Shipment Feedback:
The conflict in Syria continues to devastate lives and communities, with thousands of people still displaced and living in flimsy tents and temporary homes. According to the UN refugee agency, there are 13.5 million displaced Syrians–more than half the population.
We’ve shipped several times to a partner inside Syria who shares desperately needed goods with both displaced people and impoverished communities who are hosting the displaced. These partners spoke of how urgent the needs were when they distributed the most recent batch of goods from our latest shipment.
“Mama, I told you we haven’t been forgotten.” A child, receiving toys from the shipment
“This is a very poor area where displaced people are living in tents. They have urgent needs for clothes, shoes, food and medical care.” The adults receiving goods were most interested in meeting those most desperate needs. One woman, after receiving clothes and household goods said, “finally, because of what you’ve brought us, I can get married.” She and her betrothed had been lacking even the basics they wanted to be able to marry and set up house.
The kids, though, had other ideas about their most desperate needs. When one little boy received toys, along with some shoes, he ran to his mother crying, “Mama, I told you we haven’t been forgotten!” Another was so excited to receive a toy that he said he felt like he was in a dream. One father of five, Ahmed, had pulled his children out of school because he couldn’t provide them with bags, stationery, or clothes. When he received these things from the shipment, he said he considered it a sign that it was time to re-enrol his children into school.
Clothing (above) and other goods from the shipment are helping displaced families care for their children’s most basic needs.
(Toy donation) Toys from the shipment brought joy to hundreds of children, many of whom had never held a new toy.
Crossroads’ partners allocated toys and educational equipment, school furniture, clothes and kitchenware to a school for displaced children. The school equipment and supplies have moved some parents to re-enrol their children in school as they now wo well-equipped say our partners.
According to our partners in Syria, more than 4,000 people benefited from the toys, shoes, bedding, and medicals beds included in the the shipment.
We are so grateful to all who contributed to this shipment, helping show displaced people in Syria that they aren’t forgotten.
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Enrolments in our partner’s charity schools have more than doubled in the twelve years we have been working with them. “Instead of spending money on building wooden benches for students to sit on, Crossroads’ school furniture donations meant we could afford to build toilets,” they reported.
Maria and her husband have four of their own children and they also care for three young, orphaned relatives. Her husband has a professional job but his salary is not sufficient for all the family’s needs. Maria farms maize to provide their staple food. Before joining one of our partner’s programmes, the harvest would only last half a year but in thefour following years her harvest has increased seven-fold. She now sells the surplus grain and buys flour to make bread that she sells locally. Maria is proud to be helping her husband provide for the family. As well as providing food security and a financial “cushion” against hard times, she hopes that her baking business will bring in enough profit to allow her to start a small second-hand clothing store.
Left: Container being unloaded in South Africa by our partners. “This donation has inspired other organisations to get involved and begin to actively donate,” they said.
Right: A distribution of shoes from the shipment to primary school children in need.
This school was just one of several that received goods from the shipment, including school furniture and other school supplies. Another school said they had been fundraising for 3 years to be able to afford school furniture for their classrooms, but so far had only raised US$120. They were thrilled to receive donated furniture from the shipment, saving them thousands of dollars and time spent fundraising.
Webster’s story
A previous shipment from Crossroads provided items to set up a vocational workshop for learning dressmaking and design skills. This workshop has been training ninety disadvantaged youth, widows and refugees each year. This shipment will include more goods to support job skills training.
One of our partner’s programmes teaches mothers how to improve family nutrition through organic, dry-field vegetable growing techniques.
Another group is trained and later employed to propagate native seeds for re-forestation projects.
