By Farisja Idrizaj | Project Leader
205 Ukrainian children and their mothers received immediate support from Multifunctional Community Center in Tirana, in the very first month of war in Ukraine. It was an excellent collaboration of the Ministry of the Interior Affairs of Albania with the ambassador of Ukraine in Tirana that in a record time took them and saved their lives from blasting of the basement of a dormitory in Kiev, where they were staying for days. The fathers of this contingent of children were the leaders on the war front selected by the Ministry of War in Ukraine, and these children arrived in Albania as supreme will from this institution. Our center appreciated their trust and took care for the whole group of arrivals, even though we received the very sad news about one of the families, who was bombed at the last station at the border, before boarding to the bus to come to Albania. It was a great tragedy for this father who lost his daughter, son and wife, as well as his leg, being crippled for life, watch the video for more here.
Inspired by this terrific tragedy, our staff decided to save other children so instead of 175 first arrivals, the number of people in our shelter increased to 205 in total. They were supported with accommodation, food, health and educational treatment for a period of 5 months, from the first week of the war until July 30, 2022. During this period additional social activities were provided for Ukrainian children from other local NGOs, as a sign of solidarity and attention for their dramatic situation. Some of these activities were: concert with instrumental and songs, celebration of teachers’ day, celebration of mothers’ day, celebration of children’s day, visits to Tirana city, gifts for Easter, etc.
We believe that our warm welcoming and the shelter full of love we built for them will remain for long in their memory and story. And this will influence the creation of a culture within themselves to support and help people in need during their lives. Those children received a vital message that they were not and will never be alone, because they were supported and received a lot of love in the darkest days of their lives, under the terrible shadow of war. Placing them in a shelter by the seaside was an excellent therapy for the post-traumatic stress they were experiencing, and a great choice of our center.
We are working hard to continue support the same group of 205 children that (for lack of funds) went back to Ukraine since end of July, hosted by their relatives in areas with lower risk. We are planning to gather funds and to send trucks to their locations in Ukraine with: warm clothing and food, and generators. While, we plan to bring back to Albania a smaller group of 49 orphaned children (without parents) together with their guardians and shelter them here until the end of the war. The mechanisms to reach this goal is an Online Fundraising Campaign, where the influencing elements are:
1) The Chain of Love challenge in Instagram for donations built by VIPs and Albanian personalities: a Sportsman, an Ambassador of Peace, the World Great Grandfather of Bektashism, an Athlete, the Ambassador of Ukraine in Tirana, an International Singer, etc. who offer their donation and nominate three of their friends do the same and repeat the challenge.
2) The account of this project with GlobalGiving, which enables the giving of donations at an international level,
3) Making the Chain of Donations popular and viral online, so many individual donors and donor organizations can join this campaign and donate to help our 205 “Children of War” to relieve their sufferings from winter and war and to give them the message “YOU ARE NOT ALONE”.
We will really appreciate if our current donors continue to support our project and participate in the Chain of Love challenge with their monthly or one-time donations.
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