Stephen Wordsworth

Roberts Burns Ceilidh Belgrade 2009 - Update

The figures are through, and we raised almost 64,000 Euros for Save the Children's work in Serbia - up from 46,000 Euros in 2008.  This is a great result and reflects very well on all the hard work put in by the organising committee, and on the generosity of the Platinum and Gold sponsors and of all the others who bought a ticket or supported us in so many ways. 

Thank you to them all!

Posted at 14:40 07 February 2009 by Stephen Wordsworth  |  Comments[0]

Robert Burns Ceilidh Belgrade 2009

My wife and I hosted our second annual Burns Night charity dinner on Saturday (31 January), in aid of the work in Serbia of the UK-based charity 'Save the Children'.  '

Burns Night' is celebrated every year in Scotland on the anniversary of the birthday of the famous Scottish poet, Robert Burns, with bagpipers, speeches, lots of whisky (of course!), Scottish dancing and haggis, a special Scottish dish.  We had three pipers and a Scottish dancer, all of whom came specially from Edinburgh, giving their time for free.  They came a day early, and also did a performance at a local school, where there are some children who are supported by Save the Children. 

On Saturday, they performed several times, and the dancer did the famous Scottish sword dance (using a sword we had been lent by a Serbian General - airlines don't like people travelling with swords!).  We all danced a lot - we had been practising for weeks to get the special dances right.  But the real point of the whole evening was to raise money for the charity; it took a lot of planning and organising, and we are very grateful to all the Serbian companies who supported us, either as sponsors or by providing their services for free. 

Our Burns Night last year raised 46 thousand euros; we haven't done the final sums yet for this year, but we think we have beaten that total.  Which is good news for all the children with special needs we hope to be able to go on supporting this coming year.  

Posted at 11:35 02 February 2009 by Stephen Wordsworth  |  Comments[2]

“Special Care for Special Needs”

I went this morning to witness the signature of a Memorandum of Cooperation between the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy and the UK-based Charity, Save the Children. The Memorandum covers the implementation of a project called "Special Care for Special Needs", and is intended to improve the quality of life and developmental opportunities for children with special needs in residential care here in Serbia. Minister Ljajic signed for Serbia. A representative of the European Commission was also present, as much of the external funding will come through the Commission.

The particular goal of this project is to support the Ministry's efforts to provide foster-parenting, rather than institutional care, for children in Serbia with disabilities. As Minister Ljajic made clear, there has been good progress already, with many more such children living with foster-parents than a few years ago, but of course everyone would like to see more.

This is an area that we have also supported bilaterally, as I mentioned in my 'Highland Fling' blog entry below - the money we raised from the 'Burns Night' charity event that my wife organised last year, some €46,000, went towards this too. 'Burns Night' is coming around again later this month, and our preparations for this year's event are well under way. We hope to raise even more money this year, again for Save the Children's work here. It won't be easy, with everyone worrying about the economic situation, but charities need support most when times are hard.

Posted at 21:53 13 January 2009 by Stephen Wordsworth  |  Comments[3]