Hello friends and board members,

I attach an extract, with an active link to Makeni Ecumenical Centre's  2012 Annual report from Joe.

Pierre

____________________________________________________________________________

Dear friends and cooperating partners,

We are glad to present our 2012 Annual Report to you at this link http://makeni.org.uk/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/MEC-2012-Annual-Report.pdf. We are grateful to you all for all the support to the work of Makeni Ecumenical Centre.

We wish you a wonderful festival season and a prosperous 2014.

With best wishes,

Joe Silwenga

UVic World Aids Day event

African AIDS Angels, UVic will be having an angel sale this Monday December 2nd from 10am-2pm in honour of World AIDS Day.

We will have a table in the Student Union Building, in the wing adjacent to the Information Booth.

Also on December 2nd, we will have a film screening of "How to Survive a Plague" a film about HIV/AIDS in the SUB basement room B028, starting at 7:30pm that evening.

We hope to see you there supporting HIV/AIDS awareness

Where to find Angels in late November/December

We will be present at several venues over the next 2 weeks. This is a perfect opportunity to  pick up some gifts and support AAA.

Fair Trade fair Saturday November 30th,10am till 4pm
 

First Metropolitan United Church Hall

932 Balmoral Rd, off Quadra
http://www.videa.ca/index.php?pageid=29&eventid=384

Tillicum Mall  Friday to Sunday, November 29 to December 1

Mall hours, lower floor community booth
http://www.tillicumcentre.ca/home/

 

Dickens Fair Saturday Dec. 7th

James Bay Community School
140 Oswego St.
http://jamesbaymarket.com/dickens-fair/


If you cannot make it to these events, some generous shops around town also carry a rack of angels for quick gift ideas. (Click on the shops link to find out where)

World AIDS Day event at Camosun College

Monday Dec 2, 2013

Event Details

Venue: Fisher Foyer (Lansdowne Campus)

Starting: Monday, December 2, 2012 (9:00 am)

An all-day fair regarding the global state of AIDS; Raising awareness of AIDS in Africa, and helping those who have AIDS through donations. This is a collaboration event between Camosun College, Camosun International Department, and the Camosun College Student Society.

Contact: Bonita Bai - CCSS International Director   |international@camosunstudent.org

Costume Jewelry Needed

We need some more used costume jewelry for angel decoration.

We can use earrings, brooches, rings and interesting beads or fancy buttons. We also need pinking shears and regular scissors.

The above items  can be left at 397 Arnold Avenue, Victoria   https://www.google.ca/#q=397+Arnold+Avenue%2C+Victoria+

Open House , Saturday Novemebr 16, 10 am to 3 pm

OPEN HOUSE

Saturday, November 16, 10 am – 3 pm 

Swan Lake Nature House

3873 Swan Lake Road

(off McKenzie Ave., east of Blanchard, take Rainbow or Nelthorpe)

 

There will be many beautiful standing and hanging angels.

·        free admission and refreshments

·        minimum donation for angels $10, larger angels as marked

·         credit cards, cash and cheques accepted

·         wheelchair accessible

 

Please come and bring your friends to our annual Open House.

For printed copies of the poster advertising the event or a smaller handout, send an email to africanaidsangels@gmail.com or phone Barb at 250-384-3421. (You can see the poster on the Web site under Open House)
 

4th annual North Doug craft fair

AAA will have a table at the North Douglas Craft Fair

Where : North Douglas Church, 675 Jolly Place  https://www.google.ca/#q=675+jolly+place+victoria

When: Saturday November 23rd, 9am-4pm

• Door prizes, and another surprise!
• There will be a concession with soup, sandwiches, and dessert
• All of the table proceeds go towards the youth program

Facebook link

https://www.facebook.com/events/556163031117355/?ref=br_tf

4 volunteers needed for Videa Fair Trade fair, Saturday November 30 2013

Videa Fair Trade Fair will be happening again this year, and AAA will be there to sell angels. Lee Ann and I can set-up and stay until noon, but we will need two pairs of people to look after the shifts from 12-2 p.m, and 2-4 p.m. The last shift does entail packing up items, just so you are aware, and return to our house in Fairfield.

Full details by clicking the link above,

or e-mail me at phiri1959@hotmail.com, for any queries, or to volunteer. I really appreciate all the help in past years, and hope you can assist again this year!


