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Club Activities (Programme Action)

CELEBRATING 90 PLUS YEARS OF SERVICE TO OUR COMMUNITY

 

Welcome to SI Edinburgh’s news of our activities.

As members of Soroptimist International our work is focused on supporting women and girls in any way we can from local to international.  At SI Edinburgh we also experience the warmth of international friendship and enjoy social activities.

 

Soroptimists across Scotland ORANGE THE WORLD!

Scottish Soroptimists are taking action and calling for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

On the 25th of every month Scottish Soroptimists draw attention to the worldwide UN campaign “Say NO – UNiTE to end violence against women and girls by 2030.

The campaign is known internationally as “Orange the World”.

Violence against women and girls, from sexual harassment to abuse and femicide needs to be stopped!

Our action, “Orange cafés” is simple but conveys a powerful and visible message.

The “Orange cafés” were set up by Edinburgh Soroptimists in the Summer of 2022 and they are spreading!

On the 25th of each month, Soroptimist groups across Scotland are meeting up in a public café, wearing something orange, to raise awareness and spread the word about this important campaign.

The action has attracted interest from as far afield as Barbados!

Women are welcome to join us for a chat, to find out more or to find out about support provided locally for women and girls affected by violence.

Edinburgh Soroptimists took this photograph at our recent meeting to publicise the campaign.

 

 

Our Orange Cafe Campaign meets SIGBI Membership Month

SI Edinburgh members are delighted that the Orange Cafe idea has spread across all parts of the SIGBI Federation now and is being used as one of the promotions for Soroptimist Membership month.

Why not join us for a cup of coffee, some good craich and learn more about how we try to change the lives of women and girls for the better.

The following is the press release which has been sent out to all clubs in Scotland for them to publicise their own activities.

Soroptimists across Scotland ORANGE THE WORLD!

 Scottish Soroptimists are taking action and calling for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

 On the 25th of every month Scottish Soroptimists draw attention to the worldwide UN campaign “Say NO – UNiTE to end violence against women and girls by 2030. The campaign known internationally as “Orange the World”.

Violence against women and girls, from sexual harassment to abuse and femicide needs to be stopped!

Our action, “Orange cafés” is simple but conveys a powerful and visible message. The “Orange cafés” were set up by Edinburgh Soroptimists in the Summer of 2022 and they are spreading! On the 25th of each month, Soroptimist groups across Scotland are meeting up in a public café, wearing something orange, to raise awareness and spread the word about this important campaign.  The action has attracted interest from as far afield as Barbados!

Women are welcome to join us for a chat, to find out more or to find out about support provided locally for women and girls affected by violence.

Edinburgh Soroptimists recently met up in the National Portrait Gallery café to publicise the campaign.

To find out more take a look at our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/SIEdinburghScotland/ or contact us through our website https://sigbi.org/edinburgh/contact-us/

 

Getting to be an Orange fixture

Club members are making a splash every month wearing orange, talking to visitors to the Scottish Portrait Gallery as well as socialising and catching up on news. Why not join us to raise awareness of the increasing levels of violence against women and girls?

 

Keeping the Orange Campaign Alive!

Club members decided to meet at a cafe every month on 25th day wearing orange to continue to raise awareness of the need to eliminate violence against women and girls. Too many news items are being reported of attacks and killings which must be halted. We encourage members of the public to join us in this campaign.  If you want to know more check out the website

https://www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/ending-violence-against-women/unite/16-days-of-activism

For the next few months we are having morning coffee at the National Portrait Gallery and everyone is welcome to join us but please wear something orange.

And it isn’t just in Edinburgh – other clubs in other towns and cities are taking up the idea.

Members@ National Portrait Gallery 25 January 2023

 

Supporting Women @ Christmas

The annual fun packing gifts for our local women’s hostel. Thanks to local company Joe Cool and generous member donations we have an amazing collection of surprise bags for any of the women and their families who need the shelter this year.

Trying to count how many!

