Inner Wheel District 26

Inner Wheel District 26
Covering three counties in the UK -
Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire

OVERSEAS

District 26 is justly proud of its record of helping to improve people's quality of life in countries many thousands of miles away, with cultures very different from our own. Members support overseas charities with monies raised through a variety of fundraising activities; they maintain links with Inner Wheel clubs throughout the world; they make and donate much needed items for families who have lost their homes, either through natural disasters or war; they offer their time and service in the interests of peace and fellowship with other women throughout the world.

Each year the Overseas Service Chairman chooses a particular charity to support. Some charities, more locally based, continue to be supported over many years: Rotarian Bob Parfitt continues to collect for his charity, Refugee Relief, clothes, bedding, food, toys, sewing equipment, bicycles, baby bundles and hundreds of beautifully knitted blankets. He leaves our District meetings with his white van fully loaded. These goods are transported across Europe to be gratefully received by people living in Croatia, where life is still difficult for many, especially the underprivileged, some 16 years after the Balkans war. Bob's charity has branched out into the Gambia and Sierra Leone, where he has witnessed first hand the desperate need of teachers to provide children with basic essentials for lessons, let alone more extravagant items such as desks and chairs, or even an actual building!

Mercy Ships, with a UK Office in Stevenage, occasionally sends out an SOS and the members of our 22 clubs respond most generously. When a plea for towels went out a few years ago we provided enough to replenish their stocks several times over. At the moment we are responding to an ongoing appeal for toothbrushes and toothpaste.

School Aid is based in Buckinghamshire and members donate many books, pens and pencils as well as football kit, school uniforms and larger items such as desks and chairs. Links have been established with our local schools and rather than just throwing away old stock at the end of each academic year Inner Wheel members now call in and collect it for School Aid. Our members also help staff at the warehouse sort through all the collections and prepare boxes for shipping.

Of course, being a women's organisation we are very interested in issues that affect women worldwide. One charity that continues to be supported, either financially through donations or by sending out packages of tights, is the Hamlin Fistula Hospital in Ethiopia.

At the moment we are most concerned for the welfare of women in Africa, particularly the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan. As happened in the Rwandan civil war and in the Balkans women are forced to bear the burden of war. They are targeted for rape and violence as a tool of war. They are forced from their homes, lose husbands and children and often become the sole providers for their families. Tens of thousands live with children in make-shift refugee camps in squalid, dangerous conditions. Once war is over they have the responsibility for rebuilding their lives after unspeakable trauma. Since 1993 an organisation called Women for Women International has been helping women in war-torn countries to rebuild their lives. District 26 is supporting this charity for a second year and will show that support by staging a peaceful demonstration on the bridge in Stevenage that links the station with the town centre on Tuesday March 8^th at 11.00 am. This day marks the centenary of Women's International Day and mirrors similar events taking place on bridges in London, elsewhere in the UK and across the world.

The EVENT ON THE BRIDGE links in with the Inner Wheel's commitment to playing its part in creating and maintaining Peace throughout the world. Many people came to support our Peace concert at Haileybury College in September: it celebrated the United Nations International Day of Peace with a fine selection of music delivered so professionally by local choirs and soloists. Please join us ON THE BRIDGE on March 8^th and bring a banner calling for Peace and an end to violence against women.

My predecessor in the role of Overseas Service Chairman was Joyce Gray. She introduced us to the organisation Women for Women International. You may be interested to read a poem that she wrote and now appears on the WFWI website as evidence that there are women in the world who care for those who have lost everything.

The link is: www.womenforwomeninternational.org.uk/wordpress/get-involved/

For more information on the above charities please look at the following websites:

www.womenforwomen.org.uk

www.mercyships.org.uk

www.hamlinfistulauk.org

www.school-aid.org

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'Think Ahead-
Aim High'

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