Goods to the School & Village

We have now sent out another load of books, clothes etc. and the money to sponsor 14 pupils at the Macumbaya school.  Our thanks to "Whynot" of Exeter for looking after the shipping details and saving us over £60 on the costs.

Olly is on his way

Olly the bear is now in the USA travelling with our vice chair of Trustees while she visits her family.  On his return he will have a rest until January 7th when he will start on his first trip to Gambia.

Olly has started

Wow,
Only a few days after telling people my plans I found myself stuck in a car for a "Taster" trip to Cornwall.  This was mainly to check that I did not get travel sick but also allowed me to visit my cornish relative in St. Columb Major.  All went well and I was not sick once.
Love,

Olly

                                                                  Ready To Go

                                                     With My Cornish Cousin

The Bear Adventures begin

Hi There,

My name is Olly and I have been sitting unloved in a dark drawer for the past two years in the town of Torquay. After all this time I have decided to break loose and travel the world. At the same time I hope to raise some money to help the people in The Gambia in the fields of education and health via the charity “Harmony Gambia”. My first three trips are now organised, in September I will be flying my way to visit our American cousins and early in January 2011 I will go all the way to The Gambia to make contact with the people and see for myself what their needs are. I can bearly wait. As soon as I get back I am off with my friend Dawn to cycle 400 kilometres between Cambodia and Vietnam. As I am an English bear I am not quite sure how far 400 Kilometres is but I have been told that it is further than Torquay to Paignton and I am already in training on my trusty (rusty) bike for this epic adventure. My passport is all in order (see picture above).

All of my costs are already covered so if you could sponsor me ALL the money will be going to the good cause. Please help me in this effort. You may even be going somewhere exotic yourself and need some company. I eat the bare minimum, am fully house trained, do not nag and I am prepared to go anywhere for the cause. (Calling Richard Branson:- “Any room on a space flight, I am a Virgin!” )

If you require any details of the work the charity is already doing look on their website at www.harmonygambia.org.uk or Telephone my manager Peter Oliver on 01803 316448 for full details.

Many thanks for reading this bearly literate missive,

Olly Bear

Urgent help required

Abubacary Saidy, a young man we have been supporting for the last three years has now finished his secondary school education.  By the application of hard work he has managed to come out top of his year of 170 pupils in the exams with seven special prizes.

He is ideal material for university but it would cost in the region of £5000 pounds over four or five years to send him there.  If any of our readers have ideas on how we can help this lad we would be most grateful.

We held our annual Barby on the 1st August. £176 was raised which was a good effort, but we have decided that in future we will hold it earlier in the year on a Saturday as there were so many other events taking place on the day that it affected our attendance numbers.

Education Hopes

The Chairman & Vice Chairman had a meeting with the Vice Chancellor of Portsmouth University with the idea of setting up some kind of contact with the University Of The Gambia. The idea is still very fluid but we will be seeing the Vice Chancellor in the Gambia during our next visit, starting February 19th, to get his ideas on the best way forward.