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Safe Housing Georgia Project #10666

Care for 20 homeless families in Tbilisi, Georgia

by St Gregory's Foundation

Project Report | Oct 31, 2023
Your donations are bearing fruit

By Sarah Gale and Nino Chubabria | Project Leader and Project Director

It was a great joy to be able to bring Nino Chubabria, director of our organisation to the UK to meet a number of our loyal supporters. We very much appreciate the global ties that our shelter has been able to build up, and the generous support you have given us. Be assured of our gratitude, even if we weren't able to meet you in person.

We have used a portion of your donations to establish a kitchen garden next to our shelter. This year, we had a particularly good tomato harvest. Some of our younger volunteers have been helping us make sauce which we can bottle and preserve to use through the winter. A neighbour has also given us several chickens of a particularly good variety. Jemal, our key project worker, has been building a new chicken coop with help from residents. We look forward to having a larger supply of eggs.

Our other news is rather less positive. Once again, we have been affected by unreliable workmen as we work to complete our extension. We had to fire the latest because he had a drink problem. Khvicha, one of our residents, is now doing the work. However, he has to fit the work in around his main job on construction sites in the city. When complete, the extension will give us three new rooms, two for permanent residents, and one to use as a living room cum emergency accommodation.

We are also now trying to tackle the serious problem of online gambling, which is taking hold across Georgia. Our residents are not imune, and several of them are gambling in a way which causes us concern. There is one local organisation which helps problem gamblers, but it is a commercial enterprise, not a charity. We are actively talking to a UK-based charity and trying to work out the best way to get the appropriate type of help to our residents.

As you can see, it is not always an easy business helping our residents back on their feet. However, we leave you with another snippet of more positive news. A local church has agreed to put our enamel jewellery on display, and this has helped us find new customers. Our sales had been falling, so we are delighted to find new places to sell the jewellery, since this means we can provide more work to residents and other young people in need. If you live in the UK, you can buy jewellery made in our workshop from the St Gregory's online shop (link below). These beautifully made earrings, pendants and rings make unique gifts and help us provide skilled and interesting work.

Links:

Opportunity to buy our jewellery - ships to UK only

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Jul 4, 2023
All the news from our homeless shelter in Tbilisi

By Sarah Gale and Nino Chubabria | Project Leader and Project Director

In the last year we have been telling you about our plans to extend our shelter. Although work has not progressed as fast as we hoped, the end is now in sight. We were hampered by heavy rains and also the difficulty of finding good quality workmen. However, we are now at the decorating stage and hope to have it ready by the end of this month. We have just one professional working on site with one of our volunteers.

In the last report we told Fedya's story. As an emergency case we had put him and his family up in a small room. It wasn't at all suitable for adults, let alone a small baby. With the extension still not complete we didn't have anything else to offer on site. We helped the family settle in a town close to Tbilisi. A couple of our fomer residents already live there. It is a good place because of the low cost of living there. When they first moved, we helped Fedya and his family with food and money, but now they are settled and able to stand on their own two feet.

Some of you will remember that a few years ago, when Christina was only 6 we contributed towards her gymnastics career. A resident of Mkurnali, she has the astonishing achievement of having joined the national gymnastics team. You'll find a link below to a recent performance in an international competition. It is a joy to watch. Our thanks to everyone who contributed to her competition costs so she could join the team.

Thinking of our younger residents, at the moment we have four children living at our shelter: one toddler, two nine-year olds and one twelve-year-old. We are trying to help prepare the older children for school, but they are seriously behind their peers. One plan we are working on is trying to put some extra tuition in place for them to help them catch up. Watch this space. We appreciate very much any help you can give to the residents of all ages living with us now, and those who will hopefully be joining us soon when out extension is ready.

Links:

Video of Christina performing on the trampoline

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Mar 7, 2023
Our homeless shelter is pushed to its limits

By Nino Chubabria | Project Director

Fedya

I first met Fedya and his brother Artur in 2002. They were sleeping near Dighomi market along with other “street children”. He was always cheerful and friendly despite all the difficulties. After the death of his father, Fedya, his mother and brother were thrown out of the house by their uncle and had no other place to go. They had to live on the street and sleep in cellars or wherever they could find a shelter.

One morning, Fedya’s mother didn’t wake up and 6-year-old Fedya and 8-year-old Artur were left alone on the street, surviving thanks to strangers who fed them. Nevertheless, neither of two brothers has ever stolen anything. They were highly respected by the market traders who trusted them to look after their market stalls from time to time. In the streets, both brothers met other homeless children. Fedya’s dream was to go to school but sadly it didn’t work out.

Fedya is a hard-working person. He worked in the market of Dighomi during the day and as a night watchman at night. A little while ago, Fedya got married, and the market management allowed them to live at one of the market premises for a while. This became impossible when his wife became pregnant and they were told to move out.

Fedya turned to us for help. Even though we didn’t have any rooms free at our shelter, the boys gave up their small room and moved into a small room at the garage run by Pavel, a former beneficiary of Mkurnali. This garage already provides training and employment to formerly homeless young people.

We have been working on building a new room and fitting out a new bathroom so that we can accommodate more people. Fedya's situation makes this work all the more urgent. We don't have a choice but to help him and his family through this most difficult time.

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