THE CATALYST

PROJECT CLOSED !!!

2011-01-20T18:59:00.007+04:00

Project Closed on 31st December, 2010 !

To follow Maria's new involvement in the humanitarian field please visit the Facebook Group :

"Maria Cristina Foundation"

DONATIONS IN AUGUST

2010-09-11T14:19:00.001+04:00

Feeling much grateful for the generosity addressed to the most in need, we present the list of donors who made their donations in August 2010:

Anonymous donor - 500 EUR,
Carlos Figueiredo - 4 EUR,
Armando Martins - 10 EUR

Thank you very much on behalf of the adults and children helped through the Catalyst !

"WE ONLY NEED AN OPPORTUNITY" - MOSHAROF

2010-08-29T18:45:00.001+04:00

Seven Dhaka children to whom Maria Conceicao gave her help through a humanitarian project, are now in Dubai.

Their goal is shown in the following article published by The National newspaper at http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100829/NATIONAL/708289940/1139 as in the text below:

Bangladeshi youngsters on a mission to enter Dubai school

Leah Oatway
Last Updated: August 29. 2010 1:06PM UAE / August 29. 2010 9:06AM GMT

Diving into a brighter future: The children, from Dhaka, play with new friends at the Libra summer camp at Dubai British School, which is also helping assess how they adapt to their peers and surroundings. Jaime Puebla / The National

DUBAI // Splashing around in a school swimming pool this week, the seven newest recruits to summer camp looked like they had known their Dubai peers for months, not days.
For almost all of them, this is the first time they have been away from their home in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Until three years ago, Sujon Ishaq, 12, Shewly Akter, 11, Taslim Hossain, 14, Shah Alam, 14, Mosharaf Hossain, 15, Bilkis Akter, 13, and Milon Mia, 12, did not have passports and had never visited, let alone attended, a school.
Outcasts in their own city because of their families’ low social status, they could not speak their national language – Bangla – properly, much less English, and Dubai was a place they knew nothing of.
Today, despite sharing jokes – in almost fluent English – with their summer camp leaders, their three-week mission in Dubai is a serious one. They hope to secure a place at a Dubai school where they can continue their education and gain international qualifications.
“When I came here to visit in 2008, I saw children studying here and had a lot of dreams that one day I too could come and study,” said Mosharaf, who Libra camp staff say possesses a terrifyingly fast spin bowl.
Like his travelling companions, the articulate teenager has outgrown the free education provided to him by The Dhaka Project, a non-governamental organisation established by the Emirates Airlines air hostess Maria Conceicao four years ago to provide education and health care to the children from Dhaka’s slums.
In a bid to provide the next step for the children, Ms Conceicao established The Maria Project, aimed at empowering them with the tools they need to enter adulthood and become self-sufficient.
“If I can finish my studies here, I would be able to go back and work as a national defence officer, and show other people what is possible,” Mosharaf said. “We only need an opportunity.”
His companion, Sujon, a talented artist, wants to be a cardiologist.
“It is expensive to get treatment for the heart, so most of the poor people die because they have no money,” he said. “I want to help them and make a hospital in my village.”
Ms Conceicao, who organised the visit with the support of the Emirates Airline Foundation and local sponsors, said: “They need internationally recognised education certificates so that they can go on to great careers and contribute to their home country. They have gone as far as they can at our school. The schools in Dhaka will not accept them and they deserve a chance.”
During the three weeks they are here, the education group Taaleem, which owns several private international schools in the UAE, has agreed to assess the students with a view to providing those eligible with future scholarships.
Ms Conceicao, grateful for Taaleem’s support, is anxious that the older pupils find a school, and sponsorship, for this coming academic year. Attempts to enrol them at schools in Dhaka had proved futile. Ms Conceicao attributes this to the stigma attached to their social background.
Clive Pierrepont, the director of communications at Taaleem, confirmed that the group is looking into creating “long-term education opportunities for students from The Dhaka Project” but said the purpose of the children’s visit was, primarily, to ensure they could adapt happily to life here.
Each child would need to be assessed on a case-by-case basis, he added, and assurances would need to be made that any child accepted at a school could remain sponsored there for their entire education – with a view towards college and university.
In the meantime, the children are making the most of free access to the Libra summer camp at Dubai British School, which is also providing an opportunity to assess how they adapt to their peers and surroundings.
“They have excelled in everything,” said Danny Phillips, operations director at Libra. “They are really intelligent, bright children and have mixed immediately into the camp. One of the boys was even showing us all how to measure water pressure using a plastic water bottle – he was so charismatic.
“Their English is good, they are very respectful and they just want to make the most of every moment. They are used to challenges in life, many of them have come from backgrounds we cannot ever imagine. It is quite humbling to see how quickly they have adapted and how grateful they are for everything.”
For more information, or to find out how you can help, visit www.mariaproject.com.pt or email maria_conceicao@yahoo.com
loatway@thenational.ae

LUISA'S FEEDBACK

2010-08-27T01:38:00.006+04:00

My name is Luisa and I was a volunteer in the Dhaka Project and the Catalyst for a month. I think it may have taken me some good two months after returning home to realise how many little things had changed in me because of this experience. I can maybe now start understanding why it was difficult for Maria to just ignore the reality she saw and the people she met, although it is still very much impressive how she took such a great task in her hands. A month is really not enough to make a difference. I probably spent half of that time getting used to the very hot weather, trying to understand what I should be doing without being a burden more than a helping hand to the staff... Having Mr. Jewel waiting for me at the airport and showing me around in the first couple of days made all the difference though. I did not have to worry about practical issues, such as shopping, where it was safe to eat, exchanging money, etc, which in Dhaka may be quite difficult to manage on your own without speaking the language. There was also much flexibility on what tasks we could do, sometimes too much flexibility – in a month I was maybe hoping to do too much and I may have felt a little lost sometimes. I would normally spend the day divided between the Clinic with Dr. Jahid and the Catalyst in the evenings. It was very insightful to observe the Doctor’s work and I would help as much as I could, although, to be honest, I probably learnt more here than the contribution I was able to give. In the evenings I would go to the Catalyst, where I taught Portuguese to a group of children, who had already started learning the language with previous volunteers. I also took some English classes for the older children, although much improvisation was needed with so many power cuts and the almost unbearable heat in the classroom sometimes. Other tasks I was involved in included sorting out the books in the school’s library, helping in the recruitment of an English teacher for the Catalyst and organise a movie night for the children. Most importantly for me, perhaps, was having this informal contact with the children after school. Palash, who is the main person working at the Catalyst, makes sure the volunteers have the best chance to do some work for the project but at the same time get to know the children a bit better. ‘Nice to meet you’, some would say, always shaking my hand. I could write another essay on how lovely they are, but suffice it to say they are definitely the main reason why I decided to go back as soon as my life permits. In the meantime, I will try to get news from them and hope the Project will receive all the help it needs. For future volunteers, I would say, read the information in the ‘pre-departure’ document, you will find some useful tips in there! Also, try to discuss, as much as possible, what tasks you will be doing beforehand. It would also be good to keep some continuity to what other volunteers have done in the past, e.g. carry on with the classes someone was teaching, bearing in mind what topics have already been covered. If you wish to donate goods to the project (e.g. clothes, stationery), the best thing is to buy them – cheaply –from Dhaka and avoid carrying this stuff around the globe with you (like I did). I know they do ‘warn’ us to be flexible, but it is true, many situations may become frustrating or overwhelming. Things don’t always happen at the pace you want or don’t happen at all, but you do learn how to appreciate the struggle these people face every day. So, just do your best to mingle and I can assure you it will be worth it.

DONATIONS IN JULY

2010-08-14T23:58:00.001+04:00

Below is the list of the donors who kindly made their donations to Maria Conceicao Project - Associacao .

Cristina Leonor -------- 30,00 EUR
Maria Clara ----------- 60,00 EUR
Christelle Gateff ---- 325,00 EUR
Armando D. S. Martins - 10,00 EUR
Ben van Rooyen ------- 7000,00 AED
Dina M. M. Antunes ----- 50,00 EUR
Sanaa Moubayed -------- 328,28 EUR
Anonymous ------------- 100,00 EUR
Carlos Figueiredo ------- 4,00 EUR
Anonymous -------------- 67,00 EUR
Anonymous -------------- 56,59 EUR
Óscar Rodrigues -------- 10,00 EUR
Orlando Duarte --------- 25,00 EUR

The team wishes to express huge thanks on behalf of the slum dwellers of Dhaka and their children!

VOLUNTEERS IN ACTION !

2010-07-25T21:55:00.008+04:00

The Catalyst kids have recently welcomed two Portuguese volunteers!

Joao and Oscar arrived in Dhaka at the end of June for a holiday period volunteering towards the betterment of the kids and wishing to give a push ahead to their parents who are learning English at the Catalyst.

The adults have followed their methods enthusiastically as it can be watched in the video below:

Later, Dr. David Aristoteles has joined them for the remaining 15 days and they have dedicated all their efforts sharing their skills to help our slum dwellers.

Also they have taken and donated 3 laptops, what is a precious gift to help the students learning with multimedia support.

Finally, they gave away their new and used clothes and a guitar to the Catalyst before leaving Dhaka back to Portugal.

The Catalyst team, the children and the adults are so grateful for their contribution towards them; they show their happiness for the gifts left by our volunteers.

We present huge thanks from the Catalyst team on behalf of the Dhaka slum dwellers!

ITEMS DONATIONS

2010-07-20T01:57:00.004+04:00

There have been a few reported donations of items along the last month as follows:

Ben van Rooyen, Dubai - organized a huge collection of items at CGS schools; they collected a lot of boxs and bags full of items, and managed to deliver them at our drop off point.
Shaeda, an Emirates staff - donated her family unwanted clothes, delivering them at an office in Dhaka airport. She has yet paid for transport to get a Catalyst staff to collect the items.
Sérgio/Cristina Ribau, Aveiro - donated a receipt book and a legal registry book towards our Portuguese association for the first steps. Also donated a huge help providing all means to make the association registration possible, as the pre-preparation of legal papers, transport, accomodation, meals.
Jorge Reis, Dubai - left a box at our drop-off point, containing a game and a bag containing several toys as well as a few books for kids.

A great thanks to these donors on behalf of the Catalyst supported slum dwellers.

DONATIONS IN JUNE

2010-07-07T22:31:00.014+04:00

Maria Conceicao Project - Associacao's team is happy to address grateful thanks for the kind donations received from individuals and companies as listed below:

Shaheda (Ek staff) ----------1000.00 BDT 
George Theodoridis ----------- 85.00 AED

Camilla Glanzmann ------------600.00 AED

Olga Maria Simões Pinho ------ 25.00 EUR

Joshua Last ------------------ 30.00 EUR -(28.42 EUR)*

Paula Cristina --------------- 12.00 EUR

Nadine Pilar Abreu Lima ------ 20.00 EUR

Carlos Manuel Sousa Mendes --- 55.00 EUR

Ana Sofia Melo --------------- 10.00 EUR -( 9.31 EUR)*

Greg Stainer ----------------- 20.00 EUR -(18.87 EUR)*

Freguesia de Santa Isabel ----  7.00 EUR

Soluções e Equações, Lda -----  6.00 EUR

Nova Residir Imobiliária Lda -  2.00 EUR

José Carlos D. Costa ---------150.00 EUR

Abílio Zacarias --------------  5.00 EUR

Ferret Laurent ---------------150.00 EUR

Anonymous --------------------200.00 EUR 

Fernanda Cardoso ------------- 30.00 EUR

Joaquim Casado/Licínia Casado-150.00 EUR

Eduardo Miguel Borbinha ------  2.00 EUR

Maria Teresa Almeida --------- 50.00 EUR

António Pinto ----------------  5.00 EUR

Anonymous -------------------- 10.00 EUR

Anonymous -------------------- 50.00 EUR

Armando Martins -------------- 10.00 EUR

Albino Freire ----------------100.00 EUR

* - Via Paypal, after transfer cost
Thank you for joining us, giving your support to our work, to better the slum children's future through their parents' education.

