Introduction
The rains have been plentiful during the last month in Goa, many streets and pathways were turned in streams and rivers as the rain came down. Probably worst hit though was Mumbai, about 550Kms north of Goa where around 1000 lost their lives due to the floods and the airport and train service was halted. Robert was lucky enough to miss this disaster by only a week on his way journey via Mumbai to England for a months break.

Shermina was left in India to continue her work on the Mango house and also to welcome volunteers when they arrived. One of her favourite sights this month was a lady walking through water up to her thighs to get from one end of a field to another. Everyone is always wet but nobody complains and they just get on with their day to day business. The monsoon has brought lots of rubbish and dirt to places that normally seem clean. The roads are more like sewers in places and the spread of illness is hard to contain because of all the rubbish around. This is also made more of a problem as in some areas the rubbish bins aren’t being cleaned. But there’s hope in sight as the rains have nearly finished, and they mostly come at night now so it makes life here in Goa that little bit easier.

We hope you enjoy this instalment of the newsletter and if you have any queries or comments then please contact us at .

Website
There hasn’t been too many changes to the website this month, not even a set of pictures on the main site which we know many of you like. Below is a list of new and updated web pages : -

New Web pages

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/Copyright.htm
We have included a copyright statement, which is for users so they know how they can use the information found on the CWT website and any copyrights associated with it.

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/Privacy.htm
This is a privacy statement that covers how we treat any information given to us or is collected during the use of the CWT website. Both the Copyright and the Privacy pages are standard practice on most websites.

Updated Web Pages

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/
The home page has had a small face lift, with slightly neater graphics, a couple of new images and a link to the Make Poverty History website (Bob Geldof’s project). Another new item on the home page is the ‘Current Project’ box. We are so close to opening our new home and would like to secure it’s future. To help, we have added a small donation counter on the homepage that counts towards this goal. Currently at ZERO, the idea is that anyone can donate any amount of money by Cheque, online through givenow or by giving cash here in Goa, or even at the UK office. This money will then be used for the future of the house so we can be secure in the thought that we have enough funds to continue the charity in the ‘Mango House’. All you need to do is make sure when you donate that you say what the money is for – e.g. write on the back of the cheque, enter the details when giving online or a little note when you hand cash to either Maureen Charters, Denise Ganatra or Pat Lyon in England, or Robert Lyon and Shermina Ganatra in India.

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/NeedsList.htm
We have had a few confirmations of donations this month so a few items have been updated on the needslist, we have also given viewers a sneak preview of a few of the new additions to the house against some of the items if you’ve all been wondering about the ‘Mango House’, hopefully by next month we should be able to do a large article on the house…

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/OtherPictures.htm
Another small set of new pictures (look at the bottom of the webpage) ‘Part 5 - Candolim Beach, deserted, rubbish covering the sand... Even manages to look cold!‘ , these were taken just before the camera died and make Goa look cold and bleak, believe me it was still hot!

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/Forms/Fundraising-GiftAid.pdf
For those who like to make that little bit more of a difference and make their donations work better without it effecting them, then please print out this form and when ever you send cash/cheques to Children Walking Tall then fill out and include one of the Gift Aid Forms (there are seven on an A4 sheet). This enables us to claim another 28% from the tax man. So if you donate ₤10.00 we get an extra ₤2.80 from the government. It does not effect the donator at all… Magic!

This months stats from our website :

Favourite Pages for this month are :-
childrenwalkingtall.com – The Home Page
childrenwalkingtall.com/NeedsList.htm - The Needslist
childrenwalkingtall.com/Pictures.htm - The Pictures Home Page
childrenwalkingtall.com/Newsletters.htm -The Newsletters Home Page
childrenwalkingtall.com/VolunteerViews.htm - Where you can read about our volunteers..

Fundraising
*How to Help* with fundraising
1. Please spread the word about Children Walking Tall. A simple way is to forward this newsletter to your friends and family asking them if they could find the time to read it and to visit our website.
2. If you work at a company that might sponsor any of our projects, please get in touch with us.
3. Be a member of our UK fundraising team by distributing leaflets or raising money. A good way is by finding something that you enjoy doing and have a fundraising event.
4. Have a look at the fundraising pack for ideas about how you can help.

