We did a lot of good work today. Tired, but happy.

All the good deeds!

It may not be the type of school you dream of, nor the one you studied in. But for them it is a lot. It is a place to develop, learn and make new friends. It is the place in which they are doing the best they can.

I aim to build a school in which the conditions will be better, but until then, seeing them at school, striving for good results, just fills my heart with joy.

We don’t only celebrate the birthdays of children, but also those of their long-distance parents.

Today we organised a small surprise for our friend Graziella, long-distance mother of those two beautiful children.

May you be forever blessed, dear friend!

Such a beautiful day it was, children were simply happy, such a joy to see them flourish!

I remember as if it were just yesterday – the day I saw Gift Hadija for the first time, together with her sister, Shakira Favour. Two little girls with special names, raised by a disabled mother.

Many people teamed up that day and helped the family. The girls earned very good and loving long-distance parents and started attending school.

Gift is… very gifted. Look at those amazing grades and be happy that such a gem is shining i our world, with the help of all good people around her, who support her and enable her to go to school.

What can be more beautiful, more meaningful, than the act of making a child feel that their date of birth… matters?

It was a beautiful day of work. Children of all ages came to receive their monthly food, lovingly paid for by their sponsors. We encourage them to be themselves at all times, to show gratitude, to help each other and to study hard, so that the future may be brighter.

What can be more beautiful than a child, happy and smiling, having come to share a moment of gratitude towards the person that is feeding him and that is enabling him to attend school?

Claudia, thank you for having made it all possible!

I met Mafuta and Wickliffe in 2019, at the beginning of my activity at Help One Child Thrive. Those were boys that no one wanted to help. Usually, older kids barely receive any support.

Amazingly enough, those two boys got lucky quite fast and they managed to acquire the support and love of two lovely persons, Donna from England and Andreea from Romania. The support received was well deserved: the boys were polite, hardworking, they always came along to help us with the heavy lifting and unloading of food, they did everything to the best of their abilities.

They wanted to learn, so we helped them. Both boys were enlisted into Prime Vocational Institute, where they studied car mechanics and engineering for a year. To their misfortune – to the misfortune of all of us, Covid had spread into the region and a full lockdown has been declared, preventing them from finalising their studiea on time.

But finally they did. In June 2022, Mafuta and Wickliffe received their diplomas with high honours and they became skilled and respected members of the community.

It is such a great feeling, to see the growth and the progress of a child. They were part of HOCT, once; now, they are grown-up men, ready to start their own work, their own families, ready to give back to the society.

Moments like these make all of efforts well worth.

Congratulations!

Veronica Anghelescu