Kids Love Clothes!

Once more club members have been supporting one of our regular charities by helping to sort clothes ready to be distributed to children in need.

 

 

 

 

And Where’s the Fruit?

A year on from the planting of our orchard trees and little silver birches at Castleview Primary School, Nikki with Lindsey as cameraman, visited Castleview to meet with Kirsten and some of her Primary 5s.  Despite the weather failing us, we viewed the progress of the orchard and discussed with Kirsten the other projects the school has in mind – a bee hive and a wild flower meadow below the trees to attract the insects and other wild life.  The pupils were very interested to know how soon they would be able to pick apples and without doubt, the trees have flourished on the little derelict plot in which they were planted.  Knowing where and how, fruit is produced and what pollinators do seems to be part of this summer’s curriculum.  So glad SI Edinburgh has been part of that learning.  We shall return in a few years’ time in the hope of seeing some of the results.  Picture below shows President Nikki, Programme Action Officer Lindsey and pupils checking on progress.

 

 

Packing Christmas Bags

Members made the most of being able to meet face to face.  We had an evening packing Christmas Gift Bags for Cranston St Women’s Hostel full of warm clothing and toiletries.  Thanks to President Elect Liz’s sister’s company Joe Cool we were able to add many more gifts this year.

And  we made the Edinburgh Evening News!
Climate Conference COP26 in Glasgow

Recently, during the meeting of COP26 Anna hosted a Soroptimist and fellow activist from Southern England to enable them to protest outside the Conference in Glasgow.  They expressed their appreciation by contributing a donation to the Club, which has been divided between the 3S Fund and for a homeless supporting charity in Edinburgh.

Back to helping at Kids Love Clothes

Find out more information at https://www.kidsloveclothes.co.uk/

Members try to help regularly with sorting the many donations which are received.  Recently a small group of members tackled some of the mounting piles to enable winter clothes to be distributed.

Mountains of donations to sort

                                                                                              Sorry those won’t fit you!

 

Getting ready for UN Climate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow

Club members have been knitting and stitching to contribute to a scarf drawing attention to climate change and its impact. This will join with many other contributions  from Soroptimists and    others  to be handed over to Stitches For Survival to be included in their 1.5mile long scarf to be displayed during COP26.

Stitches for Survival are aiming to highlight the climate emergency with this project.  Read more about it at  https://stitchesforsurvival.earth/

well  done  to  all  our  crafters

Soroptimist International Centenary Year  Trees

The club are joining with Soroptimists around the world to plant trees to celebrate the centenary of Soroptimist International.

Our orchard trees are growing and even beginning to bear fruit!

 

Thanks to the work of our dedicated Programme Action Officer we have now paid for trees to be planted at a primary school. They asked for orchard trees and these have now been planted.

 3STrust and recipients of awards

SI Edinburgh supports the Scotland Region South 3s Trust regularly. (See our page on 3S Trust)  We make contributions to the funds as often as we can. We also interview applicants and make recommendations to Region. When young people are successful and have completed their volunteer year we invite them back to tell us about their adventures. It is always rewarding to see how the young people have grown and developed.  Occasionally one of the young people is so committed to the work they have been doing abroad that they want to return and help more.

We recently heard from one such young woman.

It has been a while now since my year in Guyana with Project Trust in 2018/19 and since I spoke to you on my return regarding how I got on and my plans to continue supporting the village. There’s been a lot of progress with the project recently so thought I would update you on how I am getting on. I am currently in Guyana (having made it out with just 2 days to spare before Scotland went back into lockdown!) and am on standby to fly into Chenapou, the village where I worked with Project Trust, tomorrow.

