MAYAGEMS 2009 - MOTHERS FOR ALL24 November 2009
IMPORTANT DATE FOR YOUR DIARY!
SATURDAY 19TH DECEMBER 2009
12-2 ISH
@ MAYAGEMS - 11/20 AVALON PARADE, AVALON.
MAYAGEMS IS HAVING A FUNDRAISING FOR OUR NEW AFRICAN PROJECT
MOTHERS FOR ALL
www.mothersforall.org
I stumbled upon Mothers for All, when my mother was dying and I had to spend extended time in South Africa. In a shop, I saw some necklaces made of paper beads. Loved them on sight and loved them more when I learned they were made by AIDS affected women looking after orphans and vulnerable children in Botswana and Cape Town. They are caring for these children with funds raised by picking up waste paper from magazines, Joko Tea boxes, hair braid wrappers, newspapers, and posters, recycling them into colourful, lightweight GORGEOUS beads and selling them for a small profit. In the process they're gaining independence, support, pride, dignity and most important - self sufficiency. And they are cleaning up their environment.
When I sat on the floor of a tiny tin home with some of them, I realised I'd lost a mother but gained an ever growing band of children, and women who became my African sisters.
I brought a bushel of beads back to Sydney, and made them into fast selling contemporary necklaces. Wanitha Tanasingham, brimming with love and life, bounded back into Mayagems. Now Wanitha, if you didn't already know, magnificently wore a chilli, date and garlic necklace we'd made for her for a Fox Studio show. Wanitha says it got more attention than her cooking. She saw the beads, I told her about Mothers for All. Wanitha's heart always has room for more and more love, and she immediately suggested an M4A fundraising.
So it's happening. A few days before Christmas - Saturday 19th. In the Mayagems arcade, Garden Court, Avalon.
Empty your pockets for those truly in need and donate to get an African paper bead. Buy some jewellery. A tree decoration. A key ring. A bookmark. Make a coin donation to taste the food.
There'll be dancing, singing, drumming, food demonstrations.
Hassam M'souli, whose Moroccan cookbook was voted the 2009 best cook book out of Australia - will be signing his book.
Victor Pisapia of Victors Food will be Master of this important Ceremony..
DON'T GO YET!!!
HERE COMES THE EXCITING BIT!!
We're going to auction a paper bead necklace, made out of old recipe books. So what's so exciting about THAT? you're entitled to sniff. There isn't even an attached photograph. It's a secret for now, as it's pretty special.
The beads are currently on their way from Botswana to Avalon. The necklace will be ready in a week, at which time you'll be able to see it in Mayagems, and on line.
This is no ordinary necklace. This is a Travelling Bead necklace. In the same way that recipes are passed from mothers or fathers to their children who in turn pass them on, and in the way that our food is a culinary tapestry of all the cultures that have handled it, this necklace will journey around the world, as it is passed from one temporary custodian - who has acquired it through a donation to Mothers for All (M4A) - to another, for another donation.
The Travelling Bead necklace will be worn by Wanitha during her cooking demonstration. She'll be degarlanded, and the necklace will begin its journey.
The necklace will be accompanied by a "log book" made from recycled paper by the women of Botswana, and the first entry will be the African grandmother and bead maker extraordinaire who laboured to make the recipe beads. The rest is up to you .. .and you .. and you. Pass the necklace, pass the love, pay it forward. This won't work unless you regard yourself as a mere custodian, pass it on, pass it on ... it belongs to the world. But every person who, for a donation, acts as a custodian, will have his or her name in the log book and on line blog.
The Travelling Bead necklace will end its journey on 19th December 2010, after which there has been a request for this necklace to reside in a bead museum in America. If you have a better idea, another suggestion, pass those ideas back to us.
We are expecting international bids and although the donations are unfortunately not tax deductible in Australia because Mothers for All is not registered here, you can be assured that your donation will go directly to source without any administration fee because we are directly involved.
You will be able to follow the journey of the necklace on the Travelling Bead blog, and the interactive map.
Pass the necklace on. Pass it on. Pass the love on, up, forwards.
Help these gorgeous children and amazingly brave mothers and caregivers at Mothers for All to have at least the hope of a better life.
(I've just heard that one of the mothers, with whom I sat a few weeks ago, and who has been helping to look after 12 children, some orphans of her late sibling, has TB. Go figure. Buy one of her beads at Mayagems. It doesn't take much to make an African smile. ONE BEAD will feed one of her children for a day.)
Pass it on.
YOU CAN TAKE THE FIRST STEP BY HAVING FUN AT OUR FUNDRAISING.
OR IF YOU CAN'T COME, PLEASE MAKE A DONATION.
CALL MAYAGEMS ON 02-99180066 and we'll tell you how.
Or visit Mayagems ANYTIME to see what's happening with M4A.
www.mayagems.com
PLEASE - PASS THIS EMAIL ON - TO PASS THE LOVE ON. THIS WON'T HAPPEN WITHOUT YOUR HELP.
THANKS, LOVE, AND BLESSINGS ....
SUSAN STORM & DAVID SUTHERLAND
MAYAGEMS
02 99180066
www.mayagems.com
.
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