It feels like a century since we have informed you about our activities. Despite the beautiful long Indian summer, we have been busy. The projects and our work stood briefly at a low ebb, when we ourselves were on vacation, but in August, September, and still, we were really going on and we are very happy to inform you about the state of affairs.
High visit from Jaffna, Sri Lanka, Father Edwin of O.M.I.
If you regularly read our news stories, or visit our website, you know that we've been working together for several years with the Fathers O.M.I. (Oblates of Mary Immaculate). O.M.I. is a priest organization based in Jaffna and from there it is committed to the poorest and most needy people in the region.
The nice thing is that they make no distinction in background, religion, race, or gender of the people they help. Father Edwin (Provincial Superior) leads from Jaffna the O.M.I. community and recently had a conference in Rome. And well, when in Rome, you're almost in the Netherlands, right? So it happened that Father Edwin from 17 to 19 October was staying in Raalte. He has visited "The Handsome Schinvelder" the dairy farm of the family Tuten and has seen mechanical milking. He loved it and would love to have something like this in the widow project in Sri Lanka. He was introduced to the board of Havonos, visited the Maria Cave in Luttenberg, as well as the Jumbo Supermarkets, Rudy Veldkamp in Den Ham, which has been supporting Havonos for many years, including recently with a donation for relief. Partly because of that contribution, in Mullikulam could be beaten a large, deep well. Initially for the drainage of rainwater during the rainy season (because the water could not get away, there were floods and Mullikulam was unreachable) and in the second instance as a well for the villagers.
Completion Widow Project
In 2015 Havonos was chosen as the organization where the traditional harvest gift of Stöppelhaene would go to. More than € 30,000 we have received from the people of Raalte and the surrounding villages were we collected. Because the money was earmarked for a project for which we received support from Wild Geese, we had to spend about € 45,000 to the Widow Project. Thus we have helped 75 widows, often with a family with young children, to provide for their livelihood. We did that by giving them a cow, a goat, chickens and seeds.
During Boerendag of Stöppelhaene 2016 you might have seen us. We stood together with the WOR (Working Group for Development Raalte) with a stall in the market, in order to account for the spending of the harvest gift 2015. After that we officially handed over our final report to a representative of the WOR. Click here to see more photos and click here to read the report (Dutch).
Learning/working farm
A new upcoming project, we want to realize with Wild Geese the establishment of a learning/working farm. Wath is actually the situation? The widows of the project 2015/2016 are so excited, even after following various courses on caring for (their) animals and working the land, that they want to join hands together to run a real farm. Their enthusiasm is so contagious that our partner organization O.M.I. has made available a large piece of land for this project.
State of YEC
The Youth Education Center (YEC), also called the technical school, build in the vicinity of Jaffna, was launched in September 2016 with English courses. More is not possible yet, because the building (see photo), is not finished yet. Furthermore, devices and the necessary materials are missing. Wild Geese helps us to make it a real school building. Registrations for this school come from miles around. The school provides in a huge need. Next time we write more about this beautiful and special project.
Women are going to organise themselves into teams to work on the land and in the farmhouse, leaving 20 families directly and others indirectly, benefitting from this project. Although the land is a precondition for the project it cannot start with land alone. Needed are also buildings, equipment etc. Havonos is in view to assist in that piece of the project. Will you help us?
Donation De Oude Kassa
Also this year, foundation Havonos was a month-long the charity where the proceeds of second hand shop Oude Kassa in Veenendaal went to. Very happy and thankful we are with the gift of € 1.850,00. With this money we can do so much good! Employees and customers of De Oude Kassa, thank you very much!
Our new website
Hinse is still working on our new website in his spare time. We are very grateful for it and hope to be able to show something this year. Patience is a virtue…
So far this new message. It is again a great story, and we thank you again for reading it. Thanks for your interest and support for our work. We can not say it enough: without you, we can make lots of beautiful plans but to realize them, however, is impossible without your help. We really need you all!
Sincerely,
The Board of Stichting Havonos