Thank you to everyone!
If we haven’t thanked you then please let us know! Our supporters are the ones who really do the magic, without the support of everyone then none of what CWT does would be possible. If we haven’t mentioned your name this month and you think we’ve forgotten you then please accept our apologies, we are so grateful to everyone for all they do, the best thing to do is to send us an email and say ‘Hey! Can you put my name in the newsletter for …….’. Either that or just have a look at the smiles on the faces of the children in our photos, you’ll see they think the world of you! Thanks

Online Donations
Thank you to Laura, Jenny, Melanie, Linda, Gilly, Heather & Dave, and Lorna for their kind support through online donations through the Givenow website ( http://givenow.org/charityprofile/childrenwalkingtall ).

Printer
Thank you to Gilly who has kindly donated the money towards the printer from the needslist. This will allow us to do more things ‘in house’ and keep costs to a minimum. It will also give the children a chance to print items that they produce, maybe letters or school work. Thanks

School Books
Thank you to Mavis for all the old school books and craft materials donated to use in our slum school and in our home. We were unable to bring all of the books out at the same time as there were so many but hopefully when our families visit during the year they will continue to bring items across.

Baskets Galore
We have many clothes, toys and other useful things have been donated to use in the children's home. However since not all of the items will be used at the same time, storage is needed for some items. Thanks to Lindi, Mervyn and Richard Beckwith-Corbishley we have managed to purchase 30 plastic baskets.

Sitting in comfort
Thanks to Melanie, the children will be able to lounge around in comfort and have bean bags to jump, flop and basically relax on during the day time.

Keeping the House Cool
Since the house is much bigger than we expected it to be, we have needed to invest in more fans to try and keep the rooms cool during those warm summer months. Thanks to Lindi, Mervyn and Richard we are closer to our goal of having a fan in every room.

Roof Repairs
Thanks to Maureen for all of her work fundraising to pay for all the roof repairs to the ‘Mango House’. We had to get the repairs done before the monsoons to make sure that damp did not ruin the house; it is now complete and is looking much better as we can no longer see the sky from inside the building. There is still the odd drip here and there on the really bad days, but it is much better than it was. The whole roof was taken off and re-laid, where the batons had been eaten by termites the old timber was taken out and replaced with new. Maureen wanted to say thank you to everyone for their kindness and help to make this possible.

Indian Night in Manchester
We would like to thank everyone who attended this Indian evening, it was a great success, a special thank you to Linda who unfortunately could not make it but still sent her contribution. Thanks Emma for the head massage and thanks again to Lorriane for organising the whole event

Education
Thank you to Chumpa who has kindly sponsored the education of a child for a year. Although education is free for children up to the age of 14, many children do not go to the government schools as they still cost families in many ways - books, equipment, uniform and transport still need to be paid for. Giving a donation for education will give more children a better chance of an education and then a better chance in life.

Parcels
Thanks again to Liz Flynn for sending a number of parcels containing craft kits, sweets, toys and clothes to our address in Goa. The parcels sometimes take a while to reach us but it is definitely worth the wait and the children will spend hours completing all of the craft kits. Shermina can’t wait to have a go too!!!! For anyone who would like to post items, the address is :-

Children Walking Tall
Post Bag 19
365/4D Porba Vaddo
Calangute
Bardez
Goa, India

(It is Postbag not Postbox!)

Pocket Money
I think we will have to find something very special to buy with the donation from Eleanor. She managed to raise ₤16.50, but what makes it special is that it was collected from 8 weeks of her pocket money. Thank you so much Eleanor.

T-Shirts
Thank you to everybody who has purchased one of our official Children Walking Tall T-Shirts. They are priced at ₤10 but many people have given that bit more to help the charity, Robert would like everyone from Darlton and Dunham who bought them and a special thanks you to Madhvi and Raju who raised the most from the lowest number of T-Shirts. We do appreciate all the help they’ve given us with promotion and fundraising. Thanks!

Laptops
A big thank you to Billy and Peter for securing the charity two laptops. Billy works for King Edward VII Hospital Sister Agnes and told them about their visit to Children Walking Tall last season. The hospital was kind enough to donate their old equipment to charity, these will be used by the children to learn about computers and give them a greater chance in the future with skills like word processing, spreadsheets and games, ok, maybe the games will just be for fun!

