Cathy's Bike Ride: Thoughts from the saddle

This week Cathy is on her bike riding from Carlisle to Cranleigh – here are her thoughts from the saddle!

"These past four days have certainly had (quite literally) highs and lows. The geographical contours in the Lake District as well as the emotional ups and downs that go hand in hand with an endurance task.

Highs:
The cycling support from Becs Gibson and Johnny my brother for 3 days, as well as the car and counseling (!) support from Mum and Dad for 2 days so far.
Hot showers.
Counting down the miles.
The brief half hour with Becs by the sea.
Singing 'Les Mis’ - thanks to Kazza's recommendation.
A Cumbrian farmer's offer for a ride on his tractor and my pride in declining his offer!
All the supportive texts from friends and family.

Lows:
Sore knee and behind.
The view approaching the deadly Shap pass in the Lake District.
A hail storm (thankfully brief) today.
Sticky muddy paths by the canal.

The thought of the smiles on the children's faces in Zambia when the donated money is put to good use is what keeps me going... As well as the thought of arriving in Cranleigh this Sunday!”

GO CATHY GO!

If you want to cheer her on and encourage her in the final miles then please go to her page

Things to celebrate...

We’ve had quite a few visitors to Zambia over the past couple of months - it’s been great to have them with us! Not only do they gain insight to what Beyond Ourselves do in the communities we partner with but they then share their wisdom and experience with us to help us do what we do better! Works out well for us ;-)

It’s always amazing to me how every individual reacts differently to their visit; to being in Africa, to seeing the schools and meeting the children or to being confronted with poverty for the first time. I always find it’s a reminder to me what it’s like to see with ‘fresh eyes’ and to look at the bigger picture of Zambia, to look at facts like these:

1. 60 percent of people in Zambia live below the poverty line and 42 percent are considered to be extremely poor.
2. The number of HIV/AIDS orphans is estimated at 1.5 million which means that 1 in 3 children in the country is an orphan.
3. 15 percent of children in Zambia are underweight.
4. The prevalence of stunting in children – low growth for age - is 40 percent.

Sources: Zambia Demographic Health Survey, Cost of Diet by the National Food and Nutrition Commission, World Bank, Country Analysis Report, 2013/14 Zambia Vulnerability Assessment Committee Report

When we look at stats like these from WFP we could let the enormity of poverty overwhelm us, to allow the task that lies ahead to shadow the journey... 

Or we could look and see where we are working to make a long-term sustainable difference to the people and communities we work alongside, and celebrate all that is happening to change these stats…

I choose the latter! 

I celebrate the schools, Kawama Kraft and the beginnings of other new social enterprises provide employment and income to people in the community.

I celebrate that the community schools we partner with offer education to many of the orphans and vulnerable children in their surrounding area.

I celebrate that the children at our partner schools are given a meal every school day and that the majority of them are a healthy weight. That year on a year we have seen a steady increase in height, weight and BMI.

And I expect to celebrate more transformation in the years ahead and playing our part in seeing more of the stats changed.

The success of the shoe campaign!

Last week we distributed the new school shoes that were so generously bought in the run up to Christmas last year.  As you can imagine, organising the sizing of approximately 400 pairs of feet, ordering the correct sizes, and communicating with those carers whose children were getting new shoes was so small operation!

Giving out the shoes last week was very humbling.  Children came with their carers, they tried on the shoes to ensure they fit, and the carers signed for the shoes saying they had received them.  I sat with my spreadsheets, welcoming family after family that was receiving this gift for their children.  Many children came with shoes that were too small, soles that were coming off the rest of the shoes, others didn’t have school shoes at all.  One girl had so outgrown her shoes that she had folded down the backs of the shoes and just wore them with her heel hanging significantly over the end.  As the shoes had a bit of a heel this must have been so uncomfortable to wear.  There aren’t many even roads in that community – I can’t imagine her walk to school in those shoes.   It made my heart glad to give children like this girl something comfortable to wear on her feet.  400 children are now walking to school in comfortable shoes, running around at playtimes with sturdy shoes that support their feet and ankles, and have a sense of pride in their new shoes.

In addition to the shoes, we gave out school socks to all of the children from grade 1-7.  The children were very excited to all be receiving the new socks.  It was lovely to see their smiles as they received this gift.  Thank you so much to those in Canada who were part of the donut fundraiser and helped raise money for all of these school socks.

Last week Emily’s mum and Auntie Lynnie were visiting as well.  As they are excellent seamstresses we thought we’d put them to work mending uniforms for those children who needed buttons sewn on, pockets secured, as well as some more involved mending.  We brought a whole load of extra clothes that the children put on as they tackled these projects. They spent hours helping tidy up many uniforms that just needed a bit of TLC.  Thank you Lesley and Lynnie for all of your help!

Thank you again to everyone who gave so generously!  Words can’t express our gratitude to those who helped us give these incredible gifts to these children.

A visit from Dawn

For the past couple of weeks we’ve had a friend of ours from the UK staying with us. Dawn is a lady of many talents but her years running her own nursery school were the main reason we invited her to come out to spend a bit of time in our schools.

Dawn brought with her a number of resources for our early years classrooms, some that she’d bought though fundraising as well as some donated items (thanks to Mrs Barber and Upminster Infant School as well as some great high vis jackets from Specsavers, Loughton!). Since coming to Zambia, Dawn has been able to spend concentrated time in Janna school’s Reception class modelling how to use some of these new resources as well as helping the teachers get the best out of the few items they already had.It’s been quite the learning curve for everyone involved!