Tara lui Andrei (Andrew's country)

Albert has just submitted a project proposal to 'Tara lui Andrei' which is a competition run by the Romania oil company Petrom. Tara lui Andrei means literally Andrew's country, after St Andrew who is Romania's patron saint, in addition to being Scotland's! 

The project is for us to have a safe play area for children here at the Secret Garden and the public vote will decide the winner ... so if you can, please vote! Click on the link below to register and vote ... we are not sure yet if people can vote from outside Romania, we are getting Amy to try from Glasgow!

  http://www.taraluiandrei.ro/idei-din-tla/proiect-loc-de-joaca-pentru-copiii-defavorizati-id-328-cmsid-65

Heatwave

I hate to complain about the weather ... but ... having had the longest Winter most people in Arad remember, and not much of a Spring at all, we have now entered full scorching hot Summer and are quite literally melting! Days now of a fairly constant 36 degrees is taking it's toll on us all, sapping our energy ... believe me it's hard to concentrate on anything when it's so hot. The office is the hottest room, as it is a new construction added on to the building, the rest is over 100 years old ... they obviously knew more about how to build for the heat in those days! I brought a fan from home to the office but it's pathetic efforts aren't helping a great deal, probably keeping us from passing out though! 

Think of us sweltering away but even more ... think of the families with whom we work who don't even have a fan to help them cope with the heat. Most of our families live in one rented room or a simple one room dwelling and the heat in some of them is unbearable ... but they have no choice but to bear it. Life is hard when you're poor.

We love our multi-cultural volunteers!

One of the lovely aspects of the Secret Garden is that we have the privilege of working with volunteers from all over Europe and further afield. For our children and families it is a sign to them that people care about them, that they are not forgotten, that they matter to someone. For the volunteers it is an experience which most of them will never forget. For a few days, weeks or months they work alongside our Romanian staff or volunteers and with our children, learning about them, learning to love them. Walls which exist between people from different cultures are gradually being broken down, little by little. When you have spent time with a person, sitting with them while taking part in various activities, when you have learned to see that person as a human being just like you, though maybe poorer, then it is hard to return to your own country and forget them. Over the past few years we have seen volunteers come and go from so many countries and it has been such a positive experience for us all ... and I hope, for them too!

Homelessness in Arad

We have been living in Arad for almost 13 years and we have seen a great deal of change, much of it for the better.  However, homelessness continues to be a big issue here as elsewhere in Romania.  Many of the original street children with whom we first worked are still here though of course after 13 years they are no longer children, they are now ' street adults'.  There are also homeless older people for whom there is very little provision - some of them have heard of our day centre and come along for a meal and a shower and out of compassion for them we cannot refuse.

What are we supposed to do with such people? There is a desperate need for a Work to be set up specifically for homeless adults, leaving us to concentrate on the street children and on prevention strategies.  The State Social Services here in Arad are already overstretched, understaffed and underfunded so there is unlikely to be help coming from that quarter. Clearly we are unable to move in that direction as we too are already overstretched - so my question is, who will do it?

Local food donations

Food donations from local sources are increasing significantly. It's such an encouragement to us to see more and more people from our local community visiting and bearing gifts of food. We've always hoped for more local interest and support because it's vital for the long term future of the work. Recently we've been quite overwhelmed at times by the generosity of people!

Philip making fruit salad - complements of Moise Nicoara high school students

Welcome to the 'Vis' team!

Last week saw our team grow by two people. One of them, Irina (another Irina, not our former worker) has been working with us as a volunteer already for a few months and our partners in the UK 'Humanity at Heart' have very kindly offered to pay a salary for us to employ her for a year. This is great news for Irina who has been looking for a job for a while... and it's great news for us too. 

Albert, our other new team member has joined us to be responsible for funding issues. We need to find ways to raise the profile of our work and to bring in desperately needed funds if we are to continue. We are very hopeful that Albert is the person to help us in this area and his first week with us has been an extremely positive one ... long may it last! 

