Lions volunteers in Turkey and Syria, helped by recent Lions Fund Raising efforts.

Photograph, Newcastle Lions members, Virginia Hughes, President Liz Murphy and Marian McGreevy present a cheque for the Lions International Turkey /Syria Appeal for £1,250.00 to Past Lion District governor Bernard Black .

Having earlier organised a weekend on 11th & 12th February, of fund raising and defibrillator awareness at Base Coffee, through the generous help of owner Charlie Magennis, Newcastle Lions and T Gem defib guardians had to quickly alter their agenda with the terrible news of the earthquake in Turkey and Syria. Over the week end, the public very generously donated £1,128.15 to the Lions T Gem appeal.

Today the death toll has reached more than 38,000 people with a huge population homeless and in severe winter conditions.

Already many Lions Clubs in Ireland have made generous donations to the Lions District Treasurer. This has now been added to by Newcastle Lions who have donated £1,250.00 in response to the appeal on Monday last. Since last week, the Lions Club International Foundation has already donated $200,000 through their Major Catastrophe Funds. With the recent donations ,more funds will now follow.

Newcastle Lions Club continues great work in Sri Lanka

Lion Emma presenting a scholarship donation to student Tebith, also in the photograph, President Lion Prash, Lion Amali, Lion Emma, Tebith, Lion Muthu & Lion Kanis

As well as being an associate member of Newcastle Lions Club, Lion Emma Chestnutt is also a full member of the Lions Club of Colombo Alexandrite Sri Lanka . Over the past couple of years Emma has spent a lot of time in Sri Lanka where she has worked hard to fund raise and also raise awareness of the plight of the people of Colombo and the work of the local Lions Club in helping them.

Recently Emma returned to Sri Lanka, while there Emma visited an orphanage and a plantation and while attending the Lions Club , meeting a young boy who has just started university, we gifted him a scholarship which will enable him to continue with his studies.

One project that really struck a cord with Emma was the idea of a breakfast club. Today in the UK due to the current economic hardship, the most often used sentence is, heat or eat . Because of this many schools have introduced a free breakfast club to help children maybe get only one meal per day. In Sri Lanka because education is so important, parents have to make a choice pay school fees or eat. With the intention of minimising child hunger and to feed the needy the Lions Club International and Lions Clubs in Sri Lanka have joined with the Ministry of Education to launch a special project called ‘Fight child hunger’. Thousands of children go to school hungry so it is the intention to serve a meal to school children across the country.

Newcastle Lions thank Emma also President Prash and the Lions of Alexandrite for the great work which they do and hopes, our club can continue to help when possible. You can find more information about the Alexandrite Club at https://www.facebook.com/LionsClubofColomboAlexandrite

Lions amazed at public response to Turkey, Syria Appeal

In response to a previous high use of defibrillators in Newcastle, Lion and T Gem defib guardians arranged a an awareness and fund raising week end at Base Coffee, The agenda for the two days was to help the public become aware of the use of defibrillators located in Newcastle and to to offer non certified defib and CPR awareness training at a future date in April 2023. The group also hoped to raise some funds to help pay for maintenance of the Lions Defibrillators.

The agenda was quickly altered with the news of the terrible earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria. The Lions over the week end were able to adapt their fund raising and were amazed at the generosity of the public who donated to the earthquake appeal to help the people of Turkey and Syria. Lion Clubs in Ireland are all doing their bit to try to raise funds for this crisis appeal. The donation which they will make will be added to to the $200,000 Major Catastrophe Grant that Lions Clubs International Foundation that has made to Lions in Turkey and other impacted areas to help their communities recover. As part of the week end, Lions and T Gem volunteers were also able to continue with their defibrillator and CPR awareness.

Photograph Lions Robin Mc Caren, Jeanine Knight and Lion President Liz Murphy, collecting at Base Coffee .