PAUL'S FEEDBACK

2010-06-25T01:58:00.003+04:00

P/o Paul's feedbcak located at: http://web.me.com/paulvanderboor/Dhaka./Reflection.html

" Maria has built up the project with virtually no money and no local support but once RSF decided to take over they could have leveraged the momentum of the project to expand it further but it seems they are leading it into its demise. Not an unfamiliar story in Bangladesh. Maria has started a parallel project named The Catalyst, just around the corner of The Dhaka Project. The aim of The Catalyst is to provide jobs for the parents of the children to they can sustain themselves and their family to ensure that their children will continue to have access to education. After suspecting that our advice would not be welcome at The Dhaka Project we spent most of our time with Palash, the ‘captain’ of The Catalyst. We listened to the parents that daily attend English classes to increase their competitiveness in the labour market. We spoke to the children. The Catalyst had just hired a new teacher to teach English. While we sometimes felt desperate about the lack of pro-activeness in the people, we were absolutely blown away by the determination of some of the parents at The Catalyst. One parent, a rickshaw puller, told us his dream has always been to become a medicine salesman (pharmacist) so he could provide cheap medicine for the poor people in the slums. For that he needed to learn to read English to be able to read the names on the medicine boxes. Everyday, at 11 in the morning he goes to The Catalyst and attends 8 hours of English classes until 7pm. Then he goes home to drive his rickshaw until 5am in the morning to earn money to feed the family, before he briefly sleeps and goes to class again next day. He told me all of this in English after 7 months of classes.
"
Paul

CHRISTELLE'S FEEDBACK

2010-06-23T01:57:00.001+04:00

I have indeed been giving English classes to The Catalyst kids for around 2 weeks. Everybody at TDP and The Catalyst has been extremely welcoming and friendly.
I did not plan to give lessons in the first place, but Palash though it was better to take over after Luisa (a Volunteer who had been there for one month), so that there would be a kind of continuity.
Athough it was a bit tiring (I was already working all day long at the Sewing Centre), I actually enjoyed it a lot and I am extremely happy to have done it.
The kids are great, and very motivated, it was a delight to interact with them and The Catalyst is the perfect place to do this for people like me (who want to have activities with kids without being professional Teachers). I literally fell in love with those kids and going there in the evening was the icing on the cake of each day for me.
I suffered a bit of power cuts and of the heat in the classeroom, we had to stop activities linked to the computer every day but it was not a big deal.
I think you are doing a great job there, we can clearly see that the kids are happy and having fun and at the same time they are also pleased that they can learn from us.
I honestly had the time of my life in Dhaka and will definitely come back, I would be so happy to bring a few friends to show them what is being done there.
Many thanks to all for the fantastic experience and oportunity to bring a little help there. I enjoyed every minute of this wonderful adventure and met some great people.
Count on me for promoting both organizations and trying to get more help!
Christelle

MARIA'S VISIT TO PORTUGAL IN JUNE (2)

2010-06-16T17:52:00.006+04:00

Soon in the morning of the 11th of June, Maria went to attend an interview in the Portuguese TV station TVI in "Você na TV".
In the afternoon Cristina drove Maria to Aveiro where she gave a presentation in the local school "Escola Secundária Dr. Mário Sacramento" to a young audience of students and a few teachers and guests . Thanks to Cristina who supported her in this conference, and the kind school team, Dean Mário Pimentel and Board President Teresa Correia.
Then Cristina drove Maria to Avanca to meet her school colleagues in the place where she studied during her childhood. The main purpose was to make a small movie... Nevertheless the TV station decided to step back and didn't send the videographer there as it had been agreed before. One more of the usual setbacks that upset Maria in her humanitarian life !
Let's state that her colleagues were there as agreed having some come from a long distance to attend the meeting and to make the video. Well, not all has been lost and the party has been run without the movie...
At night there was a diner near Avanca, offered by Priest José Henriques, present with Maria, her school colleagues, a few volunteers and the special presences of the President of Estarreja Council José Eduardo de Matos and Dr. Marisa Macedo who offered her help in the legal field.
On the following day some volunteers have come to meet Maria; Cristiana, Frederico and Teresa have lent some of their time to talk with her and to take some pictures having Frederico even paid a photographer to do it.
In the afternoon, Maria was present in two churches where she had been invited to. The first was the Mother Church of Oliveira do Bairro. Inside, she met a group composed mainly by young people. She gave them a briefing on what she has been doing for the last years in the humanitarian field, followed by questions and answers. And at the end they collected a very good donation to help Maria in charity work. Thanks to Cristina, worker in the vineyard of the Lord in this church, who organized it all and yet she offered a snack in the middle of that afternoon and later she made a last hour invitation to diner.
After the snack offered by Cristina above, Maria was driven to the Mother Church of Fermentelos and was present in the evening celebration. The people at this church formed a fabulous team to make and sell sweets and other things to collect funds to help Maria. Huge thanks to Priest Costa Leite and the terrific and enthusiastic team around him, whose work brought such a big fundraise towards Maria!
The 3rd day was intended to be an administration day and to meet a few people from Brazil who are related to humanitarian field in the Brazilian slums as lawyer António Afonso to whom huge thanks are addressed for the the lift from Aveiro to Lisbon in the middle of the night, and representatives of local church involved in the help to slum dwellers !
Finally our thanks to Cristina Ribau for having driven Maria all the way from Lisbon to Aveiro and around, and to Vítor Neto for having given his support during the TVI interview !!!

MARIA'S VISIT TO PORTUGAL IN JUNE

2010-06-15T13:09:00.011+04:00

One more trip from Dubai to Lisbon done by Maria Conceicao to gain awareness on behalf of the poor, but at her own expenses.
On the 1st day she took the afternoon to visit Maria José in a hospital near Lisbon, recovering from a heart transplantation, niece and goddaughter of a very well known volunteer and friend of the Dhaka kids; Manuel de Sousa !
After having done the visit she headed to the presidential palace in Lisbon, to show up in a meeting with other candidates and organizers of an important event sponsored by His Excellence the Portuguese Republic's President, the Portuguese Diaspora Entrepreneurship Award, commonly known as COTEC.
On the following day she (as other candidates) attended the event for all the day long that has been run in "Museu do Oriente" building in Lisbon. She has been accompanied by Cristina, Cláudia and António in the event. At night all went to have dinner out with other volunteers and donors. Thanks to Albino Freire who buyed the dinner to all in the group ! And thanks to Joaquim Casado and his wife for joining the group !
On the third day, Maria and Cristina were driven to Faro in a Presidency car to take part in a lunch with His Excellence the Republic's President, where some remarkable Portuguese people like Maria were present due to the role they have been playing out of the country.
And on the fourth day, they were present in Tavira to take part in the celebration of the Portugal's National Day, 10th June, having arrived in Lisbon after sunset .
At night, both Maria and Cristina, though in huge need of rest, still attended a dinner that have extended long in the night !

A FAREWELL TO LUISA

2010-06-10T21:16:00.001+04:00

After a month of hard work in our community in Dhaka with adults and children, Luisa went back to her place today early morning, leaving the children with huge tears of love and affection in her eyes because she had to go and already was missing them.She really did an amazing job to our children who attended Portuguese classes, English practice class for hours, organized the messy library at children's school for days by sweating hard work even on Fridays.She helped a lot to communicate with both French Embassy and Delhi Embassy.
She also took teachers interview for days with a patience to find a better one to teach adults and at last was happy to get the best one among all candidates.
Luisa still donated some clothes .All this makes volunteers like Luisa an asset and bless to our work.
Huge thanks to Luisa for all the time she dedicated to our slum dwellers in Dhaka.

THANKS FOR VOLUNTEERING, PAUL AND ANNA !

2010-06-10T19:53:00.001+04:00

We have new volunteers ! We are talking about two volunteers recently arrived at the Catalyst field in Dhaka, after having some visa issues by trying the terrestrial transportation expecting to have a visa on arrival, what is not available !
Visas on arrival are only available against 50 USD at Dhaka airport !Praise here to Emirates ground staff in Dhaka, who were ready to give assistance while we didn't realise they had gone back to Kolkata and had never been at the airport in Dhaka... and we present them our heartfelt thanks for that .Paul van der Boor and Anna Delgado, respectively from Nederlands and Spain have arrived in Dhaka on Tuesday and had a warm reception from our slum dwellers students, kids and adults, at the Catalyst.
We wish a good stay to Paul and Anna so at the end they feel rewarded and wishing to get back soon !

THANKS FOR THE GOOD WORK LUISA !

2010-06-06T23:15:00.000+04:00

Luisa is a Portuguese volunteer who is working both with the children and the adults, contributing to develope the whole family units ahead.She is continuing teaching Portuguese to the kids who are supposed to go for a visit to Portugual spite of the first approach to get the visas has been refused for reasons that go beyond our ability to understand.
Luisa is also teaching the kids other necessary things as grooming, manners and Portuguese culture of behaviour and having a meal at table.Luisa has yet taken part in the fight for the visas, a mission that has been shared by several volunteers and also a mission that so far has not been successful as a contradition against the good will shown from the people in Portugal, who are willing to receive these guests and provide them a good time full of visits to schools, sportive events, school interaction with Portuguese kids and amusement.When it happens it will be a very fulfill, rewarding and unforgetable experience to all.
Thanks Luisa for taking part in the fight against all odds and for sharing the pain of the disappointment with us.

THANKS FOR BEING SO GENEROUS !

2010-06-02T00:43:00.008+04:00

A GRATEFUL thanks to AVANCA and to Pde José Henriques , who directed the funds collected in the in the Auditorium of Avanca towards Maria and the poor people she is helping.And thanks to this generous people who worked at both places !!! A gentleman made a donation of hundreds of Euros and a cloud of donors made their smaller donations that all together resulted in a great amount ; so many donated their work, as the Scouts, the Youth Group, the organizers, the people who did dedicated work in the kitchen and their helpers ... the restaurant employees and all people who cooperated in this journey to help Maria... not forgetting those who gave her accomodation and drove her all the way to be present here and there in the several events occurred in Portugal !
This solidarity brought pretty good donations towards the slum dwellers , several thousands of Euros come from those who generally have little to give but united around a cause, Maria's universal cause, the good !
The amount of all donations collected made 4515 Euros ! Amazing !
And not forgetting all care demonstrated towards Maria !
We also would like to thank other donors who have donated during the last days...

Rohini for a donation of 500 US Dollars
Carlos Mendes who transferred a donation of 43,21 Euros to our new account , the first donation reported .
Manuel Jorge who transferred a donation of 100 Euros to the same account .
Ele Cooper with a precious donation of 50 Euros .
Triveni who made a donation of 1000 Dirhams.

In our Dubai store, remarks to Artie to whom we address our huge thanks ; this volunteer has already carried at least 6 loads of donations for the last few days to the 'storage room'. This represents a huge work done and human resources used as well as transportation and gas costs .
Thanks to all on behalf of the slum dwellers of Dhaka !

BIRTHDAY PARTY AND DONATIONS

2010-06-01T02:26:00.006+04:00

A cabin crew named Angellie Marie Autentico wanted to celebrate her birthday on her layover in Dhaka with our kids in Catalyst on last 26th this month of May.
It was a wonderful moment for her and her lady friend named Maria Patricia Onne Perez.They brought ice cream, 16 packet of powder milk, biscuits for children and adults.The team also arranged a nice cake paid by her.
Angellie was impressed and donated some money 2000 Dirhams converted to BDT 38700 to buy a computer .And thanks to her donation we became closer to self sufficiency in computers to run multimedia classes to provide lessosn to adults and also English improvement class for children conducted by Luisa. We are using all CDs, DVDs what was left worthless.
Thank you Angellie and Maria Patricia for visiting us !!!

MARIA'S PORTUGAL TRIP IN MAY (2)

2010-05-31T20:27:00.008+04:00

A little bit tired, as her physical condition was not the best, Maria Conceicao decided to spend all day at base. All volunteers who wished to meet her were invited to come and some of them really did it.
At night Maria attended an interview to TVI 24, a paid TV channel of TVI.
And in the morning of next day, she headed to Aveiro again; as schedulled from the beginning, this was a day totally dedicated to Aveiro .
The activities of this day attended by Maria Conceicao were:
- An interview to the radio station Terra Nova .
- An interview to the newspapers Diário de Aveiro and Correio do Vouga.
- Attended an audience conceded by His Excellence the Aveiro Governor , José Mota .
- A conference in Aveiro University .
- And at night, a event organized by Cristina and P.de José Henriques with the very dedicated help of D. Joaninha, who had already been the true strong right arm in Avanca party, and other volunteers for this task.
This event was a dinner in which participated a large number of people and aimed to raise funds to offer to Maria and her humanitarian work .
These people was really generous and felt enthusiastic with the idea of helping Maria.
At the end they reinforced their generosity by setting up a basket with all what is good to eat and made a raffle so collecting a prety sum ... and the winner of the raffle, P.de José Henriques, decided to offer the basket to Maria, his considered adoptive daughter, patron of the future Avanca 3rd age home .
Maria by her turn, offered the basket to one of the volunteers who accompanied her in the run .
At the end most of the people said a 'see you soon' to Maria; some people promised to help her as they can,... a gentleman offered to build a website already thinking about the association described below...
It's unthinkable to try to enumerate all who helped in any way on this day, though the remarks can go to Cristina, P.de José Henriques,... donors whose donations appeared through our dear Priest ... only through local help it might be possible... Thank you AVANCA !
And then the last day ! A golden day !
Maria and her volunteers in Portugal finally saw the so wished association officially registered. This was more an achievement of Family Ribau, by the initiative of Cristina after a tremendous and shameful failure to get this done in Lisbon ! Here we have to open brackets to a remark on all who are going to show their face to form this association - MARIA CONCEICAO PROJECT - ASSOCIACAO !
Thanks to Priest José Henriques who has been present and wished to pay the emoluments on behalf of Maria and the slum dwellers, and to Dr. António Amaral Marques who did it... and for free !!!
Equally thanks to Dra Lurdes Ventura of Aveiro University, Dr. Fernando Mendonça happily representing His Excellence the Governor of Aveiro, and Francisco Miguel editor in Diário de Aveiro and to... Cristina Ribau who was the ignition to make this possible. Maria , Cristiana and Arménio, the three who gave their names to the registry, celebrated this special event, feeling very honoured for having the company of these kind people during the registry act , with champagne kindly offered by "Flor de Aveiro" to whom we address our deep gratitude for this kind gesture.

And it was lunch time . A lunch kindly offered by the restaurant Bem Haja in Aveiro.
It's impressing how all these people showed so much solidarity towards Maria and what she has done !
Then Cristina drove us to the bank where with the fresh registry in our hands we proceeded to open the so needed account... UFA ! Finally an account controlled by Maria !
Later we drove to Porto where we arrived very late to the SPIE'UP 2010 conference but still with some time to allow Maria to take part in it...
This was not only a very productive day but also the longest day... Maria completely shattered only took some rest about 4:00 and had to be doing the check in back to Dubai at 07:00... a good fitness exercise to attack Kilimanjaro the next days then !

MARIA'S PORTUGAL TRIP IN MAY

2010-05-31T01:11:00.012+04:00

Maria has had one of the most pleasant visits to her homeland in Portugal.
On the first day she ended the day with different and contradictory sensations; she felt really like a documented Portuguese citizen for the first time in her life but at the same time having missed two essential goals for that day, what made her feel partially disappointed .
At the end of the day she got familiarized with the stage where she would have to perform on the next day in front of an audience of around 800 people, and present them the work she has founded in a very distant place 5 years ago .

