Care for 20 homeless families in Tbilisi, Georgia

Project Report | Jan 5, 2022
More challenges and achievements in Tbilisi

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

Christmas decoration made by our resident

In our last report we had some difficult news to report. Our lawyer, Inga, was ill with Covid. She has now recovered, but has been diagnosed with cancer. We continue our legal support to homeless and vulnerable young people with the help of her sister, Lali. Nino, our charity's director, also had a serious bike accident on the way to work and needed surgery.

One of our residents has also been suffering health problems. He was diagnosed with a severe stage of polyarthritis and his walking and sight have greatly diminished. Sadly the treatment he received has not yet been effective. He now needs a medicine that costs 5,000 GEL ($1,615/ £1,228) per dose. It turns out that Dato will need 4 doses a year. Sadly such medicines are not funded by the state.

Mkurnali’s director, Nino, and her helpers have tried to earn this amount but this has proved difficult in the current climate. Nino says: “I turned to my friend, Dr Marina Ramazashvili, who has her own eye clinic and who has helped with free treatment for some Mkurnali’s beneficiaries in the past. Marina ran a free check and confirmed that arthritis caused Dato’s sight deterioration. Thankfully she connected us with another clinic in Tbilisi where the required medicine and treatment will become available in two month’s time with support from Germany. Amazingly this local clinic led by Ms Darejan Shelia will match Marina’s free offer for Mkurnali and serve our beneficiaries free of charge”.

A volunteer has also been stepping up to help us improve our local income. Our social business refilling printer cartridges has lost 70% of its orders because of the pandemic. So we were glad when Lia offered to teach residents how to make Christmas decorations and gifts. Together they have made a lovely collection for a pre-Christmas sale at the US Embassy in Tbilisi. Our former beneficiary, Pavel, is also moving his garage to bigger premises. He hopes to be able to take on another apprentice mechanic from among our residents soon.

We also continue to make enamel jewellery and this is now on sale in the UK via the St Gregory's Foundation online shop. If you'd like to see the pendants and ear-rings made by our residents, you can follow the link below.

All that remains is to wish you all a very happy New Year and Christmas (which we will celebrate tomorrow) and to thank you for all your support through this year. As you can see, we work hard to be as self-sufficient as possible, but without your generosity the pandemic would have been catastrophic for us. You are helping us serve our community when they need us most. Thank you!

Links:

Jewellery made by our residents on sale in the UK

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Sep 13, 2021
Trying to stay upbeat in the face of the pandemic

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

Hard at work in our jewellery workshop

Usually we try to make our reports upbeat. After all, we have many wonderful things to report. With your help we are able to change many people's lives. This month, however, it's harder to sound cheerful. Corona virus continues to ravage our country. Vaccination rates are low, and we have as many as 6,000 new Covid cases a day at the moment with up to 65 daily deaths. Our population is only 4,000,000, so you can see the scale of this wave.

Covid took Lia Salakaia, our singing teacher and a great friend of our organisation. Currently, Inga Bibleishvili, our lawyer who represents homeless and vulnerable young people, is ill and her sister Lali is helping us instead. Many of the young people we help have also suffered from this terrible disease.

The indirect economic effects of the pandemic are also taking their toll. Two weeks ago one of our former beneficiaries committed suicide. Our residents continue to make enamel jewelery (see photo), and the garage is still working when there are customers. Our workshops can't work to full capacity however because of trying to reduce social contacts and because demand still hasn't picked up.

However, we do have some good news. We congratulate Luka's sister, who has started university with our support. You may remember her brother's story: he dreamed of going to university and ended up working on the streets to help his mother. He passed away with cancer eighteen months ago. We continue to help his family to this day.

Our young gymnastics star, Kristina, has also been able to go to a team meeting in Bukariani. She has shown incredible determination, continuing to train through the last year, even when she had to do it in our living room.

We have also found the money to get our roof fixed, and work will start soon.

The other good news is that this week GlobalGiving are offering a 50% bonus on all donations up to $50. So if you donate 50 USD (aprox £35) we receive an additional $25 (£17.50) to help our residents and ex-residents through this difficult time. The offer runs until midnight EDT on Friday 17th September.

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Jun 14, 2021
Food stories from Tbilisi

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

Planting potatoes

Today it's all about food.

One of my acquaintances who owns a grocery store in Gldani (one of Tbilisi’s suburbs) asked me to come and check his in-store camera recordings. He showed me that one of our fomer residents has been stealing sausages and bread for his family from the store. The owner told me that they think the boy does this every day because he is not aware of the cameras. He suggested talking to the boy and telling him that rather than stealing he can ask the owner directly for food. The owner had noticed that the boy had only taken essential food. "He did not take one packet of sweets" he added. It was a big relief that the owner didn’t press charges and understood that the boy’s family must have been in such a dire situation that he had no other option but to steal food. The owner helped this family on a few occasions after that. This is how tough the whole situation is in some regions of Georgia.

Our young people at Mkurnali who are currently jobless, decided to grow a small vegetable garden rather than sit still and do nothing. They planted potatoes and corn. They also bought chickens and rabbits to start a small scale farm. It is inspiring that they took the decision and organised this all by themselves. Remarkably one of the inspirers of this idea and work was Achiko, our new resident recently released from prison. Together with Jemal and others he worked hard in the garden - it was a particular joy for me to see that he treats Mkurnali as his home.

In Georgia just 5% of the population have received their first covid vaccination, compared to 61% in the UK or 51% in the US (based on the latest figures available). This pandemic and its health and economic consequences have a long way to run in our country. We are very grateful to everyone who is helping us to adapt to our new circumstances so we can continue to put food on the table for our residents and some of our fomer residents who need us too.

Our chickens

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