A Big Thank You
Thanks to everyone that has helped get the first year of Children Walking Tall off to a flying start. It is surprising that the charity only started one year ago when Robert came to India to look into what was required in setting up the charity in India. It was our goal to have a house up and running within two years. However thanks to the support that we have received, the Mango House should be up and running within the next two months. The support that people have given has been amazing, so thank you to everyone… For those who missed the ‘early steps’, here’s the first two newsletters we sent out…

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/Newsletter/2004-09-E.htm

http://childrenwalkingtall.com/Newsletter/2004-10-E.htm

Do you have any spare room in your garage?
Maureen is still looking for places to store items for her charity car boot sales in Barnstable. Do you a little bit of space in your garage or possibly a spare room when she can store items for the car boot? If you do or know somebody else that has and wouldn’t mind Maureen using it then please email Children Waking Tall or phone the UK office. If you would like to visit the stall and leave a donation of money or items to sell then the stall can be found at the Car boot at Infracombe dual carriage way site in Barstable.

What's Been Happening?

The Mango House
The Mango house is finally starting to look like a real house, Rob and Shermina are planning to move in at the end of the week. The house is not quite finished due to problems with damp walls from all of the rain but it is looking much better than it did a few months ago. The builders have just about finished all of their work but still have small problems to sort out but hopefully we will be fully up and running by the 1st of October. Hopefully next month we will have a Mango House special… Then again… You know what it’s like in Goa!

Slum School
The school in the slum has taken a break due to the rains, but we have still been down to the slum most days just to interact and talk with the children. As you can imagine the slum is not a very nice place during the rains and wellies are needed before you go any where near. However this does not stop the children greeting us with big smiles on their faces and all of them are eager to take us into their homes to escape the rain.

There are also a number of new children that have arrived at the slum recently and it is nice to hear them say new words in English everyday. They are constantly shouting out our names and enjoy games such as skipping and colouring, although they have much more energy than we do!!!

Welcome to our new Volunteers
Hannah and Anna came to visit us at the end of July and Anna kindly decided to volunteer for six weeks before returning to the UK to go to university. She is doing a grand job in the house trying to get the walls to look white, and polishing all of the floors. Anna really enjoys her time in Goa and is currently trying to work out a way to come again next year, although she still has to get used to being wet all the time. We hope her time with us is enjoyable and that we don’t work her too hard.

Annual General Meeting (AGM)
Amazingly it has been a year since we first decided to start our own charity and registered with the British Charity Commission. The time has passed so quickly and a huge amount has been accomplished since Christmas when all of our work started in earnest in Goa. Thank you to everyone that attended our AGM at the end of July and to all of our trustees that put in their time and effort to write the reports we needed to send to the Charity Commission. We would also like to thank Ian for offering to do the charities accounts for us free of charge. The accounts themselves are a complicated job because there are two sets, the English ones and the Goan ones, which are integrated to work together.

The Abseil
On the 31st of July a group of eleven people set out for Derbyshire to take part in a sponsored abseil for children walking tall. Unfortunately only five of these had been sponsored. The site situated in Miller’s Dale on the Monsal Trail in Derbyshire has been specially set up to accommodate abseil parties, and consists of an 80ft high bridge which spans the river Dove. The age range for the group was a massive 56 years as the youngest was Brenon at 16 and the eldest was Rob's mother at the ripe old age of 71 years. It was a lovely calm day although a little chilly at first but warming up as the day went on. Once the instructor arrived he went through a few ground rules and made sure we knew what to. We took the short walk up to the bridge that would be our starting point, to our shock we found out that we wouldn't be doing the abseil down one of the struts of the bridge but down from one of the arches. What did this mean? Well this actually meant that once you had lowered yourself to a horizontal position and walked down two meters, you couldn’t walk any further, the only thing left to do is Push off from the bridge and drop a meter so that you don't hit your head on the bottom of the bridge. It all went with out a hitch and by the end of the session we were being told to push off as hard of possible to try and reach a branch on a tree a few meters away from the bridge. Then just lowering yourself gently down, the only thing left to worry about was the stream running directly below you, thankfully we had Mic on had to pull everyone over to solid ground so that we didn't get wet.

Everyone got two runs down except for Pat, the eldest and Rob's mother who sneakily managed to have 3 turns... Everyone else there was really impressed at her willingness to do it. Once all the sponsored people had a turn, we offered it up to everyone else, and was happy that 2 others had a go. Shermina’s grandmother and another 16 year old took us up on the offer. Strangely enough it was the 16 year old (one of Brenons's friends who was the most scared, but we were all very proud of him as it was obvious that he really wasn't confident as he leant over.) Rob managed to overcome his fear; actually it wasn't half as bad as he thought, so next time we'll have to find something else to scare the pants off him.

