Not very good at blogging!

I have been awful at this! Since starting a blog, I have been meaning to add to it, but time just flies by......

Since my last post a lot has happened:
Bristol Grammar School have raised over £3000, St Joseph's RC Primary School have raised over £1500......Bradgate surgery held a concert evening and raised £900.

One of our Trustees is about to go out to Ethiopia - along with our volunteer fundraiser Mike Frost - while there they will visit the completed projects as well as look at new projects planned for next year.

The production of christmas cards was a bit of a non-starter.....after getting them designed by Jacqueline Conradie-Faul (www.expanded-vision.com) we had difficulties finding a printer who could produce them at a price we could make a profit. Eventually the quality offered was not up to standard so we have had to cancel cards for this year and will start early to prepare for 2007.

Anyway, I will hopefully keep this up to date from now on.......if not:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

A Taste for Ethiopia

Saturday the 15th July 2006, sees our second large event.

Last year was a great success with over 60 people attending and more than enough food and drink to go around. http://www.for-ethiopia.com/TFE.htm

This year we are aiming for 75 people. There will be music, food and drink, along with presentations of our projects past and present and a charity auction.

Among the items for auction is an Aardman still from 'Curse of the were-rabbit' signed by Nick Park. It is nicely framed and if it doesn't reach a resonable reserve we will be auctioning it on Ebay later on.

With only one week to go, there is a lot to organise so must get on....

For-ethiopia - the history

For-ethiopia is a Bristol based charity, operated entirely by volunteers with all the money we raise going to projects in Addis Alem, Ethiopia.

Addis Alem is a small town, around 55km west of the capital Addis Ababa. It is amazing how undeveloped it is considering how close it is to the capital.

For-ethiopia was formally founded in October 2004, twenty years after the BBC first broke the story of the famine in Ethiopia to the British public’s attention on 24th October 1984.

Prior to this, Tigist and Robert had funded a water well which was successfully dug in the grounds of the Efa Beri Primary and Junior High School in Addis Alem (Shoa).

Addis Alem was chosen as a suitable place to start development works as it was the birthplace of Tigists’ grandparents and mother. This meant that the local people were at ease talking to Tigist and did not feel that ‘outsiders’ were interfering. The area is highly deprived and has very few employment opportunities for the local community.

In a visit in December 2003, Tigist issued 500 questionnaires to students of the Junior school to complete with the help of their families. The questions were asking what local people felt was needed to improve life in the area, to identify development projects, (using a ‘bottomup’ approach of development). The first of these was the general lack of safe drinking water in the area and specific to this was the construction of a school water well as the students and teachers did not have a water source in the school grounds.

A subsequent visit in October 2004, by both Tigist and Robert saw the completed water well and the start of a link between the St Josephs primary school in Bristol. Pictures drawn by the children of St Josephs were taken along with writing materials, to be presented to the school in Addis Alem. Students were then encouraged to draw pictures to take back and present to St Josephs. The aim is to provide an ongoing link between the two schools.