Tsunami Recovery in Five Coastal Villages, India

In times of economic woe, everybody is stretching more. At the same time we all search for "beacons of hope" to illuminate our understanding and enlighten us with wisdom...

With your help we can provide self-help to 250 villagers, 20 urban families and 25 girl students for livelihoods recovery, home reconstruction (about 5,000 USD per home), medical care and school enrollment in Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

Combining the Charity funding (1,555 USD) with Global Giving donations already received since July 2009 (945 USD) is allowing us to pursue till end 2009 as a key priority our support to the shelter for disaster affected and homeless girls in Santhome near Chennai where the key goal is to help them graduate from high school and learn a trade.

As one of these girl students, Maha, said : "if I can become a doctor I could help victims of natural disasters". In 2010, a total of 3,500 USD are needed to support basic needs of these 25 girls for a school year. Make a difference.

As always, the spirit in which your gift is made is most important to us and to those you help. You can change a life and you can do great things when the need is greatest.

Have a New Year filled with peace and prosperity.

Mary

Under this reconstruction project, our priority is to rebuild destroyed homes, helping refugees find a decent place to live, providing them with clean water, medical care, and opportunities to make a living.

Project also supports a shelter for disaster affected and homeless girls in Santhome near Chennai where the key goal is to help them graduate from high school and learn a trade. This component of the project has been particularly successful in 2008.

Thanks to GlobalGiving donors and other funding, project was also able to repair 5 homes and to rebuild 4 homes for victim families in Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

To promote better results overall in 2009 we work closely in partnership with the dedicated Indian Non-proft Charity Jeevana Samridhi (Life in Abundance) very active in Southern India.

In this way, we ensure that each dollar received is properly used and has a positive impact. We are making schedules of tasks, list of services provided and of beneficiaries at village or shelter level, and we monitor construction progress every 3 months in coordination with Jeevana Samridhi.

Many poor families still need help for home rebuilding while staying in good health and earning a living. Donor feedback would be highly appreciated on how they believe we could do a better job.

Thank you to help these families fight poverty and adversity to build hope and peace, and to help us make new progress together on reaching soon project goals.

Dear GlobalGiving Friend, Providing technical assistance for livelihoods recovery in these villages in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, continuing home reconstruction in disaster affected areas, and educating young girls for a better future are the focus of this project since end 2006. Weak funding result in 2007 and 2008 is quite a challenge to do better in 2009.

I ask you to open your heart to those in crisis under this project. Your generous gift to GlobalGiving for this project will help the hungry and homeless in this region. It will also help the working poor who struggle every day, yet can't make ends meet four years after the tsunami. Your gift will give help and hope to nourish the bodies and the souls of village people in their hour of deepest needs. Budget need for 2009 is US$25,000. It includes medical assistance for a few critical cases. Thank you for your support in these difficult times whatever the amount you can afford.