The day was a great success, we haven't had all the sponsor money in yet, but it looks to have been very successful. Our next one might be a special abseil for 'recycled teenagers', to us that means great grandmothers and those past 70 years old. We've already had 3 willing to have a go. I think it would be great to get a largish group of recycled teenagers to have a go. Do you have a mother/grandmother who still wants to experience new things? Perhaps she would be up for abseiling; we've hoping that next time it will be even higher to give Rob’s mother at least something to worry about (Rob's idea). Please email us with nominations for the next abseil, the elder the better, as long as they're relatively fit and don't suffer from back or leg problems then I'm sure we can sort it out for them...

Mustapha needs a special mention as he made sure none of us fell, so thank you so much to him and Michael for arranging everything.

(More Pictures and story will be up on the website shortly)

Rob’s Stay in England
Rob returned to England at the end of July for a months holiday. Well that was the idea but unfortunately he did not really get a break. Whilst he was in the UK he helped organise our Annual General Meeting and also write the reports required by the British Charity Commission. He also managed to complete a 1000 mile trip around the UK visiting volunteers, fundraisers and supporters, many who had gifts for the children. By the time he returned to the Lincoln area he had a car full of items to bring to India. Unfortunately however, he did not manage to secure excess luggage on his flight as he had hoped.

Rob’s return to Goa
Robert landed in Mumbai after a great flight from Heathrow. He landed at just after midnight and took a taxi for the 45 minute trip from the airport to the CST Train station. He arrived at the station at 1.30am and had to wait 6 hours for his train. There were already hundreds of people sleeping on the floor of the station waiting for their trains, and as the ticket office didn’t open for another 3 hours, Robert decided to have a seat and relax.

While at the station he came across a group of children who were living there. Unfortunately he didn't have much on him, but as they were asking for food he bought them a few small items and a drink. He looked through his bag and found some juggling balls, they found these great fun and after half an hour they were terrorising the train station by throwing the balls from one end to the other. The children were also fascinated by his MP3 player, the youngest just sat on his bag 'plugged in' for a whole album, it was the only Hindi album he had, but went down well with the young audience. He also had tucked away in his luggage a gyroscope and they also found this compelling as did many men who came round for a look. All of which promptly had a go trying to generate the highest revolutions per minute. Most of the children were actually with their parents who stayed there doing odd jobs for a few bits of change. Just to prove that the monsoon wasn't over there were also a few hard bursts of rain during his waiting time, and the roof only leaked a little. At 7.30am he boarded his train and took the 12 hour journey down to Goa.

Future Projects

Indian Night in Barnstaple
Maureen is having another one of her famous Indian nights on October 8th. If anyone in the Devon area would like to attend or possibly supply items to be sold for charity or perhaps provide refreshments (with an Indian theme) for the night then please contact her on 01271 342067 (Home) or 07779 764156 (Mobile). Tickets are 8 pounds and are available now!!!!!

Toy Sale in Dartmouth
Val is starting to collect items for a Toy Sale which will be held in Dartmouth sometime in October, if you have any old toys that you wish to donate and are in the Dartmoor area then please contact Val on (01803) 835511 or drop them off at the Restored Shop, 19 Newcomen Road, Dartmouth.

What you can do to HELP!!!
Perhaps you could make a difference in the lives of the children. Make a donation to Children Walking Tall. If you have a preference on how the money should be spent then please tell us, and we will try and make the money work the way you want it to.

Other ways to help are to donate clothes, books, pens and toys. This can be especially helpful if you’re planning a trip to Goa and can bring them with you. The easiest thing that you can do is tell others about what we do. The more people who know, the greater the chance we have of supporting children like these. Do you have any comments about the newsletter? Would you prefer a shorter version? Would you like to see pictures in the newsletter (Email will be larger if pictures are added)? Please let us know what you would like, as we always want to improve what we do.

And Finally
If you would like to receive these monthly newsletters by email please contact us at . Please put the subject “Join Newsletter” so that we can add your address to the mailing list. Send us the email address you wish the newsletter to go to. If you have received this email by mistake, or wish to cancel your monthly newsletter then please let us know by email at with the subject “Cancel Newsletter” Many Thanks from everyone at Children Walking Tall.

Click Below For Direct Links