Home again and back to work!

We're home from our first holiday for years - practically on doctor's orders! Running GOES and trying to raise funds by writing is turning into a full time career - just when other people are settling into easy chairs and listening to Radio 4. We were put to shame though by another member of our holiday tour group; a gentleman of 95 years of age who certainly isn't settling down to pipes and slippers just yet! There were other people who, having overcome serious medical conditions, were getting on with an active and interesting life, and  who provided true inspiration. GOES followed us about on holiday - one of our young Gambian friends was reported to be ill and we were able to send a donation to cover his care costs. 

We use a money transfer system called BAYBA which is very quick and reliable. Money is deposited with them via any branch of Barclay's Bank (there was one two doors away from the hotel we stayed at in Bergerac.) A 'phone call is then made to BAYBA in England to arrange a transfer to a selected location in The Gambia, and a code number is given. We then send the recipient a text message containing the code and the money is available, sometimes even on the same day. We're waiting for a message to tell us how our young friend is.

Our friend in the local coffee shop greeted us today with a bag full of beautifully made baby hats - we'll just have to go and give them to deserving babies! 

In the meantime I'm working on the fourth book in the Malinding ebook series. Long coach journeys are a good place to work out a plot!

Best wishes to all of you; please consider The Gambia for your next holiday and please, please buy the books! All proceeds go straight into GOES for immediate use in Gambian schools, clinics and homes.

Back in Business!

It's been rather quiet on the GOES front recently, largely due to a shortage of funds. Being a very small charity means we don't keep a large balance in the bank! We receive money, somebody needs it.

Recently our friends in the Vale Royal Writers' Group, together with members of Liverpool's Dead Good Poets, staged a Summer Wordfest at the Blue Cap pub in Sandiway. Some excellent poets and storytellers performed and the 'profits' from a raffle and sale of books, together with some very generous donations made GOES' bank balance very much healthier - for two days! By then the money was in The Gambia providing medical care for a very sick young man and providing mosquito nets to protect families from malaria (which kills far too many people in sub-Saharan Africa).

So, we're out of funds again! Hope our e-books ('Empty Bananas@, 'Mussukunda' & 'The Mechanical Girl') sell well!

Best wishes to all, and an especial 'thank you' to VWRG and Dead Good Poets!

Taps and books?

Well (sorry!) yes: The Malinding series of books* are selling well (sorry again ..) so we've been able to send off the money to move the water supply from a tap on the outside wall to the inside of the clinic at Mandinari. We haven't had the cash to visit The Gambia ourselves yet this year but there are a number of villagers we trust to oversee the work and we have sent the money for this work to a couple of them. We're also waiting for a report on the fund raising we're sharing with the villagers with a view to buying a maize milling machine for use by the village women. Pounding the maize in large mortars and pestles is a traditional African task, but it's very hard work and very time consuming so a powered mill would be a great advantage - and raise money from the surrounding villages. I so miss being out there with our friends, but the important thing is that progress is being made. (Still want to be there!

*Please help by buying one or more of them - see previous post!

Books for Sale!

The three books about life in The Gambia are selling well - from the U.S.A. through Europe to Spain! I wrote them to raise funds for Gambia GOES, our charity, and the hard work seems to be paying off. They books are set in an imaginary village on the South bank of the river Gambia called Malinding. The inhabitants of the village are also imaginary, though I have borrowed genuine Gambian names for them. The characters live only on the pages. I'm offering the first book, 'Empty Bananas' on Amazon ebooks, free for five days, in the hope that this will tempt people to buy the rest of the books in the Malinding series - 'Mussukunda' and 'The Mechanical Girl'.
I'm having a short rest before I start on the next book, which will be called 'The Alkalo' - Sirra, who appears in the first book and marries Ed, becomes am important member of the village community ...

Improving!

I've been moaning and groaning about a decline in the level of donations but there is good news: the tap has been installed at Mandinari Clinic and is supplying pure water for use there. I gather that at the moment it's installed on an outside wall but we'll send the funds for it to be extended to a sink inside the clinic next week. It would be nice to wave a wand and have things done very quickly - as a Westerner I was becoming a little impatient; we had taken the money to the clinic in December when we visited. But, six months wait is better than not having the job done at all! Thank you folks; in the UK for providing the funds and those of you in The Gambia who undertook the work. Team effort = good result!

Hard times and tight money

The international shortage of money hits us all. GOES has suffered a severe loss of income and we're trying hard to avoid hurting the people who need help. So far we've managed to salvage most of the loss by send the money to a number of Gambian friends who act as our agents; the economy comes from us not going out there ourselves. We normally pay all our own travel expenses out of our own pockets. This time we added that money to the charity and sent it out in our place! We're saving (!) hard so that we can go out in the Autumn - we would love to see water coming out the the tap in the clinic or sit in the Bantabar and tell stories to the children - but it's not about us.

Gladstone's Library

Gladstone's Library (1809 - 1898) features in quite a large part of my life. It was given by William Ewart Gladstone to the nation, shortly before his death in1894. His wish was to 'bring together readers who had no books and books who had no readers'. To this end he bought land near his home in the village of Hawarden, in Flint. He provided a corrugated iron building to house his personal collection of 32,000 books - and it is said that he transported then, in a wheelbarrow, from his home to the new library assisted by one of his staff and one of his daughters. The project cost him £40,000 (about £3million in today's money). The corrugated building was replaced by an elegant sandstone edifice in 1902, funded by public subscription of £9,000 and in 1906 a residential wing was added, which the Gladstone family paid for. 
It is the only residential  Prime Ministerial  library in the country. Dinner, bed and breakfast is available at very reasonable cost. The dining room, 'Food for Thought' provides excellent meals, using as far as possible local produce. Many of the local people dine there - you're not forced to read a book if you don't want to! You can register as a day reader, without charge, and use the library (which now houses quarter of a million books0 free of charge. 
 The library relies on donations from the public. It costs about £1000 a day to run. There are about 20 staff, and the heating bill must be enormous. It's also a Grade One Listed building, so repairs and updating are expensive. 
 It is a priviledge and a delight to work there. A large part of my three books* has been composed at one of the desks in the upstairs gallery of the library building. WiFi is available freely but I avoid using it  - I'm there to work not doodle about on Facebook ... 
 I must admit to the distraction of trying to work when surrounded by books. Perhaps that old volume on the shelf there - the small book in the leather binding - perhaps it's last reader was the grand old man himself? 
 Maybe I'll see you there one day?




* Available on Kindle: 'Empty Bananas', 'Mussukunda' and, very shortly, 'The Mechanical Girl' - about life in The Gambia and how Europeans can either exploit or benefit the Third World. 
All monies from the sale of these books is passed to the charity Gambian Occasional Emergency Support - G.O.E.S.