We have had a nice Christmas break from work here at MozVolunteers. There has been a fair amount of rain, which has been good for growing things, not so good for buildings. We are expecting the first volunteers for 2011 at the beginning of March. There are a lot of jobs to be done, fixing and rebuilding, adding new buildings to the ones that are already there.
We are planning an increased focus on research for 2011, and are applying to become an associate in-depth research centre. This will give us an affiliation which will help us with getting permissions for starting new research projects. Now that Alex is in the UK working towards her PhD, we are hopefully going to be able to get some papers and reports published, putting our ongoing research (particularly the malaria research) out to the academic and political communities.
We are putting on a Valentines Jazz concert, in order to raise more money for Friends of Xisondwe, this will be added to the money that has been raised by the University of Warwick, and sewing items that have been collected, in order to make a start on our women's business consortium. Local women who attend our literacy classes are going to be taught the art of quilt making, and given the opportunity to make quilted cappallana squares. These will then be shipped to the UK, made into cushions, decorative wall hangings and quilts and bags and sold in shops local to our area. The money then goes back into the business consortium, the women involved get a payment per square they make and the rest goes into developing their business. Good luck for this, hopefully it will be a great success.
Scott will be in Mozambique soon, and as we have been saving hard, we will hopefully be able to get a lot of building done... (for now the plan is a secret, but watch for pictures!).
Our two school scholarships for 2011 have begun, and there are two local girls from Xisondwe who are now attending Inharrime high school. We have a new employee - Sergio, who is going to be acting as our medical translator and helping to look after all our lovely volunteers.
We have a new animal acquisition - cat, and we are one animal down - sadly Dory was stolen, and has since been lost.
Thank you to everyone who has supported us throughout 2010, happy chinese new year, and best wishes for a successful, happy and settled 2011.
No comments:
Post a Comment