Homework club

During the afternoon when we have our programme for street people, there have always been a few children wanting to come and do their homework. In the past we have not allowed children to come in the afternoons unless they are already on the streets, as we don't want them having contact with street folk. However,  their need is so great that we have recently decided to try running a homework club in one of the activity rooms, separate from the rest of the programme. Some local volunteers, including students from a local high school have offered to help us with this very needed activity - school here is hard and homework is difficult for children to do alone with no help and guidance.

Spring at the Secret Garden

the honeysuckle is gorgeous ... and the perfume takes your breathe away!

after a long, long winter, the children are finally able to enjoy playing in the sunshine

"Katy, take a photo of us in prison ... pleeeeease!"

Carina and Ionut (pronounced Yonoots, means 'little John')

Financial challenges

Running a small charity is probably the most challenging thing we have ever done ... and we certainly didn't ever plan to do it, it just happened! Over the past almost 13 years we have experienced many hard times but somehow we have always managed to keep going. While our income as a charity has increased significantly over the years, our expenditure has also increased, leaving us constantly struggling to balance the books.

Our current annual budget for the charity is approximately 20,000 euros per year - what does this cover?

• running costs for the Secret Garden Day Centre, where anything from 20 to 70 people come in a day to have showers, wash clothes, eat and participate in activities. 
• one full time paid staff member
• expenses for the 'Team House' in Sanleani where we accommodate all our short term volunteers and visitors to the charity.
• maintenance and repair for both properties, including building insurance
• transport costs eg home visits, delivery of aid to communities etc

Finances are so tight at present that we are having to consider cutting back on our services - this may include restricting people to a maximum of two showers a week, offering only one cup of tea or coffee per day and various other measures.

We believe that as a charity we offer 'value for money' to our supporters, we try to be good stewards of resources and to be economical in all that we do while attempting to also offer a quality service to all our 'clients'. 

Cristina's back!

Cristina worked with us for a few months and was excellent. Prior commitments limited her time with us but now we have the chance to employ her again for a month, perhaps a little longer. It's very exciting because we badly need help with all the admin and haven't yet found a suitable person for the longer term. As is so often the case, we don't have the necessary funding to employ anyone but we so badly need staff that we are taking yet another step of faith, albeit this time a smaller one than some of our past ones!

More from Retford New Life Centre team at the Secret Garden

We had a great few days with Susan Davies and the Retford guys - all respect, Susan for coming out with five boys / men!

It's been a busy two weeks for them, but then, our weeks are always busy aren't they?  It's lovely to have both activity rooms and the entrance hall repainted, they badly needed it - Luca, our street 'boy' volunteer kept trying to get them to sand and paint the dining room too!  They promised him 'next time' ...

Spring this year didn't come properly - it's been unseasonably wet and miserable at times but on Tuesday it was dry so we took the chance to have a day in the forest with children from one of the poor communities - I'll post photos soon.

All in all, a very successful and fruitful 'mission' for the team! As for us all at 'A Child's Dream'  it's always very rewarding when visitors enjoy their stay as evidenced by the guys all echoing  Arnold Swartzeneggar's famous words -  'I'LL BE BACK'!

Retford 'Dream Team' at the Secret Garden

On Tuesday the team from Retford arrived ready for action! They have spent the past three days singing, dancing, telling stories, playing games and sanding and painting. The drop in centre badly needed repainting but as with everything else it's a question of time and money!

We now have lovely peach coloured walls in both activity rooms and the entrance hall - it looks really lovely! 

This week in Romania was 'Scoala Altfel' (School Differently) and we were invited into the local village school, Livada Scoala Generala and one of the city's high schools, Moise Nicoara to do activities with the pupils - a huge amount of fun was had by all.

Volunteers needed!

For some time now we have been running the "Secret Garden" Drop in Centre with just one staff member and whatever volunteers we have on any given day. For a few months we had Cristina and then when she left us suddenly, Philip stepped in. With Kenneth's illness and subsequent heart surgery and my trips to Scotland to visit him, Philip was left "holding the fort" - not an easy task that's for sure!

Most days now I am at the centre for at least part of the day and Kenneth comes and goes - we both have many commitments outside the centre and are currently behind with just about everything! What is the answer? More personnel - paid staff or volunteers, we don't mind which! Of course, paid staff require money which we already don't have enough of, so we think long term self-funded volunteers are the answer!

So, if you're looking for a challenging job with no pay and no prospects but great job satisfaction, give us a call :)

English lessons

Ani and Irina are two of our volunteers, both from poor families themselves but keen to help others. It amazes me that people who have so little still want to give to others. Ani and Irina both would like to learn some English so I will hopefully be starting a wee class with them.

It's been a long Winter

It's still winter here in Arad, though usually by now we are enjoying pleasant warm sunny days, today as I look out of my window there is snow everywhere. For street children and other homeless or semi homeless people, of course Winter is by far the worst time of year. In Spring, Summer and Autumn, the weather is mainly dry, very hot in Summer and extremely pleasant in Spring and Autumn and here in Arad, on the western plains of Romania, winter is short, usually over by the beginning of March. We have also had more rain than average this winter and it is the rain even more than snow which makes life difficult for homeless people. Imagine you are living in a home made hut or a deserted railway waggon or a derelict building ... how do you dry your clothes if you get soaked in the rain? (Note the wee boy's shoes ... a good few sizes too big!)

 At the "Secret Garden" day centre we are as always busy, with many needy children, young people and families using our facilities.In the mornings we have on average between 20-30 people and in the afternoons around 12-20 street children and youth - both programmes finish with a simple but nourishing hot meal.

In recent weeks we have seen a number of new children appearing on the street of the city, coming in from villages around Arad where there are few or no jobs and out of desperation children come into town to beg until they make enough money to buy food for the family. The main problem with this is that children gradually get used to being on the streets and spend more and more time begging and hanging around and in time eventually make the move from "part time" to "full time" street child. We try to befriend such children, spending time with them and when we have established a measure of trust, encouraging them to come to the day centre. Prevention is so much better than cure, particularly in the case of street children - once they have become accustomed to life on the streets it is incredibly difficult to help them to be re-integrated into society.

Kenneth's heart surgery

Yet again,apologies for the ansence ... the only news which we have managed to get out in the past few months has been via facebook - Vis de Copil (A Child's Dream) due to unexpected illness on Kenneth's part.

Last summer we were travelling aroung the UK speaking about the work and visiting as many friends and family members as possible, but Kenneth was really not feeling up to it. He was constantly tired and lacking in energy and had been for quite a while.

To cut a long story short, as they say ... in mid September he returned to Scotland and ended up being admitted into hospital via A&E (ER) for urgent heart surgery!

A double coronarybypass and five months later Kenneth finally returned to Arad andis now trying to settle in and catch up with the accounting and various other tasks which none of us are able to do ...

Oh my goodness, is it really July?

I can't believe it's July, seems like Christmas was just a few weeks ago! We have been so busy with the daily demands of the day centre, court dates for our street folks in prison, conferences, all the charity administration, finishing off the new medical/dental room ... and a new baby in the family too! Several times I have started posts and been interrupted, other times I have searched through photos to find the right ones to post ... but the end result is total failure! I hereby resolve to do better ...

Christmas 2011 at the "Secret Garden"

We had five Christmas parties in total with different groups of children, families and street folks. It was hard work, REALLY hard work, but worth while! We had groups of children and young people from Kindergartens and schools come to bring gifts and carol sing to us and our folks sang to them in return, it was lovely.

Local people came in droves with gifts of clothing, food and even money. We had some money given towards Christmas parties from our partners, PCF Romania Projects in Perton Wolverhampton but apart from that everything was donated locally and the quantity of food and other gifts we received was quite overwhelming! Even Rosie and Yasmina made some cakes with Amy! We are so thankful to all who helped to make the parties memorable for all who attended.