People keep asking me what the plan is, and the very honest answer is that there isn’t one, but things have been falling very nicely into place since I reached the capital city last weekend. The ministry of education and local airway service have caught word of what I am doing and are transporting the books for me free of charge and I have just found out that I’ll be living in the village office during my stay. Although there is no bed for me nor any stove to cook on, this is really ideal for the library as this is where I had originally invisioned it being based. At the moment it’s a very disused space which hosts empty bookcases, shelving units and lots of old benches – the skeleton of my library really. There is a lot of work needing to be done to turn it into a more inviting space however I’m sure once I tidy it up a bit, put some posters on the walls, and the books go on the shelves, it will become a great space.

I am yet to find out if I am allowed to work at the school during the day (actually, more importantly, I am yet to find out if it is going to reopen as it has been closed since March) but hopefully term will resume as normal, in which case I can work with the teachers to use the new books as part of the curriculum and to encourage them to set aside library time for each class during the week. After school and during any other free time I’ll then be opening up my door to encourage people to read and make use of the books. I had an amazing donation of non-fiction books from DK publishers which cover many of the topics in their science and social studies curriculum so I would love to teach the children how to use these books to find information and hopefully give them a bit more independence with their own learning. I will also be available to help out with their homework and personal reading as well as hosting reading sessions and story time. Some parts of the village are more remote and require a boat to transport students to and from school. As the parents from these areas tend not to like their children staying after school time, I will use the weekends to visit these zones with a selection of books to ensure that all the students are getting access to the library and not just the students living nearest to myself and the school.

A big issue will be care of the books as surprisingly there is an extreme lack of respect for property in Chenapou. I did manage to enforce this a bit when I was sent books by my mum during my Project Trust year, but it was a lot of work ensuring that all the books were returned in good condition and that children didn’t break into my house to try and steal them. Thankfully the office will be a locked room and, as it will also be my home for the next 2 months, I will be able to oversea how the books are being used and cared for. I am hoping a parent or member of teaching staff will notice this role of overseeing the library while it is in use and that when I then leave the village someone would be willing to take on this duty. As there is no funding in place to provide any financial support for this role, I am unsure whether this will happen. Reiterating to both the children and parents the importance of maintaining the books to try and keep Chenapou Library sustainable is probably my most likely option at the moment. However, as I am unsure of what the response will be to the library, perhaps it will be something people in the community become invested in and want to support in this way.

Hopefully all goes to ‘plan’ when I reach Chenapou and I will try to send another update if there is WiFi.

Hope you are all well

Kind regards,

Kirsty

We wish her every success in her ambitions and will try to continue to support her.

 

UN 16 Days to Orange the World Campaign to Eliminate Violence Against Women

Each year from 25th November to 16 December Soroptimists join with many others to support the UN campaign to draw attention to the various forms of violence against women and girls, from domestic abuse to child marriage to human trafficking and sexual exploitation to child marriage to FGM.  We have posted every day on Facebook to remind as many people as possible about this dreadful alternative pandemic.

 

Implementing the SDGs: Helping the Environment

SI Edinburgh works in partnership with UN House Scotland which is based in Edinburgh. Each year UN House host a number  of interns, students who are interested in working on international events, projects and other activities supporting the work of the United Nations. Recently a group of interns have produced a Guide of practical tips for helping the environment. It is a really easy read and full of very useful tips.

UNHS Guide Final

Soroptimist Service continues

One of our members has been busy while in lockdown providing tiny hats for premature babies at the Edinburgh hospitals.  Her current rate of output is 3 per day every day since the lockdown started in March!

Playing our Environmental Part

During last winter Saughton Park in Edinburgh went through an extensive restoration and modernisation.  The park, gardens and house have a magnificent part to play in Edinburgh’s history – for more details see https://www.edinburghoutdoors.org.uk/featureDetails.php?id=123 and SI Edinburgh were very fortunate to hear about the history as well as the plans for restoration from one of our speakers.  Following that it was decided to donate a bush/tree to contribute to the rebuilding of the gardens to commemorate our own long history in Edinburgh. Before lockdown one of our members managed to visit shortly after planting so we now have evidence of our Loquat bush (Eriobotrya Japonica).

Helping to improve the environment in Saughton Park