A busy month! Hope and Aid Direct help with distributions in Afghanistan and Calais, we raised thousands in the London Marathon and Amal arrives in the UK shortly.

Afghanistan

In August we set up an appeal for the people of Afghanistan.  As usual we asked and you responded with £2000 of donations, thank you. 

Given the challenges associated with ensuring that any money raised gets directly to the people, in line with the ethos of Hope and Aid Direct, it has taken a while to be able to update you on how these funds have been allocated.  

We have partnered with a local organisation who also has UK offices, Aryana Aid, who work in a very similar way to ourselves.  The joint project involved the distribution of food packs to the poor and needy refugee families in Afghanistan, food packs being the most vital need at the moment in the country given the bad economic situation and the difficult living conditions in this uncertain time in Afghanistan.

You will see that the distribution was a very well planned and orderly affair, which is critical to ensure that all families receive the same aid and that no further inequalities are added to an already strained system.  The photos below show part of the distribution and remind me, and I am sure will remind many of you, of the aid distributions that we were involved in, in Kosovo.

Calais Delivery

Back in Europe, we have managed to get our trucks away!

First it was COVID, and then the new customs regulations in a post-Brexit world came to thwart our ability to get aid into Europe. After much sweat, toil, heartache, form filling and countless phone calls we have finally managed to get two trucks, Robin Hood and Frantic back on the road.

Robin Hood, half loaded with blankets and the other half mainly mixed clothing and Frantic, stuffed to the limit with pop up tents and sleeping bags salvaged at Reading Festival where we were working with Herts for Refugees.

The drop offs were to Collective Aid in Calais and Mobile Refugee Support in Dunkirk, providing much needed assistance to refugees. HUGE thanks to L’Auberge Des Migrants who officially invited us and facilitated all of the French paperwork.

Clearly we are very happy that things are getting back to normal and further trips will be planned and announced shortly.  In the meantime we continue to support Amal on her journey through Europe.

Walk with Amal

Amal arrives in the UK on the 19th October and begins her journey through the UK in Folkstone, before heading to Canterbury and then having 3 days in London from the 22nd to the 24th. 

There will then be events in Oxford, Coventry, Birmingham, Sheffield and Manchester where the journey ends on 3rd November.

We are thrilled to support #LittleAmal on her awareness-raising 8000km journey from the Turkey-Syria border to Manchester in support of refugees.

Find out more about her and the project here walkwithamal.org.

London Marathon 2021

The 2021 London Marathon was the 41st running of the annual London Marathon on 3rd  October 2021. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the race was postponed from April until October to maximise the chances of a mass participation event.

The elite events were won by Sisay Lemma of Ethiopia and Joyciline Jepkosgei of Kenya, in 2:04:01 and 2:17:43, respectively.

Hope and Aid Direct had 4 official runners, plus another 2 runners whose donations were directed to our charity.  On behalf of the charity, but also on behalf of those who will benefit from your fundraising I would like to say a very big thank you to:

Mark Hughes

Shani Giddings

Jo Fishwick

Adam Moralee

Samantha Thorogood

Maria Merridan

There are still some donations arriving, but so far we have received just over £7000. 

Thank you to the runners and also to those who sponsored these great runners.   

A Priti poor show

On the 20th October between 4.30pm and 6.30pm there will be an event in Parliament Square in support of refugees and Hope and Aid Direct are proud to offer its support to this event, we hope some of you will be able to make it, more detail can be found here.

The current home secretary continues to push the current Nationality and Borders Bill, however this bill will make it harder than ever for people who come here to seek safety.  We can and must do more to welcome refugees. Everyone who crosses borders for safety should be given a fair hearing and a chance to rebuild their lives and that is why we are supporting this event which is being organised by people with experience of the asylum system, Solidarity With Refugees, Women for Refugee Women and IMIX.For more details on the Nationality and Borders Bill, this article from the JCWI is excellent.