Thousands of homeless children, many aged as little as three years, sleep on the streets or in the drains of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia. They have to steal or beg for their food in order to survive.
My name is Annie Syrett and in late 2006 I spent nearly six months in Santa Cruz as part of my degree course, working with Alalay, a street children’s organisation.
I soon realised that Alalay was relatively poor and very dependent on donations – the staff were sometimes unpaid for long periods and money was often short for vital items such as educational materials. Which is why I was determined to help them, and why I started the registered charity “Friends of Alalay (Santa Cruz)”.
Our mission: helping Bolivian street kids to help themselves.
This will be realised in two main ways:
a) Providing education and skills development, preserving health, relieving poverty and meeting the other needs of ex-street children at Alalay.
b) Identifying, establishing and monitoring practical production projects which will become self-financing and teach new skills to the children.
See our main projects for 2012 HERE. Friends of Alalay is unusual amongst charities in that ALL of the money raised goes directly to help the children and nothing is spent on administration. Find out much more about Alalay’s work, my charity and supported projects by watching our 30-minute documentary ‘Alalay: The Children of the Cold’:
