Starting the fundraising

Now my finals for secundary school are over and having had a week's holiday in Spain, I am starting fundraising in earnest. In fact, while I was away in Spain, already a couple of important things happened. The folder about my project, which I've been working on for some time, was printed. The printer gave me a donation by cutting the price by 20%.

This is the front picture of my brochure.

My first donation already came several months ago from my aunt Clea. She paid my registration costs, which I had to pay to Project Trust to register myself as a volunteer. Because we don't have cheques in Belgium, my mother had to ask Clea whether she would write the cheque to Project Trust for us. Clea wrote the cheque and my mother paid a 100 pounds into my fund. She would after all have paid for the registration.
Then there was the carwash. It was an exercise for economics which we had planned to do with our class.

We already had the idea of the carwash back in September 2011, but then the idea was that we, the school carwashers, would share the profits between us. When I found out I was going to Malawi I asked my friends if they would agree to give all the proceeds to my project. They did. Sorry no photo's of that event, it was freezing cold that day and it rained most of the time. We arranged for the carwash to be after the Easter holiday, because we thought it would be warmer then, but it was actually much colder in April than in March.

With the pupils' council it has been agreed that I will give a presentation of my project in October or November 2012 to all classes in the school. I'm going to give a different presentation to each grade. The sixth years might be more interested in my role as a volunteer, whereas the first years will probably identify quite strongly with the children in the orphanage. After my presentation in each grade I'm going to ask everybody to give a donation of 1 euro. That could come up to 500 euros.

Today I biked through the pouring rain and back to the library in Maastricht (that's 10 km each way) and spent a couple of hours peering in a book with names and addresses of grant-giving bodies. It's a long list, but many are not suitable for my project, many don't give funds to individuals, or they're related to very specific locations. Anyway, I did find a couple and I've written my first fundraising letter.

Selection course on the Island of Coll

In February I heard I was going to Malawi. I applied to Project Trust and followed their selection course on the island of Coll, Inner Hebridees, Scotland.

It took me 2 days to get there. My father and I went to Amsterdam by train and stayed the night. The following day we took an early flight to Glasgow. We had the whole day to ourselves, but the weather made our choices easy. We looked for cover and went to the cinema and saw A Dangerous Method. I can't remember a thing about it, probably because I was too excited about the day ahead of me. In the evening we took the coach to Oban and stayed at an hotel near the pier. By the time we arrived it was so late, so we didn't have any time to explore Oban.
The following day I had to get up very early to catch the first ferry boat to the Isle of Coll. It was a 3 hour trip through choppy seas (and I forgot my sea sick tablets). I left my father behind and he went to another island, the Island of Mull. When we arrived in port I was a sleep so unfortunately I can't tell you my first impression of Coll from the boat. I wanted to text my father to tell him I arrived but I soon noticed I had no service and did not have any for the rest of the week.
The whole group gathered together and the group leaders drove us to the Project Trust centre. 

The weather on the picture is quite representative. 

We had to get started straight away. Project number 1 was building an oil rig with straws. It had to be constructed in such way that it would be able to support a dictionary (middling size). None of our attempts worked.
We were all placed with host families. I was put together with another volunteer in a vegetarian host family. They had 4 very energetic children, ranging from 2,5 to 9. I remember that we arrived there really late (it was a 3 quarter of an hour drive from the centre and we were last to get out of the bus) and we heard the children shouting 'They're here, they're here' and as soon as we put our luggage in the rooms they presented us with a drawing which they had made.

It was an unforgettable week. I've got memories of feeding sheep and cattle, ploughing, dancing at a ceilidh and meeting some lovely people. When it was finally time to go home I had a sort of sinking feeling that I might not have been selected and I had nail-biting week at home, watching the letter box at the front door. Everyone got their news before I did, because the post takes longer to get to Belgium. But the following Monday I was expecting it. Because I was at school I asked my mother to open the letter and then I heart that I would be sent to Malawi. Since then I've found out as much as possible about Malawi. So I knew that I would have to start finding sponsors to support my trip.

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