Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

 GOODNESS ME!! WHAT A GENEROUS AND WONDERFUL RESPONSE THERE HAS BEEN TO THIS SPONSORSHIP FOR SUCHANA.  PLEASE DON'T BE PUT OFF DONATING BECAUSE THE TARGET HAS BEEN  ACHIEVED.  AS YOU CAN SEE FROM FURTHER DOWN THIS PAGE, WE NEED LOTS OF MONEY TO KEEP SUCHANA RUNNING FOR THE YEAR. 

 I wanted to have a bit of an adventure during the year of my 70th birthday and here it is. 

I RETURNED HOME LATE ON 13TH APRIL.   In the  10 days   I made   70 bus journeys (one for each year of my life) and visitied 24 cathedrals! I am writing more fully later  about the cathedrals, which were amazing,  and the buses, which were very reliable.  Meanwhile please see the log below (scroll down), and new photos if you would like to see what was involved in achieving the Sponsorship.  I have lots more photos and a bundle of bus tickets if anyone wants to be sure that it really happened!  Spending less than £5.00 a day was v. easy as I didn't need to dig deep to bale myself out of any problems, apart from one broken shoelace and the need for more camera batteries; the diet - rice and lentils and some bananas and not much else was also just fine.  I even learned how to text with two hands! 

The overnight hospitality was so welcoming and warm.  I met with lots and lots of helpfulnessfrom strangers (Kate Adie's phrase The Kindness of Strangers comes to mind) and met some very interesting people. 

 There were only minor glitches with my itinery and one rather nerve racking half an hour when I found myself walking along the edge of a main road at dusk while it was in use as an unofficial motorcycling jolly by, seemingly, hundreds of people with powerful bikes.  Luckily my Suchana T shirt is white ('wear something white at night' the jingle goes..). 

The great thing is the massive amount of sponsorship... and new donations are still coming in.  Altogether, including off line sponsorship and the Gift Aid that is accruing, it's about

£1548   THIS WILL MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE TO SUCHANA 

THANK YOU SO MUCH EVERYONE. 

I I would recommend a long buspass trip as a delightful way of seeing rural England and some of its greatest buildings.  I am so glad to have been sponsored for nearly three times as much as I dared to aim for! (that is, including off line sponsorship and Gift Aid).

Suchana is the education and health project my daughter Kirsty and her husband Rahul started and continue to sustain, where they live in rural West Bengal.  It began almost by chance inspired by the tribal children from nearby who dropped in to play with their own children.  In just a few years it has grown to having its own building open 7 days a week attended at different sessions by a couple of hundred children.  It's just buzzing with life.  It has classes and sports, drama, art and music,homework tuitions and  a small health project. You need both good health and good education to give yourself a chance to be less marginalised than your parents have been if you are born adivasi.(ie indigenous people, scheduled castes and tribes).   Do have a look at www.suchana-community.org . Suchana is set up to be managed by its committee and its committee has to have at least 50% women and representation from the different tribal villages it serves. 

Suchana is the passion of my retirement.  I didn't have the knowledge or initiative to be hands-on in anything like Suchana and now it has fallen into my lap.  Now I am free to spend about 3 days a week on Friends of Suchana and live the project vicariously by administration and fundraising.  None of our Trustees claim expenses of any kind.

India has great potential for growth but it  has more poor people than any country in the world (400 million living on less than $2 a day);  per capita incomes are half that of China.  The Indian middle class is, even now, only 5% of the population.  We are are  pleased Suchana has recently received a grant from the TATA  company in India. We also need to crack on with our fundraising here. If you would like to sponsor my strange journey it will help some of these greatly disadvantaged families.

To give an idea of costs, £500 would, for example, run the very popular Library for seven months.  It takes books from Suchana's building into otherwise entirely bookless homes.  Or it would pay for 40 children to attend a computer course (4 courses of 10 children each)  It's almost unknown for computers to be available in the villages in West Bengal.   It would cover a year's sports sessions, plus 'tiffin' for sports sessions and some equipment and a sports day.  It would pay for teachers and materials to run  the Pre-School for a year.   As a Trustee of Friends of Suchana I am constantly aware that we need to raise altogether £10,000 this year to keep Suchana running next year.

LOG:

Monday 4 April: Bus Nos 666, 3X, 3A, 333, 101, 141, 701, 96, 89 and P4.  CATHEDRALS: CANTERBURY AND ROCHESTER

Tuesday 5 April: Bus nos 24,59, 11,36,9  + FOUR whose numbers I failed to record (due to roadworks in London, my planned route was ammended).  CATHEDRALS: SOUTHWARK (Catholic) SOUTHWARK (Anglican), ST PAUL'S; WESTMINSTER, RUSSIAN ORTHODOX, GREEK ORTHODOX, CATHOLIC CATHEDRAL OF THE UKRAINE.

Wednesday 6th April: Bus nos 48,34,84,724,59,71A,76 CATHEDRALS: ST ALBANS, CHELMSFORD

Thursday 7th April: First bus not on itinerary, failed to note number + 753, 338, 580 CATHEDRAL: BURY ST EDMUNDS

Friday 8th April: buses 588, X29, X8, X1, 56, X9 CATHEDRALS NORIWCH (Catholic) NORWICH (Anglican)

Saturday 9th April: buses X9, (two journeys), 33, X4, 100 CATHEDRALS ELY, PETERBOROUGH

Sunday 10th April: buses 280, 53,50,166, 44 CATHEDRALS CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, and WORCESTER

Monday 11th April: buses 42,44,144,143, (+ one in B'ham, number not recorded), 144,44,42 (three same numbers on return journey) CATHEDRALS BIRMINGHAM (Anglican), BIRMINGHAM (Catholic), GREEK ORTHODOX

Tuesday 12th April: buses 44,675,132,33,38,420,420 (different bus company) 44,42 CATHEDRALS GLOUCESTER, HEREFORD

Wednesday 13th April: buses 42,44,144,143,49,82,+stagecoach bus Coventry-Rugby CATHEDRAL: COVENTRY

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer. So it’s the most efficient way to donate - I raise more, whilst saving time and cutting costs for the charity. 

 So please dig deep and donate now.

 Angela Stoddart