Pierre

VIDEA FAIR TRADE FAIR Nov 30, 2013 10:00am - 4:00pm
Location:	First Metropolitan United Church, 932 Balmoral Rd, Victoria

Supply depot

Effective immediately ,there has been a permanent change in location for the supplies that you need to make angels.

• Pierre and Lee Ann D now have the AAA supplies - they are located in Fairfield 
• Please e-mail the specifics of what you need to phiri1959@hotmail.com or call 250-384-9799.

 

Angel Making - Fall of 2013

Angel making will take place at the following locations during the fall

• At the James Bay Community Project, 547 Michigan Avenue on the third Wednesday of each month from 1-3 pm
• From Thursday, October 3, at the Holy Cross Parish Center, 4049 Gordon Head Road 9.00-12.00 .No experience is necessary to be a part of these sessions. It is an opportunity to meet new people and to let your creativity loose as you design your own style of angel.
• For UVic students there will be a meeting held every other Thursday from 7.30-9.00 om , starting Sept 26. This is in SUB room B025 at UVic. Treats will be provided

Donations of School supplies for Lusaka, Zambia
Deadline for donations extended to end of November 2013!

We have an opportunity to send a container with supplies, for use by the St. Nicholas orphanage children that we support through AAA, and for the adjoining school (all Grades) that the orphans (and many community children) attend. Both the orphanage and school are situated at Makeni Ecumenical Centre, Lusaka.

We need good, new or nearly new:

• school supplies
• linens such as towels, sheets, kitchen cloths, blankets
• clothing for children and young adults
• toiletries
• non-breakable kitchen items (non-electronic)
• sports equipment and toys
• simple music instruments (e.g recorders)

You can e-mail me at 

phiri1959@hotmail.com

or simply drop off items at 

397 Arnold Ave., Victoria BC (you can leave non-sealed /boxed items on our veranda). Please be respectful regarding the need for new or items in good condition, and the list above.

Please drop off items by the end of November 2013.

We would like to thank Mrs. Joan Mann for permitting us space in their large container, destined for their project in Southern Zambia.

Later, we may call for help packing and moving items!

Thank you!

The Dils, for AAA board

AAA table at Global Village Anniversary

African Aids Angels will have a table at the following event

Global Village Store Turns 25!

You're invited to help us celebrate our 25th birthday in Market Square -- music, refreshments, information/sales tables of our partners, door prizes and more. And to top it off, a 25% off everything in the store (except food items) for the whole day. Come join the fun.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 10, NOON - 3:00

Market Square

-Music by Mufaro Marimba (noon – 1:15)

-Birthday cake cutting (1:15)

-Music by Kumbia (1:45 – 3:00)

Global Village Store, 527 Pandora Avenue

Fair Trade at a Fair Price

Mothers Day Paint-in at Royal Roads

This annual event will be held on May 12 from 9.00-4.30.

We will have a table and display, as we have in the past several years

.http://www.royalroads.ca/event/mothers-day-paint-and-craft-fair

Annual General Meeting

Please join us for our Annual General Meeting which will be held Tuesday May 28 at 7 p.m. at the James Bay New Horizons centre at 234 Menzies St Victoria

This meeting will feature two special presentations

• On Makeni in Zambia, visited by Pierre and Lee Ann Dil last fall,
• On our two South Africa projects visited by the Vic and Lorraine Parsons this spring.

Supply Depot until May 9

The supply depot in Victoria is at Marcia Thompson's until May 9. She has angel bodies and hot glue sticks, and will accept completed angels.

Marcia can be reached at 778-440-1460.

Volunteers needed for the Youth Committee

Possible areas of responsibility you may like to help with:

• Giving PowerPoint presentations to school and youth groups of all ages. If you can speak French there is a special demand for that.
• Giving angel making workshops to youth groups.
• Organizing and restocking bins after presentations. Set up times are often very short (sometimes 10 minutes) so bins need to be super organized. Cleanup is always quick and done by many enthusiastic students so the bins are frequently returned in complete chaos!
• Tracing fun foam pieces for our new angels for elementary students.
• Taking apart jewellery so that it is quickly and easily utilized by students.
• Pre-making some angels parts for middle school students – beading halos and making wings.
• Coordinating the World Aids Day event at Camosun College.
• Liaising with the UVic AAA club and events there.
• Contacting schools re: angel making workshops and coordinating volunteers for these events. Following up to say thank you and to see that monies are received by the treasurer. Encouraging schools to send photos for our Facebook page.
• Writing reference letters, signing volunteer hours and obtaining recognition certificates from Volunteer Victoria.Liaising with our UVic marketing students re: Facebook. Often includes sending on photos and information to be posted

Please contact  Sandra Dennis - email is bensandy@islandnet.com and phone 250-381-0921

Volunteers needed

The following events are coming up in Victoria. Please volunteer now by emailing Brian Price at brianlprice@shaw.ca
Royal Roads - Mothers Day Paint-In

This annual event will be held on May 12 from 9.00-4.30. We will have a table and display, as we have in the past several years.