And on that day after dinner she left the hotel driven by Cristina, the wonderful volunteer from Aveiro, who took Maria to her home so she would be ready to a great homage party offered by the land that had seen her growing up until her 11/12 years old... AVANCA !
It was a time of full emotions; the local community had joined to a mass in their auditorium ! More than 1000 people to celebrate a party and to do a homage to Maria, the homage done to a daughter of that land, for the great work they had discovered she had done towards the Dhaka children for the good of humanity.
The local authorities have put so much tender in their commitment to receive her ! Priest José Henriques never stopped to move all things ahead in his enthusiasm as he knew that she had said 'YES' to the invitation .
The authorities from the Council of Estarreja and the local Avanca President , José Pereira de Pinho, came to take part in the homage .
And Avanca invited Maria to lend her name to a 3rd age facility to be built there.
Many school colleagues showed up to meet Maria and recall the old times up to 22 years before .
And Maria was taken to seethe small house where she lived for 10/11 years ...
Maria also visited the burying place seeking the tomb of her adoptive mum to make her own homage to the lady, named Cristina, who had taken care of her since her 2 years until she has passed away, when Maria was only 12 yrs old.
And also Maria visited her old and sick teacher in the primary school .
These were emotional moments that left Maria very touched !
It was a true visit to her roots, the second time she got her identity in Portugal during this visit .

Then the time to leave Avanca sounded, and Maria payed a visit to His Eminence the Bishop of Aveiro, D. António .
On the next day she went to Lisbon to be given an audience by His Excellence the Portuguese Republic's President , Professor Cavaco Silva.It was an interesting dialogue, in which the President made a lot of all kinds of questions to know how she managed to go so far in a so distant and difficult place developing her humanitarian action.
And by the end of the day she went to finish steps to get her Portuguese Citizen Identification Card in her hands .

FILLED WITH STIRRING EMOTIONS OF REACHING THE SUMMIT OF KILIMANJARO

2010-05-29T14:23:00.009+04:00

Dear All
I HAVE SUCCESSFULLY REACHED THE SUMMIT YESTERDAY 5:40AM . IT WAS AN EXTRAORDINARY EXPERIENCE AND I'M GLAD I HAVE TAKEN UP THIS CHALLENGE TO FUNDRAISE FUNDS TOWARDS HELPING CHILDREN AND PARENTS BREAK THE CYCLE OF POVERTY
Haven't got with me the the cables of my camera to send you photos of the kilimanjaro trip . As soon I reach Dubai will post them on Facebook.
How was it ?... well the climb to the top of the kilimajaro gets though and at the times you just want to give up but something I learned working among the slums in a country that is resistant to change that has no empathy what so ever for the slum dwellers where is more sabotages and setbacks on your way so much politics where the interests of the child is the least of the priority of those on the top , is that we cannot give up , because then you will not experience achievement . Your dreams will remain just that - dreams and the only way to turn them into reality is if we keep persevering .Climbing a trail that is very steep with a lot of stone scree requires a great physical and mental effort trust me easy done compared with what one was to endure on the daily basics to maximize the potential of the children and their parents .
-George Bernard Shaw said once "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." so there is no stopping me and my volunteers team .
Would like to thank Rob Thomas that was the only one that responded to my 2000 appeal e mails seeking sponsorship , ( I am glad to report that 3 more people came forward willing to sponsor after I reached the summit ), 7 days the only newspaper willing to create awareness and cover the story , to Samar that never doubted I could reach the summit , Avanca the village where I have grown up for the amazing homenage (homage) surprise party few days before the climb that has empowered me to believe I am not alone on my fight over poverty , for my amazing volunteering team that are beyond resilient and been working round clock like Armenio and Cristina to ensure we give voice to those forgotten ones :)
If you wish to sponsor or know of anyone that would like to sponsor please contact maria_conceicao@yahoo.com

Our website untill we create the Maria Conceicao Project is
www.the-catalyst.org

Thank you a gazillion billion

Maria Conceicao
maria_conceicao@yahoo.com
+971504183270

JEHAN SPONSORS THREE KIDS

2010-05-26T03:32:00.010+04:00

Jehan and a friend assumed the sponsorship of three kids who are being helped by the Catalyst.With hers and her friend's gesture it means that these kids will not go to do child labour and will be able to keep attending school.
We wish to express our huge thanks to Jehan and her friend for their help towards these kids .

THANK YOU !!!

DONATIONS AND DISTRIBUTION

2010-05-26T03:10:00.006+04:00

Amal Koshin, a flight crew member, got in touch with us to deliver several items at our drop-off point. These items included clothes that he wished to offer to the children of Dhaka who Maria care for.
Thanks Amal for the beautiful gesture and for dropping them at our place !
And from the donations like Amal's and many more kind people who come forward to help us , results local distribution of useful items to achieve a basic hygiene to the slum dwellers .
We distributed toiletries that we got from donations, to our adults and all the Catalyst children.Great thanks to those who do their donations . never forgetting those who, against all odds still keep taking loads of items to benefit the Dhaka kids!!!

TASLIM IS TEACHING PORTUGUESE !

2010-05-26T02:39:00.006+04:00

One of the kids of Portugal team named Taslim Hossain is teaching basic Portuguese to the rest of the kids who are expected to come to Portugal for one month to pay some visits to local schools and interact with Portuguese students provided that they count with 1/10 of the same good will in their country as they found in Portugal from a few volunteers and sponsors .Tasslim learned some Portuguese from Inês and Cláudia and now is sharing it with the other students . Probably this great try will help the team to say 'Olá' and be able to introduce themselves with basic sentences as 'O meu nome é ...' or 'Tenho ... anos' to Portuguese people.

CANADIAN VOLUNTEERS AT THE CATALYST

2010-05-26T02:27:00.006+04:00

Robert and Danya, Canadian volunteers who worked with adults and children for a week, departed recently to Calcutta.
They taught English classes to the kids who go to Portugal and also helped them to improve in grooming, manners and behaviors etc.
Danya also tried to help the Catalyst Manager to work out the difficulties with
the visas to the kids who are going to Portugal, close to the French Embassy,
unfortunately with no results... due to unknown reasons.
They had a proper and wonderful good bye by our kids.
We wish to present our thanks to Danya and Rob for their contribution to our work with these people !

23rd MAY - IN TWO DIFFERENT PLACES

2010-05-23T23:08:00.003+04:00

The 23rd May is a special day to the Catalyst Team and to the children of Dhaka !
It's Maria's Birthday !
This was the day when in 2005 Maria got many birthday presents not to her but to her children who were not known yet at that time.

In fact Maria asked previously for anniversary gifts from her usual friends and colleagues and to all around her to donate everything they thought would be of no use at their homes to help and give more comfort to those whom she had seen in appaling conditions in the previous month, April 2005 during her 24 hours layover .

By Dhaka Kids - HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MARIA !!!

And today, 5 years later, what is Maria doing ?
She is climbing the Mount Kilimanjaro ! She is trying to reach the roof of Africa !

Why ?! It's not for self promotion, it's not to win a Nobel Prize, not to be famous, nothing of that ! Only one thing is moving her to reach the top . FUNDS !!! The so needed funds to keep her humanitarian work with the adults in Dhaka .
She decided to climb Kilimanjaro just for fundraising !
She had huge unrecoverable expenses and troubles to be able to attend this enterprise towards helping the Catalyst students and their children .

She is always having a restless fight to help them.
And she started on this special day, on her BIRTHDAY day !
While Maria is climbing Kilimanjaro, the adults and the children did a party to celebrate and share a cake.
They have an idea about the efforts that Maria is doing to better their lives !!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MARIA !

CLIMBING KILIMANJARO

2010-05-22T12:54:00.008+04:00

Dear friends,
I'm starting to climb the kilimanjaro tomorrow, 23rd, May , my birthday day, to fundraise funds towards my humanitarian projects, and proceed with my goal of taking the slum dwellers from the roots to better jobs towards breaking the cycle of poverty in Brazil and Dhaka .
The parents and the children living there have not escaped their culture, superstitions, and the rest that holds them back because the overall environment, and difficultness of the deprivation that leads them to it. It is almost like they have no choice. They know nothing else. It is very, very hard to turn people around when the system, environment, culture and educational constraints are still around them.
They are in it 24/7, so have a different view of hope and life and opportunities. It is hard to change a slum from within, when the slum remains everywhere around .
So I wanted to put myself out there in a scary, overwhelming situation; something that was big and just to show my team , the parents the children and the slum community that you can win that battle with that big, scary things called fear and adversity .
Please visit our new website www.the-catalyst.org and pass this message forward.
If you wish to sponsor us, please contact maria_conceicao@yahoo.com

Maria Conceicao

GARAGE SALE

2010-05-13T23:37:00.008+04:00

Cristiana opened the garage sale and she had a surprise to see all those donations left! The place was running out of space! She and other volunteers organized all.

These volunteers who got hands dirty tidying the room are Aarti, her daugthers and a friend Parul, and also Dr. Samina Siddiqi and daughters (Taybah and Nimrah) showed up to help.

They sorted and packed some children and indian style clothes in the suitcases, ready to go to Dhaka.
The new volunteers are really willing to help and feel on the mood to keep caring of the space organising the donations.
Though not many customers were not able to show up at the garage sale this week, they managed to make 775 AED.
It's really impressing the important role performed by the volunteers keen on doing very small tasks to rise Dirham by Dirham to help the poorest.
A great thanks should be given for their high committment on behalf of the poorest slum dweelers of Dhaka.

SAIS - Catalyst Pen Pal Program

2010-05-13T02:02:00.007+04:00

Sharjah American International School's (SAIS) sixth grade students are starting to learn about poverty and unemployment problems worldwide.

In order to really understand the plight of many people globally our teachers have decided to teach them about Maria's project.

This work is a perfect example of goodness in the world, the type of goodness that helps kids just like ours attend school, learn the arts and ultimately have hope and success in the future.

Our students will become pen pals with children from the slums of Dhaka.
This will help both worlds understand each other and learn about the alternatives in life.
Our students have also started organizing fund raising events at school, beginning with a bake sale, in order to help some poor students continue their art studies after school. We hope to help even more in the future and continue a loving and helpful relationship with our new friends.
We only hope that whatever we do will make a slight difference in someone's life, and we greatly appreciate the opportunity to be a part of such an amazing project.
The students of SAIS grade 6 as well as Mrs. Sanaa Moubayed and Mrs. Suzan Hanna.
The Catalyst team expresses a tremendous thank you to SAIS students and teachers !!!

WORK AND DONATIONS

2010-05-09T02:48:00.014+04:00

The volunteers Dana and Artie have been collecting many clothes on our behalf to drop it at the drop-off point.

A big thanks to them for all the huge work done and time dedicated to the slum dwellers.
Amy Smith has brought a lot of items, 6 packs of stuff for newborn babies, containing nappies, baby wipes, hair brush, hat and a few other bits. A great thanks for having dropped it to us.

Liesel Gabrielson provided us a nice donation of 3000 SEK that will do great impact in the life of the children. This donation was done as a Maria's birthday wish... Huge thanks to Liesel !

A good quantity of items has been brought to our drop-off point by Ruth Soley. A great thanks to Ruth.
Also we have got some brand new garments from Track & Trace reported from Arup and forwarded to us by Jane.
Thank you Arup and Jane .

THANKS DAVID SCHWARZ

2010-05-03T13:38:00.010+04:00

Big thanks to Captain David Schwarz for the recent donation handed to the Catalyst.
The 60 pounds donated will be enough to pay a big portion of the rent of our school premises for one month.
Our gratitude is always present to our donors who step forward on behalf of the slum dwellers who we struggle to provide better English skills and find a job to.
Thank you !

GREAT INITIATIVE FROM DUBAI BRITISH SCHOOL

2010-05-01T15:16:00.008+04:00

Miss Noakes was who started this brilliant inittiave moved by an interview of Maria Conceicao.
She read that the children in Dhaka were getting ill most times due to lack of warm clothes...And being Dubai British School an usual well wisher of the Dhaka kids, recalling the famous "Shoebox Appeals", and at the same time having the DBS student's parents been so supportive in previous campaigns to raise funds, Miss Noakes launched another type of challenge in a letter to parents and students; invited all to donate children and teenager clothes, old books for all age ranges, etc. and the result was a huge collection of used clothes, shoes and books,... these kids at DBS have gone to great lengths to do this and have made a superb effort.Ruby Kennedy and her team are who usually care for sending small amounts of donations through Emirates crew, but this donation exceeded their capability, having this task been addressed to our volunteer Cristiana Naufel.
A tremendous thank you to Dubai British School Students and their parents, and to Miss Noakes for her outstanding initiative.
Huge thanks to Ruby Kennedy and the team who keep trying to keep our children warm.

RICE DONATION TO HELP OUR STUDENTS !

2010-04-27T20:15:00.010+04:00

It's known that students work better in learning any subject when they are not starving.

That's why our well wishers, concious of thei fact, donated a sack of rice with 50 kgs towards our slum dwellers.
This donation was delivered by Anwar and Hussain towards our regular adult students at the Catalyst .

This will surely contribute to encourage the students to attend the classes and walk towards a better chance to win a job not only bettering their life but also contributing to achieve a better life to their children.

A tremendous thank you to Anwar and Hussain for handing over this food, on behalf of our students !!

THANKS ANA AND FRIENDS !

2010-04-27T18:15:00.009+04:00

More items donations have been collected in Portugal !
They have been reported by Ana Dionísio and it was a load of three bags.
One of them containing many sorts of clothes items for children and stationary offered by Ana Dinonísio herself and a good deal of toothbrush kits offered by Captain Ferreira dos Santos.

Some details of below picture

A second bag received from Ana was offered by Lara Alves, containing some stationary, clothes and other items. All the mentioned are in the picture below.And yet a third bag was offered by Catarina Graciosa, containing a large sort of items from bed sheets to socks, as in the picture below.
There is a strong hope of managing to send a few kids to stay in Portugal for a month, and take their baggage full of donations to Dhaka and at the same time expecting to use some of the clothes to dress them while they stay in the country .Their ages range between 10 and 14 years old...
Big thanks to Ana Dionísio for having taken care of this for us and to Cpt António F. Santos, Lara Alves and Catarina Graciosa on behalf of the slum dwellers of Dhaka.

THANKS FOR A FEW FUNDS DONATIONS

2010-04-27T03:31:00.001+04:00

The Catalyst has been hit by a few good donations during the last days.
So our huge thanks to Rob a pilot who has been donating several amounts;
a donation of 1900 Swiss Francs, another donation of 3600 Dirhams, and yet he helped with 3000 Dirhams and 200 US Dollars to be spent towards the kids vacation trip to Portugal.
Another donation comes from Erik who we address our gratitude for his donation of 10 Dirhams.These donations are very precious to us and wil do a huge impact in the slums dwellers life, on behalf of whom we say a big...
...Thank you to Rob and Erik !!!

THE SUCCESSFUL POLO MATCH ORGANISERS

2010-04-26T03:40:00.009+04:00

A final reference to all who have worked hard to take the Polo Match towards the success it had!
Once again we wish to present our huge thanks to Lise who gave so much dedication to make this event a beautiful party where we could create awareness about our humanitarian work .
Our deep gratitude to Danielle who stood up with us when many others would have given up, giving us the strength to keep steady pursuing our goals.
We were really overwhelmed by the amount of people who came to support us, thanks to your perserverance .Another great thanks to Liesa, once again, who at last hour has offered to sell tickets in Polo Match covering the need of a ticket seller.
And our gratitude yet to a large group of people for taking part in the event that will do great in the field life...
Thanks to :
Anwer
Atif Araz
Camila Serano
Corne
Darryl
Dalida
Mark Taylor
Ran McGregorSteve WestmacottNicola Green
Jan Azzam
Keith ProsserNatasha VallenSally ProsserTom UrquartAll the young volunteers C/O IqraTo this crowd of people who showed their strong will of helping the poorest goes our tremendous thank you on behalf of the Dhaka slum dwellers.

CLOTHES DONATION

2010-04-26T03:11:00.005+04:00

Thanks to Eduarda Coutinho from Massamá - Portugal, for her donation of all sorts of clothes to small kids.It was a car back sit with three large full bags containing all that a 3-4 years baby needs to be comfortably dressed.

From socks to hats, and a few items for adults, all sorts of pieces can be found in the range of clothes used in a mild climate environment.Thanks to Eduarda and family for this donation that we hope to be taken to the field as soon as possible.
Unfortunately, due to all kinds of setbacks we can't accept many donations from countries other than United Arab Emirates.

A DONATION FROM LUÍSA ALVES

2010-04-25T23:55:00.002+04:00

It was handed over by Wahed to Palash, our Catalyst manager in Dhaka, a contribution of BDT 20.200 donated by Luísa Alves.
This money as all that comes in, came really handy and we wish to share with all of you in what it was spent:
The Dhaka Project - used to pay the kids passports - BDT 9.800
The Catalyst - used in garbage disposal fees - BDT 10.400
Thanks to Luísa we had money to pay for the passports to take the children of TDP to a planned Portugal trip in May.
So once again we wish to present our huge thanks to Luísa and Wahed for all their support and contribution for our slum dwellers.

PREPARING TO CLIMB KILIMANJARO

2010-04-25T00:42:00.005+04:00

I'm preparing myself to climb the kilimanjaro to fundraise funds towards the my humanitarian projects, and proceed with my goal of taking the slum dwellers from the roots to better jobs towards breaking the cycle of poverty .
"Why I am doing well I can't even begin to understand what slum dwellers are going through when I ask them to come out of the slums and break the cycle of poverty with all the resistances and fears they have to face .
The parents and children living there have not escaped their culture, superstitions, and the rest that holds them back because the overall environment, culture and difficultness of the deprivation leads them to it. It is almost like they have no choice. They know nothing else. It is very, very hard to turn people around when the system, environment, culture and educational constraints are still around them.
They are in it 24/7, so have a different view of hope and life and opportunities. It is hard to change a slum from within, when the slum remains everywhere around .
So I wanted to put myself out there in a scary, overwhelming situation; something that was big and just to show my team , and the parents and the children that you can win that battle with that big, scary thing called fear and adversity ."

Maria Conceicao
maria_conceicao@yahoo.com

CHAD AND FRIENDS SPONSORED THE CATALYST CRICKET TEAM !

2010-04-24T01:18:00.011+04:00

Some of the children had a wonderful time with Chad and his three friends last 9th Apr, Friday.
The kind visitors took the team and the kids to visit the historical places that are Lal Bager Kella and Ahsan Mongil in old Dhaka.
After visiting those places they went to Gulshan to buy cricket sets for the kids having spent a pretty sum in it .
They couldn't buy cricket uniforms as they were too expensive and so the Catalys manager and Al Amin (the oldest teenager teaching in the Catalyst) went to whole sale market on the next Saturday and bought 12 sets of uniforms for a cheaper price... 2700 Taka.
Chad and his friends donated 22500 Taka and we had total cost with the cricket sets including car fare was 15700 Taka having the rest been kept to buy stationary for the Catalyst.
They have already organized a cricket team of 30 kids, trying to play for a short time in the narrow field close to Catalyst and they are planning to organize a cricket tournament against other community / school team on every Friday.
They formed a gorgeous team in a very nice look in the uniforms and cricket tools like the Royal Begal Tigers.
It's worth of great happiness seing them go in much fun and learning cricket using all suitable tools to play and who knows if one day some will play in the Bangladeshi national team as some of them want to be cricketers in the future!Huge thanks to Chad and his friends for lovely contributing to the proudness of these boys !

PRESENTATION IN ROTARY CLUB DUBAI

2010-04-22T11:33:00.002+04:00

Maria Conceicao has kindly been invited to do a presentation at Rotary Club Dubai.
It was a really fruitful work that made all feel rewarded in this event having she touched many hearts among the audience with her passionate speech.
And Maria has kinldy been offered some wonderful contributions and her work has been appreciated making the audience motivated and leading to possible future cooperation from this reknown club in Dubai and worldwide...
We wish to address a big thanks to an Anonymous donor who contributted with 200 USA Dollars and to Dr. Mitchell who donated 700 Dirhams towards sponsoring a child.
Heartfelt thanks to Liesel and Kevin for inviting and organizing all, helping Maria with the speech and on presenting all the work in the Rotary Club.
And huge thanks to the Rotary Club members who made Maria feel quite happy in such high level event.

GARBAGE ZONE HAS BECOME A GARDEN

2010-04-22T07:42:00.001+04:00

There was a side of Catalyst that was still full of garbage and because of that it was full of mosquitos.
But there was already a plan to remove all that garbage and make a flower garden in the place.Claudia gave a great support towards that and an initial plan to make wonderful garden. So Cláudia, Ana and Isabel donated 3000 taka to make it.
The Catalyst "Clean Team" was so willing to make their side clean that they gathered together and the wonder seen in pics.It was beautiful to watch their efforts to clean that all.
And now where there was before garbage and mosquitos there is a wonderfull planned garden that makes the environment healthy, well organized, and extremely beautiful to all the eyes that pass through there.
Thanks to "Clean Team" and to Claudia, Ana and Isabel for their donation and good work done.Now it's a pleasure to our eyes and good for the health of all Catalysts who want to go for a walk.

MARIA’S VISIT TO PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA, USA

2010-04-22T03:31:00.005+04:00

Maria Conceicao visited Pittsburgh (PA) on April 9th and 10th and delivered two presentations, namely at the Carnegie Mellon University’s Heinz School of Public Policy and Management as a Social Innovation Speaker, and during the PAPS (The Portuguese Post-graduate Society) dinner as the keynote speaker.

According to feedbacks received Maria’s visit and presentation were very inspiring and motivational:

" The presentation of Maria yesterday has been memorable !! At the end of her speech, the audience stood up and applauded her for a long time. After the questions and answers the audience once again stood up and applauded... it was touching..." by P

"... all the feedback related to your speech I had, was very positive (people became touched, impressed and inspired)...
Maybe we can find a way to cooperate with the project...
...once again, thank you for having come here... it was a very good contribution to our forum." by F.

"Thanks for coming and sharing your energy and your self delivery to the children in so needy condition. People like you are rare and precious (even when being saints ) I myself can't forget my dera Maria and her six hundred kids... you know that when you need help... you are free to ask, right !? " by V.

" I wanted to thank you for your recent visit to Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. The presentation at the Heinz School and the keynote during the PAPS dinner were truly memorable and inspiring. The response from the audience was remarkable too – yesterday at diner you received two standing ovations. " by P.

Maria would like to express her gratitude for the kind invitation to visit CMU. She enjoyed to deliver the presentations at the Heinz School and at the PAPS dinner very much.
Particular heartfelt thanks to Francisco, Anabela, Luís, Rita and Pedro, for having taken care of her at all moments.

Thank you CMU !

MORE RESULTS OF CRISTIANA'S DEDICATION

2010-04-21T03:09:00.021+04:00

We had a garage sale with the donations brought and released by Cristiana at Westin Hotel on 23rd March.It was organized in the scheduled time 27th March, Saturday, by our kids as usual in Catalyst.

We found a lot of new plastic sandals among all donations what are so useful for the children to use in monsoon and we distributed one pair to each children of Catalyst and made a sale by rest of them.

We earned 3570 Taka in the sale.
Cristiana personally contibuted with 1000 Taka for the transportation of the donations.
She also personally gifted some dresses to some kids whom she took photos in her visit to our project.
She showed the photos of the kids and asked us to provide them the dresses.
Once again our grateful thanks to Cristiana Naufel for the excellent work done and for having offered items and yet for having afforded the costs of transportation, on behalf of our slum dwellers !

MARIA PREPARES TO CLIMB KILIMANJARO

2010-04-19T15:05:00.007+04:00

Maria Conceicao is preparing to climb the kilimanjaro to fundraise funds towards the Catalyst, and proceed with her goal of taking the slum dwellers from the roots to better jobs towards breaking the cycle of poverty in Dhaka.
From her words we can read : - "Why I am doing well I can't even begin to understand what slum dwellers are going through when I ask them to come out of their confort zone and break the cycle of poverty with all the resistances and fears they have to face . So  I wanted to put myself out there in a scary, overwhelming situation; something that was big and just to show people that you can win that battle with that big, scary thing called fear."

LILY GOT A SPONSOR !

2010-04-19T01:48:00.008+04:00

Lily, one of the teenagers that Catalyst is trying to give a hand, has a sponsor !

Huge thanks to Dr MITCHELL who is her sponsor !!!

14th, April, 2010

POLO MACTH 2010 TOWARDS DHAKA SLUM DWELLERS

2010-04-16T23:55:00.006+04:00

Thanks to a few donors who came forward to help us and hearfully made a few very good donations to help us in our difficult mission of helping the poorest slum dwellers in Dhaka.
This time we are not only writing about funds donations; we are also writing about months of dedicated and hard work to reach a goal.
We are expressing a big thanks to Lise and Danielle for the wonderful work done to become the Dhaka Project Polo Match 2010 to reality.
The event took place yesterday, 16 April, and was a success !
We wish to express a big thanks also to Ishu who made a pretty good donation of 300 Dirhams and to Tez for another wonderful donation of 600 Dirahms.
Thank you on behalf of the Dhaka slum dwellers !!!

KAROLYN VISITED US AGAIN !

2010-04-16T23:50:00.001+04:00

Karolyn Zinetti, an Emirates Airline cabin crew has visited us for the second time in the middle of the last week during an afternoon.She brought a water melon, bananas and some chocolate for our children and also donated some clothes and toiletries.
She showed her very good heart for our children and wants to visit us again and again whenever possible.Our Catalyst manager took his baby team with her to a park in Uttara and all had a time of fun with playing, eating etc.And Palash used the environment to take a few pictures with her and the kids.
Thanks Karolyn for the great time provided to our slum people and for the gifts to make them feel better.

THE CATALYST HAD NEW VISITORS

2010-04-16T21:14:00.001+04:00

The Catalyst had a few visitors, workers and crew from Etihad Airways, who did the evaluation of a few parents towards possible employment and all had a great time with kids and adults.
One of these visitors was Chad Mc Rae who declared to be impressed by the great experience they had with the Catalyst work and the management team as well as the results achieved with the parents in a few months.

Chad Mc Rae admitted that he and his friends not only could teach but also could learn a lot, specially how to play cricket on what the kids are enthusiastic.
Chad and his friends decided to raise some money to get proper cricket sets for the kids.
These visitors left Dhaka intending to get back very soon to have a good cricket match with the kids and also to take donations possibly through crew members. And also our visitors saw wonders in the kids' ear to ear smiles, what made their delight and missed them all shortly after arriving home.The Catalyst team is happy for their kind visit and is wishing that they manage to make a start of our dream come true...
Thank you Chad and friends on behalf of our slum dwellers !

OUR DUBAI STORAGE PLACE GOT A MAKE UP!

2010-04-14T22:17:00.008+04:00

As the donors keep showing up to deliver their used items to help our community , the background volunteers' activity at the drop-off point keeps being so precious yet to provide living conditions in the place.
We have counted with the help of Lisa and her son, Sharon and Cristiana to do the necessary work of sorting, packing and storing clothes and other items, so tidying up the place.
Cristiana has also been coming to the place very often to take donations and hand them to cabin crew who go to Dhaka...
Thanks to this involvment of the volunteers miles away from Dhaka there will be less children walking barefoot and more children better dressed what will be a good help to face the upcoming moonson and contributing to make them feel happier.
We want to say a very special thanks to Lisa and her son, to Sharon and to Cristiana for supporting us with their work towards our slum dwellers .
Also a special thanks goes to the donors who initiate the cycle and the crew members who complement the above volunteers' work !

HOLIDAYS IN COX BAZAR TO REWARD CHILDREN!

2010-04-09T02:58:00.008+04:00

Some kids among who have been cooperating with us in innumerable activities have been offered three days of pleasant holidays to reward them for their work along the last 9 months and since the first day of the Catalyst.It was a period of great joy for all who felt so lucky for seeing and enjoying the seaside for the first time in their lives at Cox Bazar.They visited Teknaf, the last border of south Bangladesh.
They visited Himchory, 5 kilometers away from Cox's Bazar, and another amazing place for our kids to look over. It's a hilly area.
There is a lot of small hills everywhere and the sea beach along with the hills forming an amazing scenario.Kids rode on the small hills and they were so excited to cross them one after another. There was a steam too where kids washed their face and felt the steam water keeping touch in it.
In the afternoon they couldn't miss to swim and play and passed wonderful moments in the sea beach of Cox's Bazar. They spent hours in the beach with a lot of joy and happiness. Also they wrote on the sands, and played with the snails and the water.And all had delicious meals in different nice restaurants everyday. They have been given the opportunity to choose the menu they would like to eat.
This lucky group has been accompanied by the Catalyst team members who have been teaching the parents, Palash Roy and Mir Sawkat and by the Dhaka Project teacher, Md Azad!
Thanks a lot to our donors who have enabled Maria to provide this gift to these kids and we wish to present our gratitude on their behalf !

THANKS TO OUR KIND DONORS !

2010-04-05T02:26:00.003+04:00

Francesca Malagoli has met Maria recently to donate a good deal of items, a donation of children clothes and shoes, as well as some adults clothing.

And also Francesca decided to go shopping for stationary to the children.

Another kind donation came from Lah Saheb and Sharif who offered a prety amount of 500 Hong Kong Dollars that will do wonders in the field.

Yet another donation came from an Anonymous donor who offered 1200 Dirhams to help us. This donor came to know that 600 Dirhams can cover a child education for one year in Dhaka and decided to give a hand to help us.

The Catalyst team wishes to express gratitude to Francesca, Lah Saheb and Sharif and to the Anonymous donor above, on behalf of the children and their parents.

Thank you !

THANKS TO EK CREW WE GOT MORE ITEMS FROM DUBAI

2010-03-31T03:40:00.006+04:00

Cristiana Naufel, the Brazilian Ek crew volunteering with us, and who has been dynamizing the process of taking items to our community through the awareness done among her colleagues who fly to Dhaka, has recently done her own flight to Dhaka and took the chance to kindly give us a push forming a kind task force with her flight mates.
Cristiana enthusiastically reported that a great load has been taken by her and another crew members of her flight as well as by the crew of a previous flight.
The crew members who lent us their helping hand are Damir Pavlovic , Yan Tan, Quenia Fiedler, Charisse Yuson, Maida Ortiguerra, Angelica Alcorta and Ann Angeles from Cristiana's flight on 23rd March... (pictures below)

...and Eimer Folan, Karima Gaoua, Stephanie Redondo, Amy Martinson, Nivine Cogan, Bianca Sergio and Assimina Diakos, from the previous flight to Dhaka on 22nd March. And some of them also donated their allowances... Eimer Folan donated 2500 Taka and Damir Pavlovic donated 2605 Taka.
We wish to address huge thanks to all these flight crew members for their kindness towards thechildren and their poorest families.
Our continuous gratitude to the Westin Concierge Team - Habib and Team, (below) who have been so supportive for a long, long time, in their commitment in helping the children of their country to break the cycle of poverty!
Cristiana Naufel and Palash Roy barely managed to fit the huge load of items in a taxi !
Also great thanks to the donors in Dubai who keep delivering their items to Maria always showing concern towards the slum dwellers community she is helping !

THE CATALYST HAS GONE SHOPPING

2010-03-31T02:41:00.008+04:00

Plenty of video material has been bought a few days back, a pack with lots of DVDs type Sesami Street, to teach adults and children, so trying to use every available ressources to make our desire of seeing these slum dwellers breaking the cycle of poverty.
This pack contains items worth of 1345 Dirhams and the details can be seen in the EXPENSES BUTTON (2010) or by clicking here.

A FEEDBACK ABOUT 4 YEARS OF WORK...

2010-03-29T22:08:00.006+04:00

"...I was previously ... in Dhaka, Bangladesh for a number of years. During this time I came to know Maria quite well and the work that she was doing in Dhaka for the Dhaka Project & for the underprivileged children of the city.
Maria is quite an extraordinary person who thinks of others before herself; she has a passion for these children and I believe that she has sacrificed her own personal life for them. She is drawn to them and keeps on returning; there seems to be some unknown force that drives her back to the Dhaka Project and her children.
She is dedicated and completely focused on breaking the cycle of poverty for these children and I believe she has succeeded in doing this with many however there is much much more work required as the sheer numbers of children that need help is alarming and I believe that this fact alone, drives her to return.
Maria is a strong individual on the outside, she has to be to get things done in Bangladesh. She has had to fight the beauracracy of the country, the corruption that exists everywhere and has to gain the confidence and trust of the families of the children just to let her educate the kids. To see her work during a normal day can become exhausting. She is constantly on her feet, managing staff at the project, fundraising, lobbying, negotiating, planning, following up, but forever caring and loving her kids throughout every day that she is present.
These kids love her to death, they love her because she cares and she outwardly & naturally displays affection for them and they just soak it up; as much as they can take in, they will take, because they just don't receive this kind of affection in their daily lives. To see these kids faces on a normal day at the school is wonderful, something that stays with you for the rest of your life when you witness it. It is all created by Maria. She is such a hero to them.
This is just a small account of my observations. My words do not do her justice. She is my hero too!"

ASSOCIACAO AUXILIO E AMIZADE OFFERED US CLOTHES

2010-03-25T02:01:00.006+04:00

When Maria has been in Portugal some people from Associação Auxílio e Amizade (AAA) in Lisbon got the opportunity to know the work done by Maria Conceicao in Dhaka through the awareness done by the Portuguese media.
And the AAA publics relations, Luis Alcobia, got in touch with us to offer us some clothes being only necessary someone to collect the ones that best could fit our needs .
Helena and Susana showed availability to choose and collect the items that likely could be taken by our volunteers to the action field in Dhaka.
As it was not possible to Helena to go, Susana did all the work for us and brought 72 clothing items... to several ages. Underwear clothes to little girls... dresses to older girls... and a few jeans and 12 pairs of shoes type tennis to several ages.Helena and Susana themselves also wished to do their donations...
Helena: 28 items of new clothes and 2nd hand children clothes in optimal state;Susana: 45 items of new clothes;We wish to express our big thanks to Helena Brilhante anda Susana Alverca for the donations done, and also for the availability, and to Susana in particular who drove a long way at her own cost to do the job.
Equally our big thanks to the team at Associação Auxílio e Amizade, Luís Alcobia, Maria Alcobia and Leonor Lucas, on behalf of the children in the slums of Dhaka.

AMAZING DONATIONS FROM WONDERFUL HEARTS !

2010-03-21T19:17:00.008+04:00

Valuable funds/items donations have been recently done by kind donors, who keep wishing to help us break the cycle of poverty !
These are the kind donors who made donations in funds for the last 2 months:

A pretty sum of 5000 Dirhams was received from an anonymous donor.
Rob Thomas, a private pilot, made a wonderful donation of 1900 Swiss Francs.
Sharon D'Sousa offered her usual hand with 200 Dirhams.
Another donation of 100 Dirhams of sweat money, came from a cabin crew member.

As for the items, many people of Dubai have offered their used items, delivering them at the drop-off point, and others have handed some gifts to Maria personally.

Another anonymous donor who got to know that Maria used to leave her Mac in the Catalyst office for months as there is a huge lack of means there, offered her a laptop ; a new brand Mac ! A gift that has touched her deeply, one of those donations that we need to pinch ourselves to believe it's true.
Maria was also offered 2 mobile phones, 1 charger and 1 digital camera. The donor was Catarina Holstein - Lisbon.
And a donation of clothes and other items that can fill a car boot is ready and waiting to be collected. This donation comes from Ana Dionísio - Lisbon.

Huge thanks to all donors who came forward with their precious funds and items to help us make the difference in the slums of Dhaka.

MARIA BACK TO LISBON - THE 5TH DAY !

2010-03-21T16:34:00.006+04:00

Soon in the morning, Maria left Dulce's house in Porto, towards the train back to Lisbon. Huge thanks to Dulce and António for the accomodation provided in their home as well as transportation where needed.
After travelling for 2 hours Maria arrived in Lisbon where Pedro Oliveira was awaiting to take her to the Catholic University (Católica) . Kindly, Pedro made an invitation to the lunch at the university and arranged all so a meeting room could be yielded and Maria could meet with some people who were still expecting to talk with her.
But before heading to the university Pedro drove Maria to attend a previously arranged meeting with Fátima Aveiro who in her kindness towards the poor was wondering about a way to help in Dhaka having donated a few innovative items to Maria... hygiene and school items. Great thanks to Fátima Aveiro !
After lunch, Pedro wished to take Maria 'home' on the other side of Tagus River, more precisely, Corroios .
At night, Maria attended the last interview in Portuguese media. An interview to the same TV station that launched a documentary about her humanitarian work in 2007 and made her known in Portugal for her humanitarian spirit.
And Maria performed it very well in the channel 2 , commonly known as RTP 2 .
Huge thanks to the sympathy of all who have been involved in this week, all who helped in anyway !

MARIA IN PORTO - 4TH DAY

2010-03-20T13:56:00.016+04:00

After so many trials and so many plans to provide a day dedicated to the Invicta City (PORTO) and the northern zone of Portugal where most volunteers have dedicated their efforts to go to Dhaka and spend their time helping the children, we have finally set a day,... 28th January!
In Porto the volunteers Cláudia and Dulce took over the arrangements .
They were responsible for getting Maria where needed at the schedulled time...
Late in the morning she attended a last hour planned presentation at Universidade Fernando Pessoa, who without any doubts deserved it. These great people had promissed a huge donation of toothpaste units as previously related.
Around noon Maria and the volunteers went to Universidade Católica in Porto . They had kindly invited Maria and the volunteers with her to have lunch there, followed by a meeting with local entrepreneurs... and the meeting would last for longer than it was planned so, as Maria needed to pay a visit to the Bangladeshi Consulate in Porto the rush was absolutely necessary once again.
On the way to the Consulate an interview was requested by phone, all the schedule was already planned with no empty spaces but the organizers opened a gap so Maria could go to the interview to Radio Festival later in at night.
The appointment at the Consulate was very fruitful, thanks to the kindness of His Excelence the Honorary Consul .
Finished the visit to the Consulate all have gone to the meeting with the volunteers and friends in a quiet place and after a while had a walk towards Universidade do Porto where Maria was the honourable guest and did her presentation to a numerous audience.
Thanks to the Chancellorship and its Provost and in special to Isabel Amorim at Human Resources who enthusiastic and persistently performed the initial steps to cause this event to happen .
And after this presentation Maria still attended and interview at Radio Festival Porto before she had a time to have dinner with the volunteers present.
Thanks to all volunteers who have been be present and in special to Dulce and Cláudia who have been in a rush to set all arrangements for this day !

WARM THANKS TO UNIVERSITY FERNANDO PESSOA !

2010-03-19T03:00:00.002+04:00

Maria da Graça and Inês Pinheiro, mum and daughter, volunteers from Gaia - Portugal, have been in the Catalyst field in last February and they have been trusted the mission of taking an overwhelming load of toothpaste to be offered to the kids and adults.
This donation has hit a pretty high number of toothpaste units, what was enough to reach almost all the kids being of great help in keeping their teeth in good condition.The donation provided by University Fernando Pessoa in Porto - Portugal , has an unexpected story of solidarity behind it and involved several volunteers and enthusiastic heart giving souls who made it come true.
"One day, when volunteer Cláudia Alemão was wondering what useful she and her friends Ana and Isabel , presently in the field, could take to help the kids there, and when they were talking about it at a café table, someone who was sitting at another table beside them, (Ana Isabel Silva), heard their conversation and asked permission to join the talk to offer some suggestion... And the suggestion was taking them to meet Professor Jacinto Durães at the University to talk about the possibility of getting a few toothpaste units and toothbrushes. And Cláudia was absolutely thrilled with the results when she heard the numbers ! And yet she was given the hope that they would try to get some toothbrushes..."
Later the great donation has hit 500 toothpaste units and 412 toothbrushes. Amazing! And making Maria Conceicao so grateful for such gift to the children !
For this we have to express our gratitude to Ana Isabel Silva, and huge thanks to who helped this donation to be a reality; warm thanks to the kindness of Dr. Manuela Trigo, Dr. Nadine Trigo and Dr. Jacinto Durães who have acted on behalf of University Fernando Pessoa !!!

THE CATALYST IS GOING TO BE RELOCATED

2010-03-19T01:00:00.001+04:00

Why we are shifting?
Well what has been given to the people of Gawair in terms of opportunity - had to be received back in terms of commitment, hard work, dedication, success .
All day and every day I am accountable for the results. I believe we should be really clear that if our donors do not see the numbers going up and that I am not able to put results at the bottom of their updates, they are going to wonder why and possibly stop investing in us .
They have thousand charities to choose from and I need to give them every reason to pick Catalyst.
On that note we decided to relocate to better accomplish the goals and the mission of the Catalyst .
keep tuned on our blog for updates !

Maria Conceicao

LICE REMOVAL PROGRAMME

2010-03-09T15:14:00.000+04:00

This is the most effective and important approach to the children and the community that is being launched by Isabel and Ana.
They are removing lice using the necessary medicine and tools in the beauty room according to the schedule class after class.They are also giving some guidelines with the kids to take home so that they can help their family members to get the same way to remove lice from entire family.
If we can't remove lice from the entire community, only removing lice of children might be only a waste of time as they assumed.They also taught lessons on lice in the adult nursing classes that would help adults to get both their family and neighbour families aware.The project should run a regular programme on cleaning and checking every tree months otherwise our efforts will be useless.
Ana and Isabel have cleaned 46 children in two days from which 24 at least need a second cleaning.Since efforts with children are not being effective as initially thought, the nurses are thinking to adopt a new strategy; Ana and Isabel would like to start visiting and teaching the families.
Amazing work done by the nurses from IPOFG - PORTO !

MEET THE APARTMENT OF MARIA !

2010-03-09T10:13:00.001+04:00

It's an excellent occasion for those more curious to have a chance to know how Maria lives.
Fortunately the maintenance team provided a well documented means to allow us to know something about the 'luxury' that makes Maria's delights, in the wonderful centre of Dubai in the main avenue.The maintenance team got stopped to work due to the caos visible in these pictures all over the room due to not existing good conditions to perform their work.
And what caos is this ? Well, Maria used to run garage sales to help the poor slum dwellers but due to the crisis she was kicked away from the place (as many others) loosing the mezzanine where she used to run the sales and from then on she has begged for a place where she could keep running sales as the funds don't fall from the sky...Nevertheless she hasn't managed to find a good soul who could provide a good storage place so, as she is not able to refuse the donations, she keeps accepting them and at the first opportunity she will send them to the field in Dhaka where she has hundreds of children waiting for a toy, a toothpaste or toothbrush, a shirt or a pair of trousers or yet a pair of shoes... as from time to time there is a good soul willingly keen to take the items when it's not Maria who takes huge cargos with her...So the great news is that this apparent lack of tidiness means that a storage room is urgently needed to store the used items kindly offered by the people of Dubai who feel happy to donate to the poorest !!!

THE KITE PROJECT

2010-03-09T08:08:00.000+04:00

Once again reporting about the volunteers' initiatives with the children who attend the school in the community in Gawair.
Cláudia ran an interesting and creative set of lessons with the children in art and craft classes that consisted in teaching on how we can use useless paper to make useful and pleasurable things like kites to fly in the sky what was highly motivating to the kids.
And she did it not only for one class but for all the classes,... to almost 500 children organized in small groups.

There was a competition; the best kite in each class was selected an all were launched after a school break and it was a very nice scenario seeing the children trying to fly their kites in the sky.
This was an excellent activity in which Cláudia achieved the commitment of children and teachers towards their goal.

NURSING CLASSES PROVIDED TO ADULTS

2010-03-08T23:40:00.002+04:00

The volunteer nurses Isabel and Ana are teaching nursing classes to our adult students according to the schedule arranged at the Catalyst.
This will be a very precious asset provided to the adults living in the Gawair community. It's indeed an amazing chance for those who wish to learn the basics of nursing and what they learn about health and hygiene may help them to better take care of themselves, their families or still they can help and guide their neighbours.Ana and Isabel are also a nursing team of two who kindly make it possible the access to help and relief to sick people of our community who have health complaints.
They are really playing a precious role in the field that imposes our continuous thanks for the good work they are doing on behalf of the poorest slum dwellers of Dhaka who struggle to get rid of the extreme poverty.

FIGHTING FOR KNOWLEDGE

2010-03-08T04:25:00.004+04:00

It's deeply touching in our hearts the battle some of our poor slum dwellers have to fight to gather towards some more knowledge trying to get a better life.
All their life no one has ever got concerned about the way they have lived so they gaze this opportunity as unique and wish not to loose it.
One of our students, Kukhi, keeps trying hard to understand English in the evening sitting on her broken cot.
Another one, Jahanara, tries to learn English with her broken legs lying in her cot as she isn't able to come and assist the classes due to her sickness. She sends her baby girl to learn the lessons and write down the notes to later pass them to her mother.
The Dhaka Project cleaners use to work with one hand and hold the English book with the other hand to learn as much as they can.
The father of our English teenage teacher Milon, couldn't see well and our Catalyst Manager gave him money so he could buy eyeglasses to study at night...
It's so many sad stories possible to get if we freely did interviews to each one of them; the stories related to human beings born in the wrong place !
How good it would be if one day soon these stories could be story !

PORTUGUESE CLASSES - A TASK FOR CLÁUDIA

2010-03-05T23:12:00.016+04:00

After Inês and Maria da Graça, who taught the first Portuguese classes in the Catalyst, it's now Cláudia's turn to keep the continuity of these classes to the candidates to possible upcoming chances to go on holidays to Portugal for a few weeks during next Spring/Summer .
And of course Cláudia counts with some help come of her friends Ana and Isabel and a very motivated class though they know that such possibility is limited only to a few kids.

This was the day of the truth. The kids have done a test to show how far they have gone in successfully learning the new language and be able to pronounce some basic words when they go abroad.

And as the topic is dedicated to Portugal, its volunteers and donors, also we mention the pen distribution that took place recently at the Catalyst.
These pens have have been stored since 2007 somewhere in Portugal awaiting an opportunity of some fund raise inittiative could happen to help Maria's humanitarian work.As it didn't happen, Maria toke a great deal of these pens to be delivered to the kids as they are a precious asset in the schools.

And here we have to stop for a moment and address a great thanks to Flávio from the Algarve - southern zone of Portugal, who kindly offered these pens and a lot of other stuff, whose remaining units hopefully will reach Dhaka soon.
Should there be no barriers and much less would be th kids' trouble throughout the world !

SOCIAL MOMENTS - SINGING PORTUGUESE SONGS !

2010-03-05T18:00:00.005+04:00

One may think ... Too many things related with Portugal in Dhaka!
The truth is the great news at the moment is that we have three Portuguese volunteers in Gawair, a kind of volunteers who are not private, instead they share their time for both places, in the area that provides education to the children during the day, and in the Catalyst adults school at the end of the day.
And also they have time to develop recreative activities like this;... Isabel is teaching them Portuguese songs while they are surely looking down at the song's lyrics.
These boys and these girls are committed to learn a little bit of Portuguese with the expectation to be selected to go on holidays to Portugal this year.
The topic looks very interesting as a glance at the details let us see one of the students using a candle to better see his notes .
Let's hope they will be able to reach their deserved goal !

TOOTHPASTE DISTRIBUTION

2010-03-05T04:16:00.012+04:00

Thanks to a chain of awareness about the needs of children and adults on what concerns to their daily dental hygiene.

This chain resulted in a huge donation come from Universidade Fernando Pessoa, brought to the field by our volunteers recently arrived from Porto - Portugal .

A great deal of toothpaste and toothbrushes carried to Gawair, to be distributed by the students, either children or adults.
And here we have Cláudia doing the distribution of some units to our Catalyst adult students.And of course they feel so happy for having this heartfelt attention come from so many miles away... from whom are willing to help them without even having met them anywhere.
This has a name - SOLIDARITY !

PORTUGAL - VOLUNTEERS & DONATIONS

2010-03-05T03:30:00.004+04:00

On 20th February three Portuguese Volunteers have left Porto towards Dhaka to do volunteer work!
Cláudia Alemão who is going to spend nearly two weeks in the field work.
Ana Reis and Isabel Figueiredo, nurses, who are going to spend one month developing several actions related with their area of skills to help the kids and their families.All of them took their allowed 30 kg completely full, leaving many donors of items waiting for the next volunteers who hopefully will be able to take their donations to the kids.
Ana and Isabel carried a huge amount of articles donated by their friends/bosses towards improving the health condition of the Dhaka kids and the community. At this point we have to address a huge thanks to IPOFG - Porto, Drª Isabel Sequeira, for her kind and invaluable cooperation to make their mission possible . Also a huge thanks to Drª Ruiz for kindly providing the gift to permit the preventive treatment of the kids...Cláudia also took some funds offered by a group of friends to be used towards the wellness of the kids through their parents . These friends who kindly trusted her their donations are :
Jose Tavares - 40 euros
José Costa Reis/Daniel Neves - 20 euros
Margarida Machado - 20 euros
Graça Machado - 20 euros
Eduarda Carvalho - 40 euros
Paulo Machado - 20 euros
Domingos Ribeiro - 100 euros
Filomena - 160 euros
We appreciate very much when volunteers dedicate their time and their financial efforts to do the good to the poorest people in underdeveloped and distant countries like Bangladesh; the case of the Portuguese volunteers who have to afford huge travel costs to do their volunteer work is remarkable!
Thanks a lot to them and thanks to the donors above who kindly sent their donations to help the poorest in a place where some families have to live with a dollar a day... or less !

AMENA IS BACK TO SCHOOL

2010-03-05T01:25:00.008+04:00

Amena is a little girl from the Korail slums of Dhaka, one of those children to whom Maria got commited to provide school and a better and rewarding life.
But also her sponsor, Richard Ng, whose traces you can find through The Dhaka Project website including some writing not yet banned, is committed the achievement of her education and has shown up sorrowful a few times as Amena had gone back to the slums spite of him keeping paying her regular sponsorship.
Sometime ago there was a girls hostel, setup and closed a few months later where girls like Amena could get accomodation and keep studying without trouble, so she had to go back to the slums where her parents live as they don't want to move to Gawair...
Spite of a staff member has gone to Korail slums to talk with her parents they didn't allow their daughter to come back to the school spite of been promised a family to take care of her in Gawair, what was done later, but they kept refusing to let her come back aledging that she had already been admitted in a school near Korail slums, so compromising her future and contradicting her deep wish of coming back ...
On a new complaint come from her sponsor, and not being possible to go herself to talk with her parents due to all kind of not understandable odds that permanently persist stopping her to visit Dhaka, Maria suggested our Catalyst manager, Palash, to go there once again, with the volunteers Inês and Maria da Graça, talk with Amena's parents and try to persuade them to allow Amena to come back to the school in Gawair...
Unexpectedly as no one had reported her return to our Catalyst manager, and during a toothpaste and toothbrushes distribution done in The Dhaka Project school by Palash and the volunteer Cláudia, Palash had the good surprise to see that Amena was sitting in a classroom, well groomed wearing a colourful school dress in a huge contrast with the messed look she had a few days before in the slums with her parents .
Amena is back thanks to the steps originated by Maria through Palash Roy and Inês Pinheiro/Maria da Graça as her representatives, who got out of the relative comfort lived in the Catalyst premises, to go make the parents feel how important is the education of a child and at the same time taking in account the respect we should have to the efforts and good will of a sponsor.
Thanks Palash and Inês for the good job done !!!

CRISTIANA - WELCOME TO CATALYST !

2010-03-04T22:17:00.011+04:00

Cristiana Naufel, the Brazilian volunteer in Dubai for several months, Emirates Cabin Crew, and who has been organizing and sending donations through her colleagues crew members from Dubai to Dhaka for a few months, has visited the Catalyst recently where she has been highly welcome by children and adults.

She had some time to visit the slums and to have fun with some of the kids present in the Catalyst at the time.
And of course she didn't loose the opportunity to take some useful donations to all.
She took some soaps to the adults and biscuits to the children making the delights of our students and their children.

Huge thanks to Cristiana for all the good work done along the time and for her donations and kind visit!

THANKS FOR VISITING AND DONATING

2010-03-04T21:57:00.004+04:00

We Have been visited by Camilla, an Emirates Cabin Crew who came from the Westin Hotel where she has been during a layover in Dhaka.
As usual she was welcomed by children and also visited the slums.
Also thanks to Camilla for her donation of 1000 BDT for Catalyst.

NIKKI IN THE CATALYST FIELD

2010-03-04T02:01:00.018+04:00

Nikki has been doing part of her volunteer work of a few days at the Catalyst place .
Among a lot of other activities she took part in a garage sale session where she could see the clothes provided by her as well as other clothes left of previous garage sales, being sold to the slum dwellers.

This sale was organized by the kids and was worth of 1456 BDT.
Thanks to Nikki for her donations and for the incentive of her presence.
And thanks to other donors from Dubai and all cabin crew members who have provided the remaining donations.

FUNDRAISING IN DUBAI - THANKS MONIA!

2010-03-03T02:15:00.007+04:00

Monia Gonçalves, a Brasilian living in Dubai did a recent awareness action to help the children under the care of Maria and their families.
Monia addressed a message presenting the amazing humanitarian work of Maria Conceicao to 3 Brasilian groups in Dubai - Manas (a group formed by wives of Emirates pilots) , Brazucas (group of Brazilian living in Dubai) and Jumeirah Jane Brazucas (group of women any Portuguese speakers living in Dubai), a total of more than 100 members...
From these she got 3 replies... but not all meant a donation.
As the final results, Monia got 2 donations, one donation of hers and her husband, Jean, 2400 Dirhams, and another donation from Sabrina and Rodrigo, 100 Dirhams .
Wonderfully heart giving, Monia and Jean took part in such brilliant inittiative , contributing with a huge donation from their hard earnings what deserves our heartful deep thanks for all their involvment and dedication.
Also huge thanks to Sabrina and Rodrigo for having adhered on behalf of our children and their families.

FLIGHT CREW DENIA CARAMORI VISITED THE CATALYST

2010-02-28T18:40:00.007+04:00

As a result of the awareness run by our volunteer Cristiana Naufel, the Catalyst had benefited of a visit done by Denia Caramori, who works as cabin crew with Emirates Airline and had a short layover in Dhaka a few days back.She has spent some of her spare time with our adults at the Catalyst and either Denia or our adult students and the Catalyst team loved their time together, as it represented an extra source of different knowledge that they are always thirsty to absorb much specially from a preciously fluent English speaker.So the Catalyst students had a good chance to practice some English as it happens each time a such visitor dedicates some time to know our work in Dhaka.And as it happens frequently with other visitors, Denia is looking forward for another accasion in which she can go back there... and so are our local team members, the Catalyst students and their children.
Thanks a lot to Denia Caramori for deciding to give her time to the slum dwellers.

DEEP GRATITUDE TO DANIELLE

2010-02-25T17:30:00.006+04:00

It's a great time to express our recognization to Danielle Wilson, an enterpreneur based in Dubai who has been supporting Maria for a few months.
She is Maria's Publics Relations in Dubai, and is always seeking new sponsors to events that will conduct to the wellness of the Dhaka Children and she is doing it with so much passion...
At the moment she is organizing a big event in Dubai, The Dhaka Project Polo Cup, that will hopefully be a good source of help to Maria Conceicao in her work of caring for her children and their families in Dhaka.And the kids feel how important the work of Danielle is.
That feeling is expressed in the words written in the letter above.
With a great thanks to Danielle for her hard and demanding work done for free, on behalf of the kids and the Catalyst team, we wish to tell how we feel very lucky for having her with us !

LESSONS AND DONATIONS FROM PORTUGAL

2010-02-24T02:59:00.001+04:00

Recently, in the first days of February we had two volunteers from Gaia - Portugal at the field work in Dhaka.
Inês Pinheiro and Maria da Graça, daughter and mum, decided to do volunteer work for the Catalyst and The Dhaka Project.
For the first time a Portuguese volunteer, Maria da Graça, who doesn't speak English, dared to go and spend her time in the field and had a great time with the children and their families.
Nevertheless, she felt very happy for sharing her time with the smallest children in the nursery, sounding around that she wished not to have to go back home...
And they were given the mandate to manage some funds kindly fundraised by their friend Isabel Valente thanks to the kindness of the group of donors below who adhered to her appeal:

Isabel Valente - 50 euros
Teresa Brandão - 50 euros
Maria Neves Basto - 40 euros
Júlia Cunha - 5 euros
Rosa Maria S. Barbosa - 200 euros
Teresa Carrasco - 30 euros
Maria José Couto - 20 euros
Marta Silva - 15 euros
Maria José Bouça - 10 euros
Filomena Santos - 50 euros
Carmen Coutinho - 20 euros

Our huge thanks to to our volunteers for their brilliant work and for these people who joined their efforts AND help the Catalyst team TO do their work in Dhaka.

DONATING AND PAMPERING !

2010-02-24T00:21:00.009+04:00

There are donors who not only keep ready to give a helping hand to the team but also join some tender to their kind gifts towards Maria's humanitarian efforts.It's what we report in this post related to when Maria has been to Porto for one day; one of the usual latest supporters, Luisa Alves, who has been a friendly presence and who we already referred in some entries, delivered the results of her fundraise collected from her company, Li + Fung's team, from her family and from a friend, and took the opportunity do dedicate a few heatful messages to the children along with the donations .Our great thanks to our friend Luisa (and the donors mentioned in the messages above written in the cards) for the lovely cards delivered with her donation, her team's and friends'.

CORROIOS PARISH RAISED FUNDS TO MARIA

2010-02-21T01:55:00.010+04:00

It hadn't been imagined that the people living in and around Corroios and usually attending the masses in local churches could be so generous.
Thanks to the kindness of Priest Casimiro who found amazing having the opportunity to contribute freely to the humanitarian work that Maria has been doing for the last 5 years on behalf of the poorest slum dwellers in Dhaka !
So Maria was invited to be present in Corroios' Church on one weekend day so that the people attending the Sunday mass could have the opportunity to meet her. And at the end she was invited to say some words what she did in a shy mood, but it's easy to recognize that people give high value to those who have no words to say but have great feats to show.
And during the following weekend the unexpected results rose during a extra and free collection of funds to Maria outside the churches' doors.
The sums were collected...

1044,17 EUR in Corroios' Church
104,08 EUR in Sta Marta's Church

A few days before we counted with the church's help to copy around 500 sheets providing 1000 simple flyers containing and introduction to the work of Maria, as well as the awareness of her interviews for the next week in the Portuguese media, all thanks to Priest Casimiro and the precious church cooperators.
At the end of each mass an light introduction about Maria and her work was done by Alberto Ribeiro or Laurinda Ribeiro to whom we'd like to say a big thanks, telling that if anyone would like to donate, there would be cooperators outside the churches' doors to collect the funds.
When Maria knew about these fundraising she became thrilled. Neither her nor none of us had expected such generous collection of funds in the local churches.
A MASSIVE THANKS TO THE CATHOLIC PEOPLE OF CORROIOS AND SANTA MARTA !

DONATIONS NEARBY LISBON AND PORTO

2010-02-21T01:52:00.011+04:00

Donors/items sales in Lisbon/Almada/Corroios/Barreiro.
Many people who had already known about the work of Maria or getting to know about it at the time, have come forward to donate. Either through Católica Univ. or through the media, or yet through the local church where Maria has been , the people sympathized whith her and her humanitarian work developed in Dhaka, and have done some precious donations.

2 bags sale - 20,00 EUR
9 T-shirts sale - 100,00 EUR
Afonso - 40,00 EUR
Ana Vilhena - 5,00 EUR
Rosa Mindão - 36,35 EUR
Rosa André - 20,00 EUR
Anonymous donor - 40,00 EUR
Sofia Chaves - 90,00 EUR
Fátima Aveiro (Unilever) - 120,00 EUR and a few amazing items traded by Unilever
Helena Brilhante - 100,00 EUR
Sónia and Bruno - 10,00 EUR
Família Ribeiro - 60,00 EUR (thanks to this family, Alberto and Laurinda for the introductory speeches at the end of each mass in the churches of Corroios and Santa Marta )
Família Pereira - (integrated in their Parish donations)

Donors in the zone of Porto
Here, we have be offered so much symphaty come from past, present and future volunteers and friends of Maria's humanitarian work who by their turn have done awareness around, all bringing a nice amount of donations from their colleagues and family members as the following:

Li + Fung Portugal - 215,00 EUR
Luisa Alves and Family - 150,00 EUR
Ivan McIvor - 200,00 EUR
Isabel Amorim and friends – Recursos Humanos - Reitoria Univ Porto - 98,00 EUR
Isabel Amorim and Paulo Coelho - 60,00 EUR
Maria Manuela Franchini - 200,00 EUR
Fernanda Santos and Manuela Barroso – Reitoria Univ. Porto - 50,00 EUR
Gabinete Jurídico (Unicer) - 31,40 EUR
Teresa - 5,00 EUR
Ana Clara - 50,00 EUR
Brigite - 5,00 EUR
Pi - 1,00 EUR
Dulce - 50,00 EUR
Tó - 12,60 EUR

Grateful thanks to these donors on behalf of our adult students and their children, to whom these donations will mean wonders towards a better future life !!!

HUGE KINDNESS IN DONATIONS - THANKS LISBON CATÓLICA UNIV !

2010-02-20T22:01:00.013+04:00

During the recent visit done by Maria to her homeland, as we have shown in previous entries, there was a lot of interest from the media and a lot of small and medium donations come from kind souls who attended her presentation thanks to the invitation done by Lisbon Catholic Universtiy as follows:

Ana Isabel Costa - 60 EUR
Raquel Mendes - 20,00 EUR
Nick and Katie - 47,50 EUR
Patrícia Nunes - 20,00 EUR
Maria Carvalho - 30,00 EUR
Consulturia de Gestão Sector 3 - 5,00 EUR
Henrique Mouta - 5,00 EUR
Maria Sales - 10,00 EUR
João Ferreira - 5,00 EUR
Melanie Lavita - 15,00 EUR
Andreia Azevedo e Silva - 6,00 EUR
R.C.P. - 80,00 EUR
Anonymous donor - 20,00 EUR
António Abrantes and José Faria - 55,00 EUR
Ana Groznik - 100,00 EUR
Leonor Festas - 50,00 EUR
Emília Simões - 40,00 EUR
Maria Inês - 20,00 EUR
Pedro Ferreira - 10,00 EUR
Anonymous donor - 20,00 EUR
Helena Quelhas - 100,00 EUR
Mª Teresa Sladanha - 10,00 EUR
Ana Tomé - 200,00 EUR
F.B.B. - 100,00 EUR
Catarina Rosa and Dânia Rodrigues - 10,00 EUR
Elsa Vila Lobos, António Miguel and Renato Braz - 50,00 EUR
Heather Good - 20,00 EUR
Clube da Responsabilidade Social da Faculdade Católica de Lisboa through their members Francisco, Andrei and Elizabeth - 40,00 EUR
Paul van der Boor (towards investing in books if possible), - 40,00 USD
Joaquim Matos - 40,00 EUR
Rita Costa - 10,00 EUR
Mafalda Sarmento - 10,00 EUR
Anonymous donor - 10,00 EUR
Francisco Rodrigues - 20,00 EUR
Ana Castro - 5,00 EUR
Ana Rita - 20,00 EUR
The Lisbon MBA Clan 2010 - 35,00 EUR
Anonymous donor - 35,00 EUR, 50,00 USD, 20,00 AUD, 5,00 GBP and 6,00 SGD
Celine Moedas - 20,00 EUR
Luís Albergaria - 30,00 EUR
Rita Viegas - 20,00 EUR
P.B. Moita - 10,00 EUR
André Dória - 10,00 EUR
Rita Gonzaga - 40,00 EUR
Anabela Pereira - 10,00 EUR
Salima Rehemtula - 10,00 EUR
Nunes de Jesus - 20,00 EUR
Andreia Almas - 20,00 EUR
Patrícia Neves - 10,00 EUR
Rita Ferreira - 20,00 EUR

Tks to Paul van der Boor and Pedro Oliveira for setting all on our behalf in Lisbon Católica - FCEE (Universidade Católica de Lisboa), as well as to their Dean Profª Fátima Barros for the amazing introductory speech and all the kindness towards Maria and her team!
Finally a tremendous thank you to all who attended and were so kind giving their huge support to Maria and showed so concerned in helping her, being this way trying to help the hundreds of children in Dhaka !

THANKS TO VOLUNTEER NIKKI

2010-02-18T01:17:00.005+04:00

The children and the adults at Gawair community counted with the presence of a special volunteer who was around for a few days to have a look inside the Catalyst and The Dhaka Project and how they are being run.

Nikki Mathews, did a great job by writing down her point of view on how the works should be run in the field...
And also she wrote the long text that represents a complete manual for the volunteers to come spend their time with the children in Gawair.
Huge thanks to Nikki for lending her time with the community that hopefully will result on behalf of their better future life!

A MINI STAR IN THE SLUMS OF DHAKA

2010-02-16T02:23:00.005+04:00

Thanks to Maria for giving support to Shinu our super talented dancer who learnt the art of dancing by watching the television and imitate the dancers on the television dance.

Shinu has been admitted into a good dancing school in Uttara and we are supporting her for the school fees.

She is now attending 1.30 hour classes twice a week, if she gets proper training/nursery she will be for sure somebody Great in the future.

The case of Shinu tells us that if a child is given an opportunity in life he or she can be branched in any career ...

GARAGE SALE

2010-02-14T12:18:00.010+04:00

Our volunteer kids organized one more garage sale making the delights of our adult students and their children.

In these pictures you are able to see how happy children and adults feel after purchasing their new clothing, what means they can feel more comfortable with their new clothes.

The result of the sale was 4479 Taka and the task counted with the presence of the volunteers Inês and Maria da Graça from Portugal.

Thank you to the volunteers above and to those who did their donations and yet to all who kindly brought them from Dubai and left them in the Westin Hotel mentioning clearly that they were addressed to The Catalyst.

MARIA IN LISBON - THE 3RD DAY

2010-02-13T03:36:00.006+04:00

This day was partly tiring and spoiled as we had to get off the sheets at the usual early time in the morning. Maria was invited for breakfast in Ritz by the journalist Ana Borges for an interview... meawhile another of us has beed angerly fighting for a parking place in Lisbon downtown hell for 20 minutes to collect the so precious new brand passport...
Then we headed for the suburbs in the Ocidental side of Lisbon beyond the natural lung of the city, the green space, where many greedy would love to build a stone jungle...
In the industrial zone where SIC - TV is placed we only have roads, fortunately with roundabouts to easily reverse the way, and no space to stop a car... all legal space to parking is taken...
Fortunately the name Maria do Céu da Conceição was the magic key to open the checkpoints and the way to the private zone.We arrived very soon as we had gone to a neighbour door in the morning to have a meeting with an editor... and after an interview with a journalist of Elle, Sandra Gato, Maria was called to the preliminars and a few tenths of minutes later they asked us if we would have lunch there... OF COURSE, nobody was there to spend their little money, (1 Euro buys 50 bananas in Dhaka, says Maria ) and we went to enjoy our lunch in SIC - TV facilities on the other side of the road - hats off to them, it made our day a better day.
We got back to the studios building and then Maria and Cristiana went to have special preparation to appear in front of the TV cameras... we waited, waited,... and at the final of the program there was Maria being interviewd by Fátima Lopes in the SIC programme VIDA NOVA, being Cristiana among the audience to support her.

As a result of so much delay, Maria and Cristiana hardly managed to catch the 19:00 hour train to Porto as there were huge traffic jams in Lisbon on the way from the occidental side to eastern side... and just got at Gare do Oriente on time, 4 minutes climb to the upper level and buy the tickets .

MARIA IN LISBON - THE 2ND DAY

2010-02-12T01:19:00.012+04:00

Due to the usual mega chaos in the access to Tagus bridge, soon in the morning there all have drove to practically take a nap while burning time until the first appointment of the day took place.
A long time before Maria had a request to an interview to the Portuguese magazine GINGKO and finally they got the so wished interview. For that the journalist and the photographer chose a very special place in Belém, the Botanical Garden.
It was a very cold morning spite of being sunny; fortunately nobody got sick, specially Maria who had to be dressed according to the instructions of the photographer to get better pictures.
After this session in the garden we went to a café where the interview was run by Nelson Marques, in a totally relaxed environment while having a coffee or a tea for around two hours.
And the hour of driving to another place for another interview sounded so we headed to the eastern side of Lisbon to be present at TSF (listen to interview) studios after having a light cheap meal in the neighbourhood .
It was a superb live interview run by João Paulo Meneses and lasted for nearly one hour with a small break for the news.
Then we went towards Almada and kept present for nearly five hours in the big mall Almada Fórum where Maria was interviewed by 'O Mirante' a regional newspaper whose journalist, Isabel Borrego, had been after Maria for a long time, and by 'Expressões Lusitanas' with the journalist Daniel Pinto Lopes .After this all kept steady with no dinner until around 10 PM so that a few donors could meet Maria, and we regret that due to the cold weather we had to get refuge in a corner beside the entrance what caused some people to miss us !

THE IMPRESSING REST OF THE 1ST DAY IN LISBON

2010-02-11T21:12:00.000+04:00

After having been successfull in getting the unmissable document we headed to catch Cristiana at the railroad station... and we had to cope with the exhaust fumes as there was a real caos in traffic on the way back.
After escaping from this, we headed to the other end of Lisbon (in the suburbs) to the interview to the TV station (TVI - Independent Television).
We had been requested to get there before noon that was the lunch time, not to rush in their facilities to be ready to the live interview .
All run as we expected except for an unexpected 2nd interview to the same TV station to be broadcasted later, and that took another hour...
Absolutely on the limit of time we rushed to Lisbon Catholic University (CATÓLICA) where we arrived just in time; fortunately there were no traffic jams at the time. Afer sensational introductory words spoken by the Católica Dean, Prof.ª Fátima Barros, Maria was feeling so nervous, speechless, starting in a shy mood. But when the first question came she started practically a dilalogue with all the people attending as if they had met one another a long time before.
At the end all wished to talk with Maria who is the face of The Dhaka Project and an interview was done for SAPO NOTÍCIAS online .
All of us felt impressed for the audience's generosity at CATÓLICA !
And we counted with the precious enthusiasm of Prof. Pedro Oliveira and the student Paul van der Boor who prepared all since months before for the presentation and made us feel at home.
Huge thanks to Sofia and Cristiana for having been available from soon in the morning to nearly 2 AM in the next morning...
Grateful thanks to the CATÓLICA students and teachers, and all people who attended and a special thanks from the bottom of our heart to those who gave their donations at the end of the presentation, on behalf of our children and their families.

INTERVIEW TO PORTUGUESE RADIO RENASCENCA

2010-02-09T20:43:00.007+04:00

When all the movements of Maria in Portugal had practically been set, we received a request to an interview to Radio Renascença! The request was sent by Francisca Favilla and the first thing that ocurred to say was... "IMPOSSIBLE!; we have to be in Civil Government Building at 09:00 and that is mandatory, so we can't attend nothing prior to that time, and after that we have already a lot of things to do..." And she replied "no problem, we can run the interview from 08:00 to 08:45 and the place you need to go is next door with us" !
Terrific! Immediatley accepted and taken steps to contact Sofia to ask a little more sacrifice from her to be present so early in that cold morning at the radio studio. We left our accomodation in Corroios early in the morning (06:45) to be secure we would have a good chance to escape the mess of the traffic jam that is the brainstorm of most people who have to commute from the south bank of Tagus River to Lisbon using their cars. And in this way we arrived very soon at the place, securely half an hour in advance, as there were no accidents delaying us.
We had no trouble to get a parking place in the middle of the hell of Lisbon downtown as super kind Francisca had previously offered us a parking place as well as had given instructions so that we could park ourselves.
Just after we had the car in a fine safe place kindly yielded ... Sofia went to meet us. Francisca arrived later at the place and took care of us to set up the interview upstairs. It was a nice interview to begin this day and all the hard tour Maria would have to perform all around Lisbon from one end to another.
After a careful preparation in the studio room they (Maria and Sofia) performed the interview run by Sónia Santos and at the promised time we were ready to go next door.
And the RR Radio team still granted us the precious parking along our stay in the zone.
Thanks Francisca, Sónia & Radio Renascença ! Huge thanks to Sofia ! All for Maria and her hundreds of children !

CHILDREN HELP PARENTS IN THEIR STRUGGLE !

2010-02-09T20:38:00.003+04:00

Rina Begum is one of our adult students who works in garments from morning to night.
Somedays she works till 10 or 11 o'clock in the night due to the garments cruel policy and can't attend the English classes though she has intensive desire to learn English so that she can find a job with a good salary to survive with her family of 5 members.Her baby son named Sagor who attends the KG-1 in the Dhaka Project comes everyday to her Mum's schedule class (6.30-8.00pm, Group-B) to take note down the lessons and to learn what teacher teachs in the class so that he can teach her Mum at home.
It's continueing like this for months.Sometimes it's surpising to see how such a baby boy can keep his patience along 1 and a half hours class after finishing his own school for hours in the day time.
There is another same story in the Group-A (6.30-8.00 PM) about Rahima Begum and her daughter Rashida Akter who attends grade-VI in TDP and she comes to the class everyday like Sagor and helps her mother.
Noted that last month Rahima Begum achieved 85 out of 100 marks though she was 100% absent for her garments work.
Rashida could make her Mum go up helping her to get better results than many regular adult students .

THANKS GREG & SIMONE FOR THE DISCO NIGHT

2010-02-08T04:07:00.000+04:00

It was an unforgetable night for a group of kids, that night they spent at Dejavu Disco in Dhaka.They had never been in such amazing place so these boys and girls were so amazed to get the chance of their first time in a disco...
They danced a lot, thay had a nice dinner with brown rich, fried chilly chicken and cold drinks.
They celebrated Al Amin's birthday and had a nice cake provided by the disco for free that made their wonders as it was an unexpected bonus.Our great thanks to Mauro, who spite of unable to be with them, once again provided the costs for transportation to and from the disco .
And our huge thanks on behalf of the kids to Greg an Simone Stainer, for this amusement in which we used their donation.

MOTHER SETS FAMILY SURVIVAL BUSINESS

2010-02-07T16:35:00.008+04:00

Shahina Akter, our adult student in the group-B, who is scheduled to attend classes from 5:00 to 6:30 is a mum of several children what makes her feel permanently concerned .
And to feed all this big family she has to have some better income.
And do you know what she planned to achieve this extra income ?
She buys the unwanted clothes left after our garage sales, those items that due to their western pattern are not according to their tradition, takes them to her home and makes different kinds of dresses giving them a local touch to make them suitable for sale.
This new business helps her to survive with her family, one of the largest families whose members are a mother and her six girls !

A BRAVE FAMILY RAN THE MARATHON TO HELP US !

2010-02-06T04:17:00.010+04:00

Helen Gooden and her children Timothy and Zoe decided to give their contribution to the Dhaka children through running in the last Dubai Marathon.
Helen ran the 10 km Marathon Standard Chartered while Timothy ran the 3km. And Zoe was intending to perform her run but another duty with her school made her unable to take part in the run what left her very sorry for it. A friend of Zoe, Nick, ran in her place.And all felt very happy with the results as they got very good marks well under their expectations by a difference of some minutes... i.e. much better marks...They fundraised a pretty much atractive amount of 4450 Dirhams also thanks to kind donations from Helen work colleagues, friends and family.
And Helen added her contribution to take it up to 5000 Dirhams .
The proceeds so bravely won will go towards creating bathrooms, showers and toilletts within our community project in Dhaka, Bangladesh.Thanks a lot to Helen, Timothy and Zoe and yet to Nick for having bravely fought in the track on behalf of the poor Dhaka kids and their families.

GOOD STEPS TO FIGHT THE COLD WINTER

2010-02-06T02:23:00.006+04:00

Along the month of January, our team of volunteer kids in Dhaka has run a few sessions of garage sales in the Catalyst to provide warm clothes and other useful items to our slum dwellers.
These garage sales are done towards the poorest.
Only slum dwellers with little income have been (and are) allowed to buy items in our sales as they are really sold at a low price but only towards the most in need.
Spite of the 'customers' complaints for the symbolic price we sell the items, of course their value at output price is not worth of the gas burnt in Dubai by the donors / volunteers to take them to the drop-off point and the gas used by our volunteers to take them to the airport as well as the other expenses supported with vehicles maintenance.
And equally it doesn't pay all sweat drops poured by Maria and the volunteers who help her in all those tasks.
Not even they are worth of the efforts done by the crew who took them to Dhaka plus the transportation from Westin Hotel to the Catalyst place.

Equally not worth are they if we think about the efforts and the concerns of Maria who, each time she travels to Dhaka she has a a lot of brainstorms due to all odds come from all directions since Dubai until reaching the field in Dhaka.
But this is a contribution thanks to the good will of a cloud of people who feel concerned about the poor.

Most of these items have been donated in Dubai and brought by Maria and cost a lot of worries and effort. Some have been donated by Wahed, a local Bangladeshi citizen friend .
Only with that much love for her children Maria can keep going on... spite of all the kindness felt around on behalf of the kids she faces all kind of brainstorms each time something is to reach the field work; the need to break rules, the hostility, the jeaulousy,...
The amounts done in these garage sales were... 5694 BDT and BDT 3646 in consecutive weeks.
We have also sold 49 kg of rice donated through The Dhaka Project.
Our huge thanks to Dubai donors and Wahed !

THANK YOU SO MUCH TERRY AND EMIRATES AIRLINE

2010-02-04T01:16:00.005+04:00

We feel in eternal debt with Terry and Emirates Airline / Emirates Airline Foundation.
Without their help and cooperation many families would be now in worse sheets shivering in the winter due to the colder weather that is felt in Bangladesh as the warmer clothes kindly offered by the poor children's friends in Dubai wouldn't have a way to reach Dhaka if there wouldn't be their good will to concess some extra baggage to Maria who is always travelling with hundreds kilos to Dhaka as well as allowing the kind crew members who take the opportunity to take some items with them in their flights.
And all this is only possible thanks to the kindness of Emirates Airline and its foundation, the EK Foundation .
So our big thanks on behalf of the children and their families to their melted hearts hardly hidden behind the strict rules !

NOOR CALLS FOR HELP !

2010-01-21T04:15:00.001+04:00

Noor is a mother of 2 little girls, who is fighting against LUNG CANCER . Her sister Moni pleads for your help NOOR's WEBSITE

A GENTLE LUSO-BANGLADESHI BREEZE HAS BLOWN OVER THE CATLAYST

2010-01-21T04:14:00.005+04:00

The Catalyst has been visited a few days ago by Whaed who came forward on behalf of Luisa and his company.
Wahed and Luisa both worked for the same company, Lifung International, that has branches in Bangladesh and Portugal.Our Catalyst Manager had a good conversation with Wahed regarding the Catalyst needs and goals and he is willing to give us a helping hand on behalf of Luisa through his support to the basic needs of our work.
He had a look at the CV's of our adults and had a short interview with two of them to find them a job if possible.Also he has brought a donation; two boxes full of clothes, that will be of good use to the families, and 49 kilos of rice, all to be sold in garage sales to the slum dwellers.
A tremendous thank you to Whaed and Luisa for caring about us by giving their kind help and support on behalf of our adult students slum dwellers !!!

DECEMBER MONTLY EXAM

2010-01-16T02:55:00.006+04:00

In the final days of last December, the adult students had one more English test at the Catalyst.
This time the acceptable level usually de 40% , was increased to 50% .
This has brought some more diffulties to the students who have their life not so easy as before. 40 students out of 59 who attended the exam managed to pass and get their sweated reward.
For the others these results mean they have to study harder to reach success as it will be their best chance to reach a better life through the new language hopefully learnt as it will likely allow them to be admitted in jobs where they can get new skills never imagined before.
In this video you they can be observed in action trying to perform their tests and escape from failure .

Our goal is to provide them a rewarding life that allow them to keep their children in the school, not feeling they are a burden or a way of getting income and this way they won't need to work in garments factories or be forced to get married too soon !

LITTLE SHIMA HAS LEFT OUR PLACE !

2010-01-07T00:26:00.005+04:00

We are all going to miss this little girl named Shima. She used to approach our office everyday as she used to live in the same compound in a small and tiny rented one room house.
Almost everyday, Palash, our manager used to have some fun with a group of little children who used to be present to do thanks posters, being Shima one of them, always wishing to lively present her thanks to our supporters.In the morning of one of these past days she came to the office and said to the Catalyst Manager "Sir I am going to leave to Gazipur..., that is a place faraway from Dhaka".
At first he didn't understand and reacted thinking that probably she would go to visit her relatives. But she said again "Sadly Sir I am leaving this place forever..." what caused him to feel sad thinking he will not be going to see her again having fun with other little children in the row for thanking posters.
She left with her family to the place where her father is working...
Our manager wanted to see her smiling face when saying goodbye and asked if she wanted to take a photo with him at what she smiled and replied "Yes Sir"
And this way the sadness of the last farewell became a little relieved !

OUR VISITORS ARE ALWAYS A FRESH BREEZE !

2010-01-06T04:02:00.006+04:00

Each time we have visitors from abroad it's like celebrating a small party at the Catalyst field.

The small children always take the chance to have big fun, the older students have a good opportunity to use their knowledge of English and the adults feel a double happiness; they experiment the satisfaction of seeing a different sparkle in their children's eyes and feel themselves having a new push tot give them the strengh and the will to learn English and to think that their efforts are towards a worthy goal.

The Emirates Crew Karolyn Zinetti and two friends of hers had a flight to Dhaka on the 25th December and they decided to spend some time during the evening of that day with our kids.

Moreover they left a few donations like toiletries and women clothes.

One more wonderful Christmas gift indeed !!!

Our thanks to Karolyn and her flight mates for the donation and for having visited us !

DHAKA CHIDREN TO STUDY IN DUBAI - A NEW CHALLENGE !

2010-01-02T18:24:00.011+04:00

--->THE SCHOOL TURNED DOWN THE OFFER <---

Some of the students under Maria's care who have got top scores in the EK School at TDP are going to be proposed to study in Dubai.
To get this dream come true we need sponsors for their passports and visas as well as their flight tickets that we hope to be kindly sponsored by Emirates Airline.
We also need sponsors/supportters to give them accomodation and help with all expenses for the 9 months of school.
If this pilot project is successful then it could be the start of an amazing opportunity for the gifted children to get to a new top level hardly imagined 5 years ago.
If you think you would like to take part in this project please get in touch with us.
Thank you !

--->THE SCHOOL TURNED DOWN THE OFFER <---