What is my background and why Vohimarina-Lamosina and Mangarivotra schools?
I am currently working as pharmacist branch manager within ManiMoss pharmacy in Horsell. I was born in Vohimarina-Lamosina village in 1955. I used to go to this school when I was young [from 1959 to 1966] then I joined the secondary school of Fianarantsoa [1966-1973]. After the two years popular unrest in Madagascar [1972-1973] I moved to France.
During my stay in France as student
and pharmacist, I was involved within humanitarian activities [Pharmaciens Sans
Frontieres, Madagascar/Aquitaine association] in favour of developing
countries.
The second school was established by my father, he had this great idea of building a school at Mangarivotra so the other small villages 5-10 miles around do not need to send their children to Mahasoabe, the nearest biggest village with larger school but still too far to be joined by walk [45 minutes to one hour walking distance].
What is my contribution?
I
will make the link between the representatives of the schools and all
volunteers, donators, national and international organisations likely to be
interested in this kind of actions. I will be campaigning for fundraising with
the individuals first before extending my field of operation to other structures.
Why did I get involved?
The concept of helping these two schools started when I was
told [following a letter I sent on 27 December 2002] that the conditions of being a simple pupil
became difficult in Madagascar.
But, the first memorable event was when Rachel
Jordan, one of my assistants had a great suggestion of playing flute on the
Christmas “late opening day” at Horsell in December 2003. Rachel is a talented
musician and attended regular flute tuition at this time. She was a part-time
dispenser taking a gap year before joining her University. She decided to give
the cash collected to the 2 schools after having performed for3 hours in the
pharmacy premise…the first fund raised was £7.84 [£5.13 in pot No1 and £2.71 in pot No2 displayed in
the shop].
That was the birth of this pilot project; my family
and I made a donation of 114.56 giving a total of £122.40.
Mr David Jordan [Rachel’s father] offered 6 folders
for the teachers; 360 pens and 360 pencils were bought with the money from
VIKING company. The shipping was under my responsibility. Rachel left the
company the following year but the other members of staff decided to keep a permanent
box to collect spare change deposited for the two schools.
How can you help?
The fund raising continues and if you are able to help please contact me on make_a_difference@mangarivotra.org or use the Make A Donation button on this page.
Miasoatra!
Paul