Volunteers are needed for 2-3 hour shifts . After you finish your shift you could take in the other artists at the Paint-in

Tillicum Mall

We will have a table at the Mall on Saturday, June 15 from  9.30 am to 5.30 pm
Volunteers are needed for the following shifts

• 9.30-12.30 - 1 volunteer
• 12.30-3.00 - 2 volunteers
• 3.00-5.30 - 2 volunteers

In addition, if you have an opportunity to add a table or a few angels to another event, please let us know. Consider your workplace, tea parties, craft fairs, before or after Sunday service at church. This can really help our efforts.

Vic and Lorraine Parsons Africa report

From Jan. 30 to March 7 Lorraine and Vic Parsons visited Africa. During that time they visited the two projects in South Africa supported by funds from AAA. The following is a report:

St Mary's Hospital


Unit Mgr Khetho Njapha receives an angel

Lorraine with new Mom and baby

On Feb. 4. we were given an excellent, extensive tour of St.Mary’s Hospital just outside Durban, by Sister Nokwanda Bam, who is the deputy manager of nursing. She has been our contact at the hospital for the last year.

St. Mary’s is the only Level One hospital serving one million people living between the cities of Durban and Pietermaritzburg in KwaZulu-Natal province. On average about 100 people a day come to the St. Anne’s HIV clinic for treatment, assistance or counseling. Some days, this number rises as high as 200.

AAA funds have in recent years supported the counseling and monitoring-roles in the area of Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission of HIV (PMTCT). St. Mary’s is recognized as a Centre of Excellence in this area.

Clinics vision and mission

 
• How significant this program is can be judged by the fact that there are an average 450 babies born at St. Mary’s every month. In November and December, there were 355 live births to HIV+ women. Many of the women are co-infected with HIV and TB. Despite these high infection rates among mothers, very few babies have become infected when they are given their final tests at about 18 months of age.
• There are many challenges facing the program: Lack of disclosure and discrimination against HIV+ people remains a problem; mothers are encouraged to attend clinics before they are 14 weeks pregnant but many do not; some mothers miss appointments and “clinic shop” so follow up is difficult;  mothers often do not have any support from their partners; some mothers stop taking their drugs and breastfeed their babies. Despite this, the PMTCT program is 95 per cent effective.
• Another challenge is that on April 1, the US President’s fund for supply of AIDS drugs expires and the South African government will have to take over. Although the government has rejected the denial of a decade ago, it remains to be seen how the necessary drugs will be distributed. 

Thembalethu children’s shelter

: A group shot in the playroom

Older girls dancing

Chasing bubbles, a favourite pastime

Younger kids with assistant Fundi

• On Feb. 6, we travelled to the Thembalethu children’s shelter to work with the children there for a little over two weeks. At the time we were there, there were 19 children in care. This was down from previous numbers. Several children had been taken in by extended family or foster parents over the previous week.
• None of the children from when we were here in 2007 are still there, although some come back to visit, which to us is an indication of success.  There seems to have been great progress over five years, both at the shelter and in the local communities. The pre-school children now have activities to keep them occupied during the day, led by assigned younger Sisters, and those in school have far better marks and projects.
• Some of the work we saw done by 10-year-olds were quite impressive. An important feature of the shelter is learning their Zulu culture, which includes dancing – punctuated by the impressive Zulu kick -  and songs. One thing I will never forget is the ABCs as recited by the pre-schoolers: A is for Apple; B is for iBanana, C is for iMoto, which sounds illogical unless you know Moto is the Zulu word for Car. As ever the children are beautiful and delighted to have visitors. Even though our stay was short compared with 2007, there was a great deal of emotion when we left.
• On the Outreach side, much of the work is now being done by co-coordinators in the community who receive a modest stipend. Unfortunately, Sr. Gerarda who took over a couple of year ago in the running in the program is suffering from bone cancer. More positively, she has a number of strong assistants who can take over the program when needed. We were impressed by the new housing in the local settlement of Louisana. Those people now live in sturdy block housing as opposed to the mud houses that often collapsed in heavy rain when we were here last.
• We were honoured to be invited to a school Sports Day held by the Outreach program. Lorraine and I thought we were getting in the way of photos being taken at the event, until someone said the photos were of Us! Several people said we were the only whites ever to come to this event, and they wished more would come to see what the children are doing

