As some of you may already know, over the past few months - together with many friends and family - I raised more than €6000 for the NGO La Esperanza Granada. A couple of months later the moment has finally arrived for me to transfer the funds to the organization.
When I arrived to Granada about two months ago, with a huge amount of money in my bank account, it didn't take long to find a project this money could be used for. During the month of August, a group of British students worked on a new classroom for the school 'Madre Teresa de Calcuta'. As construction progressed, it became clear that there weren't enough funds to finish building the classroom. Just about that time I arrived to Granada. During my first week at the office, Pauline explained the situation to me and we decided to use some of the money to complete this project. At the end of August, I first took a picture of the classroom while construction was still underway, and I agreed that this would be a project worth spending part of the money on.
About a month later, the classroom is finished and just needs painting. The school finally has a classroom for the smallest kids. It is hard to describe the feeling when seeing these kids on the first day in their new classroom. The teacher seemed really happy and just couldn't stop talking about the walls, the roof and the cool breeze (38°C) entering through the window.
Soon the classroom will be painted and an official opening will follow. In the meantime, it was great to read the following message in this month's newsletter:
"Another new classroom complete! Madre Teresa de Calcuta school now has an extra classroom for their kindergarten (preescolar) and also a kitchen for cooking the school food. It was well underway by the end of August, and now we used funds raised by Anka Verhoeven to complete, including the roof. The children are happy in their new classroom, only the painting and the official opening to go! You can read some more about it here on Anka’s blog – in Dutch - http://www.ankanica.
We also received an offical letter from La Esperanza to thank us for the support:
I often get the question why exactly I chose La Esperanza to give my support to. I hereby would like to answer in all honesty: La Esperanza is the first and only organization of which I know that we share a common goal: the children. The children are and will always be the focus of every project, and I can promise you this: the feeling of happiness when you see a smile on the face of one child here, is not even comparable to the 'happiness' of a life there.
Some pictures to round off:
