Lighting up Nigeria
Donation protected
Dear Friends and Family,
Many of you celebrated my 50th Birthday with me two years ago. As well as the multiple celebrations, I embarked on a quest to give back to Nigeria. A week before my 50th and 51st birthday, I donated a Solar Street light to a village in Abuja and some solar lamps. All of you will know that power is a major issue in Africa and many villages don't have access to clean water and electricity. Although there are many international charities offering to build bore holes for access to clean water, very few charities focus on what goes on in these villages at night. Families are using unsafe kerosene lamps and children are not able to read books to do their homework.
I am generally not in favour of donating monies to charities where you have no control over how much of your money actually contributes to the cause. I will personally select the villages or take recommendations from local charities and using a local company , I will install the solar street lights and provide desk lamps to individual huts.
As for the challenge, I shall be trekking up Kilimanjaro in September and reaching 19,000 feet, the highest peak in Africa. At 52, this is not going to be an easy task. I have started my training already and will have to give up drinking (yes I will) and build up my stamina.
Please don't feel any pressure to donate (but I will come looking for you if you don’t, haha) but a simple solar light only costs $20 and will give a family light every night for years.
Thanking you in advance for all for your support.
Sanjay
Many of you celebrated my 50th Birthday with me two years ago. As well as the multiple celebrations, I embarked on a quest to give back to Nigeria. A week before my 50th and 51st birthday, I donated a Solar Street light to a village in Abuja and some solar lamps. All of you will know that power is a major issue in Africa and many villages don't have access to clean water and electricity. Although there are many international charities offering to build bore holes for access to clean water, very few charities focus on what goes on in these villages at night. Families are using unsafe kerosene lamps and children are not able to read books to do their homework.
I am generally not in favour of donating monies to charities where you have no control over how much of your money actually contributes to the cause. I will personally select the villages or take recommendations from local charities and using a local company , I will install the solar street lights and provide desk lamps to individual huts.
As for the challenge, I shall be trekking up Kilimanjaro in September and reaching 19,000 feet, the highest peak in Africa. At 52, this is not going to be an easy task. I have started my training already and will have to give up drinking (yes I will) and build up my stamina.
Please don't feel any pressure to donate (but I will come looking for you if you don’t, haha) but a simple solar light only costs $20 and will give a family light every night for years.
Thanking you in advance for all for your support.
Sanjay
Organizer
Sanjay Vaswani
Organizer
