Thursday, July 5, 2018

I need your help!

Stanley - Thursday

About a year ago, while wandering around the Web, I bumped into an amazing man, whose name is Ntokozo Ndlovu. His mission is to encourage young Black kids in South Africa to read and write. In any country, this would be a huge task, but it is even more daunting in South Africa because so many schools, mainly rural, don't have libraries. And families don't have the money to buy books for their children. You can read about Ntokozo here.


Ntokozo Ndlovu
So Ntokozo founded an organisation to address the issue - and Siyafunda Donate a Book came into being. He and his colleagues spend their time encouraging people to donate books and funds and, more importantly, they go into schools, working with both teachers and children to promote a love of reading. You can read about Siyafunda here.



Books for Africa, based in the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, is an organisation close to my heart. Its mission is to send books and, more recently, computers as well, to schools and universities in Africa. 

Over the past thirty years, it has sent over 41 million books to Africa! FORTY ONE MILLION BOOKS! And every African country has been the beneficiary.

You can read about Books for Africa here.


Getting Siyafunda and Books for Africa to talk to each other seemed an obvious thing to do, which I arranged to happen in January this year in Cape Town.

And this is where I need your help.

Books for Africa has agreed to send a container of books (approximately 22,000) to the port of Durban. Siyafunda has agreed to distribute the books in South Africa. The problem lies in the port! It will take about US$4500 to pay for clearing the container into South Africa and for transporting it to a Siyafunda facility. 

Please make a donation to help us accomplish this - $1 or $5 or $10 or $100. Or more. Every dollar will make a difference.

I will match each two dollars donated with a dollar. 

Donations can be made with a credit card from anywhere in the world at a dedicated Books for Africa website: 

Donate here.

Alternatively you can send a US dollar contribution to:

Books for Africa
370 Selby Ave.Ste. 305Saint PaulMN 55102
USA

Please note that it should be credited to the Siyafunda project.

These are the sort of people who will benefit from your generosity.




Thanks,

Stan

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Our stand-alone thriller, DEAD OF NIGHT, will be released outside North America on July 15 by Orenda Books. Join investigative journalist, Crystal Nguyen, as she tries to find a friend who has disappeared while writing a National Geographic story about the poaching of rhinos in South Africa.



3 comments:

  1. From the perspective of someone who has spent his professional life in tertiary education in South Africa, I can't think of anything more worthwhile for the future of the country. It works out to just 20c a book! My donation is in...

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  2. Bravo, Stan, on all points! Will do so ASAP.

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  3. Well, since I can't imagine a life without books, especially for children, I will donate and probably mail to Minnesota.
    Good that you are doing this.

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