All our work revolves around the thousands of children left orphaned through the HIV and AIDS pandemic. There is so much need that prioritizing is paramount and often quite difficult to turn down requests. Up until now our policy has been to work only in rural villages, but when a family from London recently contacted me and said they would like to support Lubasi Orphanage in Livingstone I felt that we had to make an exception. Lubasi has over forty children and relies heavily on aid with a few sustainable income-generating activities. Julie Gottlieb and her family saw first-hand the need of these vulnerable children and aim to raise funds for The Butterfly Tree to support this project. Their initiative, ‘Pack a Pillow‘, provides items for the children. Sun International, Zambia has kindly donated the pillows and pillowcases.
Funding for orphans: twin brothers supported by The Butterfly tree
This month sees other fundraisers working hard to provide funds for the orphans in Zambia. Once again our team, ‘The Flying Butts’, namely Mike Kaye, Nigel Birch and James Blackburn with the addition of Richard Harrison, will be participating in Cyclothon UK, a twelve-hour endurance test cycling challenge around the Brands Hatch Circuit. The organisers, VULtd, headed by Victor Umbugu put a great deal of effort into making this a hugely successful day for both the participants and the charity beneficiaries. The event takes place on 13th September from 7am until 7pm, spectators are welcome.
Mike Kaye participating in Cyclothon UK 2011
Yoga Aid is a global challenge to raise funds for needy causes and will be held on 9th September when they aim to raise over $1,000,000. Events will be taking place in over 30 countries in five continents. Prana Zambia is hosting an event at the Victoria Falls and is donating the money to The Butterfly Tree. On another global matter Malby Maps, a new company that specialise in creating handmade and unique pieces of map artwork, greeting cards and stationary, soft furnishings, homeware, paperweights and doorstops, has generously offered to donate a percentage of their card sales to the charity.
Funds are used to house a widow with four orphans – just £400 with house a family
We are so grateful to all our donors, fundraisers and sponsors who have enabled us to reach out to orphans in three Chiefdoms in the Southern Province of Zambia. If you would like to sponsor an orphan or support one of our projects please contact jane@thebutterflytree.org.uk
