Books for children In Honduras

Books Project 

I am Lilian Banegas from Honduras, a chef by profession and a dreamer by vocation. I’ve lived in England for 20 years. I arrived here as a student, with a grant that enabled me to access higher education. Today my work is my passion, and I’m really grateful for the luck I had. Now I feel the urge to give back something of all the knowledge I’ve built up over the years.

I come from a small village just outside Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. Every time I’ve managed to go back and visit my village I come away with mixed feelings about it. It makes me sad to see how poor people are there, not in the way they live but in the way they think. That is my main reason for starting this project – I want the children and young people there to broaden their minds through reading, to change the way they see the world, to feel inspired to achieve goals, to dream, to believe that everything’s possible. Most of all, I want them to lay aside the helpless attitude that because they don’t have money they can’t do anything to change their destiny.

The pandemic had a bad effect on their education, because classes were online instead of face to face in classrooms. They got very little out of the online classes for several reasons – connection problems, no computers, little motivation to learn, and many of them dropped out of school altogether. 

My experience was that travelling to other countries opened up my mind. Unfortunately for many of these kids, they may never get that experience, but giving them access to books will enable them to live out the stories and learn something from them, increasing their store of knowledge. A book can become a time machine, or even a dream machine.

I’ve got the support of some of the local school-teachers and friends for my books project, and like me they’re really keen to make a success of it. What we need now is donations from you so we can start sending books and set up a reading club, where kids will be free to choose whatever they want to read, instead of just “set books” that demotivate them because they see them as a compulsory task.

Thank you for your interest, having got this far, and I’d like to invite you to dream with me. I’m sure every book-lover understands how important it is to get into the habit of reading while still very young. Our project aims to help a small group of 10- to 12-year-old kids, but we are sure it will sow the seeds of a big harvest in the future. 

Doing good to our neighbour also does us good ourselves. It fills us with blessings and God’s grace. Please assist this cause with whatever you can manage. Your help is greatly valued.