OSF Events

OSF Events since 2006...

The Container

From Belguim to Nairobi

The idea of the OSF EA container began with a mad hunt for sewing materials for the Mama Africa workshop. Alix in Nairobi was having difficulty finding charitable priced goods or donations for the workshop and so we were forced to look back to Belgium.

The feedback was marvellous!

We were originally going to try and send the sewing material down in luggage as various OSF volunteers made their way down to Nairobi, but upon realising what fantastic support we were getting, we realized the great potential of collecting far more than just sewing material. We started to turn our attention to the needs for the Resource Centre.

We decided to turn our attention to containers – applications for fund donations began! Transport costs from Belgium to Nairobi would normally have set us back a painful 3000 Euros, not including tax and extra transport from the port by Nairobi to the Resource Centre in the Kangemi.

Finally, after weeks of applying, we hit gold: Wereld-Missiehulp vzw (World Mission Aid) offered us a 20-foot container (38 metres cubed) to be sent from Antwerp in Belgium to Nairobi. We gladly accepted this generous donation and began container collections all over Belgium.

We were collecting a whole range of goods including:

Books

English only for adult books i.e. paperbacks, novels, documentaries, etc.
English and French for children's books - including colouring books, schoolbooks, stories, etc.

Magazines and Journals

· E.g. National Geographic, Scientific America, etc.

Desks and chairs

· Computer and classroom desks and chairs, etc.

Computers/laptops

· All computer accessories e.g. printers, scanners, speakers, headphones, cables (of all sorts), modems, mouse, keyboards, mouse-pads, and any other spare hardware, CD-ROMs (any software for computers and educational content e.g. Encarta)

Other Electrical goods

· Telephones, fax machines, TVs, VCRs, Videos (educational content preferably e.g. ABCs, 123s), Over-Head Projectors (OHPs), etc.

Stationary/school equipment

· Ring binders, paper, pens/pencils/colouring pencils/crayons, sharpeners, erasers, rulers, compasses, calculators, binder dividers, plastic envelopes, note books, math books, etc.

Sewing material

· Cloth, sewing needles, sewing accessories, etc.

Liz Clarkson, with help from fellow Generation Europe colleagues – notably Catie Thorburn and Arnaud Houdmount, organised and carried out the collection, packing and contents list of the container over 2 months.

Catie Thorburn once again proved of great help by offering her garage for storing all of the container goods – it was very full by the end!

container_garage_2 liz_container_garage

Thanks to all who helped.

Mama Africa Sales

Generation Europe Central Office

Brussels, Belguim

Alix d'Ansembourg, Board Chairperson for OSF EA, had come over for a visit to Belgium from Nairobi with her family, and brought with her goods from the Mama Africa workshop. We decided to organise a proper charity sale and Catie Thorburn, Founder and Director of Generation Europe Foundation kindly 'donated' her home for that.

Thank you once again Catie!

For more details, click here !

The Charity Flea Market

Waterloo, Belgium

Thanks to so many helpful supporters throughout Belgium, OSF has been able to collect an enormous pile of flea market goods. We collected an enormous range of goods varying from lamps, decorative pots and statuettes, dishes, candle holders, pictures and picture frames, baskets, bags, clothing, books, jewellery, cosmetics, electric goods, toys and even a dust-buster!

We managed to get set up by around 5am and already there were plenty of bargain shoppers doing the grand tour.

clothing shoes

pots coats

Our sales were unfortunately not as high as we would have liked as not enough people were prepared to pay more for our charity. We were having to sell our goods for exceedingly low prices, which, in the end didn't make up for the amount of effort that OSF had put in to organising the event. A shame, but something for us to learn from!

electrics

If you would like any information on student or project sponsorship, please don't hesitate to contact us at osfea@aim.com.

Thank you again to all who helped with the brocante and made such generous donations!

The Raffle at ISB

Boitsfort, Belgium

The International School of Brussels (ISB) was kind enough to allow us to advertise and run a charity raffle on their schools grounds. The middle school committee at ISB – a group of four talented and dedicated fundraisers – helped OSF organise and run the raffle. These four wonderfully motivated students, seen here below, were more than happy to take on the challenge of raising enough money to buy 2 cows for our schools in the Nairobi slums.

Catherine Thorburn at Generation Europe Foundation (seen above in the red jacket) came up with the wanderful idea of running the raffle at a school. She also donated the fabulous prizes to be won at the raffle - including an iPod nano, 5 USB sticks and 10 cinema tickets. Up to 16 people had a chance to win a prize – you can imagine how this helped sell tickets !

Thank you Catie Thorburn and Generation Europe Foundaton!

Students and staff alike all participated in the raffle, generating the wanderful sum of 915 euros!

2the_crowd

3callin_the_numbers 4who_won

Handing out the prizes!

Liz, seen here below, also helped organise the raffle and prepared publicity, tickets and prizes for the event.

6Liz_and_team_member

8team_and_numbers

For more details, click here !