flip-flops. With all of this I sent a letter. I also really wanted to get her this adorable dress, but ended up choosing the more practical and mix and match items because I thought she could get more outfits/wear out of them. Also I was worried about the weight limit, but I ended up being quite under when I got to the post office.

Sandia is 10, and ended up getting her child small (6/6X) (the shorts had an adjustable waist) and her flip flops were kids' size 3/4. They all ended up fitting very well, which I am happy about because I was a bit worried about that.

She sent me a letter thanking me, and then a bit later I got this video. She looks quite shy in the video, which surprised me, since she seems quite talkative in her letters. But that's alright, I understand being on camera can make one nervous:



P.S. the photo at the end of Sandia with the food is from a food package I sent her family when I started sponsoring her. It was $25 and provided the family with enough staples for a few meals (depending on the size of the family.)