Festive greetings to all our wonderful supporters.

Picture thirty little boys and girls aged between 21⁄2 to 5 yrs, each clutching a large bag, half their size, toddling home, their tummy’s full of chocolate cake and moo-moos. In their bag, they have a cuddly toy, a colouring book, a woollen jumper, hat, gloves, small toy and sweets.

A tired but happy, these children will have another hand-knitted warm outfit to wear, thanks to Room to Learns knitting group and have toys to play with at home. In the winter months, schools across Kalimpong shut down. It is bitterly cold. The cold winter wind often comes from the North, flowing over the snow-covered peak of Kanchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world.

Thank you to those of you who helped make this party a success by providing the presents. Thanks, Andrew for the balloons and Christmas tree.

Talking of parties, our annual fundraising party next year is on Saturday, 1st August 2020, 1 pm start.

Contact Ann on 01993 775479 for details.

This year we all had a fabulous day. See here for more detail.

This major event ensures that our nursery doors remain open and that our teachers are paid.

The children now have 3 months off. With no heating in their homes, it is bitterly cold. Brian and I can vouch for this, as one Dec/Jan we stayed in the hills and suffered. Come the first Monday in March 2020 the children return with the Happy Days Nursery new intake.

Thanks to one of our sponsors paying for our School Bus, we can now reach out to those poor families who live in the surrounding foothills. During her recent visit Ann made enquires in four different locations and one area was visited each day.

Our teachers spoke with people on the road and called into the mini shop stalls that dot the hillsides. Leaflets in Nepali were handed out. The following week the mothers called into the nursery to register their children.

We presently have 25 new admissions for 2020. It kept Sangeeta and Sharda busy talking to the mothers, filling in the forms and explaining that they must bring a birth certificate, photos and Below the Poverty Line (BPL) certificate when they return in March.

The main residents in Kalimpong are from Gurkha stock who migrated from Nepal and what was Tibet. We can see this in our children’s faces. Others are from the plains of Bihar, slighter in build and darker-skinned. Our children all come from different tribes and scheduled classes, described as the ‘backward groups’ by the government. We are yet to find a backward child!

They blossom and flourish and get the life of a child. Once they leave us and go to a primary school they will have to sit behind a desk with fifty other children in a class with one teacher where ‘talk and chalk’ takes the place of free movement, song and dance.

If the heavenly powers hear my prayer, we will be given the funds needed to run the whole of level 2 as a primary school where we would use more interesting modes of teaching, ensuring less restraint and also making use of the garden in the campus so they can learn about horticulture and sustainability.I like to think BIG. In my world anything is possible. Join me and make it happen. Look at these little faces and know that this opportunity you are giving them is life-changing.

Special News:

Alen Rai has completed 3 years at Happy Days Nursery school and was 5yrs old at the end of this November. Ann took grandmother, grandfather and Alen to St Augustine’s School where Alen had to sit the written/verbal admission test. (See here also.)

In the June ‘mid-summer’ newsletter 2019 Ann had asked for sponsors. A lady who wishes to remain anonymous is now sponsoring Alen.

Thank you, dear kind lady. His uniform has been ordered and later books will be purchased.

When I went to pick Alen up, his grandmother had him standing on the edge of the road situated immediately outside their small 2 room wattle dwelling. He had a tea-shirt and plastic clogs. A small vessel of water was thrown over his bottom and his grandmother quickly washed the lower part of him. I was taken aback, but why, they had no bathroom, no inside toilet. They collect water from a stream 20 minutes away. Had I started already to forget the hardships that our children’s parents live with daily? We shall follow Alen as he progresses and although I may not reach the grand age of 96yrs to see what career he has, Room to Learn will still be expanding and the younger ones who hold the reigns will have many an inspiring tale to tell. There is a pdf sponsor leaflet here if you would rather use that than donate online. We do need sponsorship for the very needy children whose parent cannot afford anything! I say parent because for many of our children their father has left, as is the case with Alen.

Occasionally, it is the mother who leaves with the children and this was the case with Manisha. When Jenny and Corinna, our trustees, were there in mid-September, Manisha was attending the nursery but when Brian and I arrived end of October, she was not. The nursery mums have said the mother had re-married and they think she has gone back to Nepal. We can’t check this as we think she was in the country illegally. We do not know if Manisha’s father, who had been critically ill, has died. Manisha’s mother was a good mother; a quiet, composed, beautiful woman. We all wish mother, Manisha and Manish a healthy happy life wherever they are. They may yet return.

If they do come back, we have a house ready for them, kindly provided by The Darjeeling Goodwill Animal Shelter trust, founded by Christine Townend seen here with Jerry Townend and Ann. Wattle Cottage will give us 2 homes to house our homeless mums. Thank you, dearest Christine.

In September Jenny and Corinna attended the Fete arranged by Manju to sell the crafts that nine of the mums are busy producing. Thank you, Manju. The group have been named ‘Connect’. See more about it here.

The project is to provide the mothers with a means by which they earn a small amount of money for themselves. Some is placed in a fund to be used if required in cases of hardship for the poorest children, to be able to buy medicines for example. The bags sell as soon as they are made, they are so beautiful and a help to the planet as we turn from plastic shopping bags to sustainable linen.

A lovely incident came out of this venture. Janet Abraham, one of our knitting group, herself into her eighties, was doing some pre-spring cleaning when she came across a folded soft bundle, which when unwrapped shows hundreds of skeins of silk embroidery threads in many colours. It had belonged to ‘her grandmother’ who lived into her eighties!. Brian and Ann were able to pass on these silks, which had to be over 100 hundred years old, to the Connect ladies. In our Room to Learn charity, with hand on heart we can say we have no wastage, every donation you make all goes on the children, not a penny is wasted. So many of you help and in so many ways.

In 2020 we are hoping to employ 2 nursery assistants to help our trained teachers, as the numbers of children have grown. We also hope to open the third classroom. The amount of food we supply will increase as will the fuel for the bus as we move further afield. And guess what? A Christmas present arrived! With tears in my eyes, I read a letter from the Sai Ram charity who have sent us a wonderful donation. Thank you so very much. I had been a little worried as prices have risen, and really it was foolish of me not to have thought of this. But then I do have great faith in a divine universal spirit in whom my trust of provisions lies.

A lovely lady called Nicola came to Happy Days Nursery. She has 30 years’ experience as a nursery nurse, having started at the age of 16yrs. If we are lucky, she will return and spend time here with the children. She is at crossroads in her life, let’s hope that the path she takes will be towards Happy Days nursery.

Thank you, wonderful people. If you cannot give, please pray for us. If you can give, your gift will be blessed and multiply.

May 2020 be kind to you and yours. From Ann and Brian and all the Trustees of Room to Learn.

Thank You, FROM US ALL.