B3

By Mark Bettle

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Readers of this column may remember the overwhelming success of the "Operation Bookworm" project where we sent about 3,000 books to Fundukuwela High School in Piggs Peak, Swaziland. When John Murphy and Ross Henderson visited the school over a year ago, they helped furnish a library for the books. John told us when the books were taken out of the boxes, it was like Christmas morning!

While at the school, Ross and John also noticed that the students had no lockers. As a result, they had to carry all their school books back and forth to school every day, sometimes more than five kilometers each way. So since that time, we have been working on "Operation Bookbag." Spearheaded by Jill Darrah and Laura Myers, we have collected about 330 backpacks and on Sept. 26 delivered them to Connors Bros. in Black's Harbour for delivery to South Africa. From there they will go to Fundukuwela High School. In our shipment we have also included school supplies, about 120 t-shirts donated by the Hampton River Runners and almost 1,000 books collected from our community.

Thank you to the River Runners, Wal-Mart, McAllister Place staff, and everyone in and around Hampton who donated to this latest shipment for Piggs Peak. Special thanks to Mike LeBlanc and the folks at Connors Bros. who started helping us by sending our books and continue to support our partnership by now donating the transportation of our backpacks.

The value of shipments like these to our neighbours in Piggs Peak can not be overstated. It has been proven that supporting education is one of the best ways we can help break the cycle that perpetuates the spread of HIV/AIDS in Swaziland. But more than that, the connection we make by sending gifts of books and bookbags is priceless. It demonstrates to the people of Piggs Peak that they have a neighbour who cares about them and is working to help them. And that imparts something more valuable than all the books in all the libraries in all the world. Something bigger than all the bookbags it would take to carry them. That something is hope hope that there can be a better life and that there is a reason to live. Stephen Lewis, UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa said, "The partnership between the Town of Hampton and Piggs Peak in Swaziland is exactly the kind of response that needs to happen to beat the pandemic. You can't imagine what it means to a community in Africa to know that they have the support and assistance of Canadians."

We are demonstrating to the people of Piggs Peak that they have the support and assistance of Hamptonians. If you would like to demonstrate your own individual support by making a donation to one of our projects, please contact Mark Bettle at 832-0003 or visit our website www.hamptonpiggspeak.ca.