Felix Masi - Arriving from Kenya to NZ Thurs, 8 March 2007

How exciting - Felix is making his maiden journey to New Zealand, arriving tomorrow!!! The purpose of the trip is to translate our very lengthy footage filmed in Kenya last december into English. After arriving back here last Dec 06, we hunted high and low for translators of the 4 village dialects that the grnadmothers speak (we had anticipated recording in Kiswahili, but we discovered upon meeting them that they don't speak their national language in the villages). We couldnt find anyone in NZ with this skill, so our decision to bring Felix to NZ was made!!!

On many levels this is very exciting:
1. we get to finally transcribe our 53 hours of footage to English
2. Felix makes his first journey to NZ
3. The connection between Kenya and NZ is further solidified
4. Our project continues to build momentum.

I'd love to hear from you, and thank you all for your continued support. The Sponsors Club is growing and we're able to make the film happen because of you!

All love Q x

Updates from Funyula

Only a few weeks since Kimberley sent her support to the women of Funyula, we have been able to get progress photos of the acerage that she sponsored. These women now have a generator, pumps, irrigation, fertiliser and seeds to be able to plant this acre of land and grow crops to raise money for school fees and other necessities.

Felix returned to Funyula this week from Nairobi to document the progress, and here is what he just sent us.
Its amazing to be able to track this kind of work so easily thanks to Technology, but moreso thanks to the incredible dedication of Felix in kenya who tirelessly works to make our job as supporters so much more enjoyable.
Thanks Felix.
Q x

Merry Christmas

From the team in Kenya, we wish you a wonderful Christmas. The journey is almost over, and our time with grandmothers and their families in both the villages and cities in Kenya has changed our perspective of humanity forever! This year, thanks already to many friends with big hearts, we have not only been able to begin making a fabulous film, but we have also contibuted to helping up many whom really need our support. Grandmothers in Kenya have benefited from bags of flour, sugar and tubs of fat, parrafin, AN ACERAGE PLANTATION fitout with generator, pump and irrigation, and grandmothers in Kibera, Nairobi have been given small gifts and their grandchildren will be supported with education in 2007.

The team in Kenya working with us, Felix Masi our fixer, Susie Banfield resident grandmother and photographer, Ken and Ngungu our drivers, Malcolm X, Brian Jnr ("Daddy"), Kenneth, Abuja and Badi our security, and Laya, Pastor, Mili and Judith our guides, are incredible people whom we will not forget. Thanks for making Kenya a colourful place to be! :)

For now, Dean and I are back to NZ soon to complete the making of this film, and the next steps promise to be just as exciting as the previous ones. We plan on a NZ based Black Tie Gala Event starring the grannies from our film, travels back to the grandmothers in Kenya to premiere the film, and a global distribution to all festivals and cinemas to finally deliver the world this beautiful story of the unsung heroes of Africa.

Merry Christmas to you all!

Love the AGT team..xx

Change of plans

We're in Kisumu and have had a wee change of plans. We had expected to be here for 4 or so days but after one day yesterday with 3 grannies and some locals, it is a challenge to find where the hope lies. Understandably, life here in an urban centre is complex - poverty, disease, corruption and all sorts of things make it hard to capture the grandmothers' voices. They are less forthcoming.

BUT WOW, now that we've seen this, we can really see that there is so much hope in the village! The contrasts are amazing - the people there ask for so little and we feel that our help on behalf of our friends and family is so worthwhile there - it really is.

Having susie with us (our resident granny) has been awesome. She is a rockstar. And felix is very knowledgable about the local ins and outs. He is great at cautioning us on what to do and how to be. We dont want to offend people or cause problems anywhere.

So right now we're bound back for the village - Kimberley (from Canakiwi) has kindly offered to support the building of an acerage for all the village women to work on to buld a sustainable existence for the farm. So with that news, we will take ourselves back and build it with them.

Keep the emails and support coming - these people are truly worth it!!!

Lotsa love us xx