Fundraising Concert

We are excited to announce that a special concert is being organized to raise funds for  AAA projects in South Africa, Zambia and Malawi

• A classical repertoire, including Bach, Beethoven, Schubert and Mendelssohn will be performed by exceptional young musicians in this gala charity recital.
• Stirring performances on piano, strings, woodwinds and voice relay the passion of these students. The lineup includes the 2012 Symphony Splash Young Soloist -17 year old violinist, Eejoon Kwon.
• Angels and refreshments will be for sale before the concert and at intermission.
• A silent auction will also be featured
• Tickets will be for sale at Ivy Books, Long and McQuade and at the door.
• Please come join these supremely talented students as they share their music and find innovative ways to bring joy to the world!

Sun. February 24th, 2013 11:00am - 1:00pm
Cost - Adults $10; Sudents $5

Location Philip T Young Recital Hall. MacLaurin Building, University of Victoria
http://www.uvic.ca/home/about/campus-info/maps/maps/3D-Map-2012.gif

Valentines Day Sale

The U Vic Group is hosting a sale at the University as follows:

Location :  Clearihue Building Main Lobby
 
Time Tuesday February 12th. From 10AM -3 pm
Items for sale include African Aids Angels, Valentine treats and bookmarks.

Come and buy a meaningful gift for that special someone

 

AAA Transition

African AIDS Angels will be going through a period of transition with the departure of Carol Sherwood. We are trying a new approach, with responsibilities divided among various volunteers, so that not too much is falling on one person’s shoulders. We ask for your patience during the transition period. The following people are undertaking various tasks:

• Marcia Thompson will be the overall and volunteer co-ordinator. She can be reached at marciathompson@shaw.ca but will be away until Feb. 3. She will be assisted in this by Laura How at laurahow@uvic.ca, tel. 778-440-1460.
• Brian Price is the treasurer, and will also look after the blog, web site, graphics, calendar, etc. His email is brianlprice@shaw.ca and phone no. 250-721-3763.
• Barb McKrow will be shops co-ordinator and liaison with out-of-town groups.. She has also been instrumental with the annual Holy Cross sale and Oak Bay HS event. Her email is bmckrow@shaw.ca
• Sandra Dennis is co-chair of the board and with Nathan How will do outreach to schools and youth. Her email is bensandy@islandnet.com and phone 250-381-0921.
• Gail Blais, a volunteer for several years, will be monitoring the africanaidsangels@gmail.com and will forward messages to the appropriate people.
• Pierre Dil handles the annual Videa sale and is the connection with the Makeni project in Zambia. His email is pierredil@hotmail.com
• Vic Parsons will continue to hand out angel-making supplies and receive completed angels. He is the contact with Volunteer Victoria and the South Africa projects, and the board chair. If there are questions, you can email him at lvparsons@shaw.ca or phone 250-472-6499.

Carol Sherwood

Carol Sherwood left her role as coordinator of African AIDS Angels in December, after several years in which she performed a wide range of duties on behalf of the society.

We are very grateful for Carol’s dedication and thoroughness . Some of her roles were as treasurer; overall coordinator;  organizing the Open Houses and other events; producing brochures and other materials; ensuring quality control and many other activities.

Thank you, Carol for all your hard work and devotion to the people who benefit from AAA’s fund-raising. We wish you all the best in your future endeavours.

Please see seperate blog post advising who will be taking on Carols' duties

Seeds for Malawi

We have received the following message from the Malawi project

 

Kayombo

"We distributed the aid for the farm input and nutritional beneficiaries..the beneficiaries were all happy for the aid and wished us to send our regards to you.  

They really appreciate your help.Many have already planted maize and other crops,we all just wish and pray that rains are good this year. 

Finally we all want to send our new years regards to you, we wish you all a prosperous year in 2013. 

stay blessed

Delirah "