Thursday 19 July 2012

Volunteers' Tea and visit to Borde Hill

 Every year we do a special afternoon tea for the shop volunteers to thank them for all their hard work.  This year we decided to have a trip to a local garden called Borde Hill, followed by tea in the cafe afterwards.  A lovely time was had by all - we braved the cold and winds, and managed to gallop around the garden, reviving ourselves with cake, scones and tea afterwards.


Tuesday 10 July 2012

The Girls finally move into their new home in Birlad, Romania

We are pleased to hear that after 2 years of living in the State Institution, Geta and Irma moved into their new permenant home on Monday.  Linda and Mike from RAKE went out to Birlad to settle the girls in, and sent us this lovely report and photos.


Doing the washing up!


Irma and Geta with Cela.

 We set off on Monday morning to go and collect the girls and amazingly there were no set backs – we were allowed to take them! The girls didn’t know we were coming so they were really excited to see us. When we arrived at the house we all had lunch with the team from Myosotis (the charity we are working with). They were great and we have every confidence in their ability to care for and support our young people. I was so proud of Irma and Geta, who despite the environment they have been living in for two years, behaved beautifully with perfect manners.
Mike and I were then “on duty” for the next few days. On Wednesday we were joined by Cela (our support worker from Casa Linda). We were acutely aware of the close relationship the girls have with Cela and how vital it is to have her there, at least for the first weeks. The girls were totally relaxed and happy.
The house is great and all the items HAH enabled us to buy looked lovely. Although on the edge of the town (about a 15 minute walk from the town centre) it feels like its in the country. We were woken by the noise of cockerels and barking dogs. The temperature was about 38 degrees but the house has a lovely patio area shaded by grape vines and once we discovered a table in the cellar which we brought out we spent most of our time outside. The garden needs some work and a new fence (a job for next Spring), but it has 4 apple trees, a plum tree, and a couple of other fruit trees we couldn’t identify. We are hoping to get chickens as soon as possible.
 

"Hope for the Colony" Community Centre

Here are some recent pictures taken on on 1st June at our Community Centre in Petrosani. They were celebrating Children's Day in Romania.