Teresia Ludvika Sweden

My name is Teresia and im a single mother of two girl. And we live in Ludvika Sweden. My oldest daughter is Jasmine she is 12 years old she loves singing, dancing and acting. Her biggest dream of right now is that she wanna at some point in life walk the red carpet as an artist. Indigo is my youngin' she is 11 years old and she is a real firestarter she got so much energy and loves dancing and singing. She will be her big sisters backup singer and dancer that is what she say ;). Me and my princesses had a conversation one day in april of this year (2010) when i was getting laid off the work i had. And Jasmine and Indigo was wondering about kids in africa and they was wondering if they have a life like them. I said some probably have a good life but some have it way worse then we can imagen. I had talked to a friend about wanting to start a project he had said take over from where i was when i lived there and he told me he was working in schools and doing things, i was wondering how i could do what he had done with me being here in sweden and just about to lose my job. I told Jasmine and Indigo what me and Alieu had told me and if they had any ideas or want to do a project for kids in Africa. Both was excited and started brainstorming right away. We decided we was gonna start the project with the purpose of children helping children it would be as an exchange of knowledge and culture between kids in sweden and kids in africa. Spread love and understanding. Kids helping kids would be something that will teach swedish kids of giving and helping sharing and gaining understanding for something that is far from us and for african kids to learn about sweden our traditions and maybe to gain supplies for school and afterschools activites. What we wanted to do at first was to have sponsor and i asked my contact Sol in Gambia to send me information and told him the idea for the project or "mission" and he was eager to help right away. I am so thankful for all the help he have given me althought we both know we might not get no where with this and we might always be doing it for free. Never be able to make a profit of our own. Just alot of work never any pay.....we are both aware that might be the case. The end mission of this is to have a youthcenter set up, for children of serrekunda to have place to go after school since those places are not so common there. Some place where kids could come to use computers just hang out stay off the street get a roof over the head and some positive place to go to and feel safe and connect with friend shoot pool and withnot yes so many plans for this. I was told i needed to do a project plan and then go to possible sponsors with it and see if they would give money for it, and when i finally talked to a man that know alot about projects he said after a long talk that "you know Teresia you might not be the one to lead this project after all the work you putting down on the planning and writing all the connections you making. They might not feel you have enough experience at all to take on what you wrote about." And i was kind of turned off about that news..something i never ever even thought about ones even...of course i was gonna lead the project it never accured to me someone else might get to do it after the plan i wrote. At first i was thinking it dont matter...its not for me its for the better of the kids....and then i felt the motivation slowing down....i had talked to some more people and it seemed more and more it wouldnt become what i had imagened....my focus was totally lost. I left the project for a couple of months and i was thinking the whole time it really would be such a bad thing if made a plan and it would be misused and be something totally different then what me and Sol had discussed. I was thinking alternative routes to do this and alot of other things happened with jobsearches and kids at home with me the whole time due to summerholiday and i wanted to give them all of my attention. So in the fall i was talking to a dear friend of mine that i had told about the plan for a project and he said after a whole lot of excuses to why the project never had gotten launched that dont make it so damn hard. Start small....start with your kids. And basically all he said was exactly what i had been thinking to do and he gave me new inspiration to start on this project again. Thanks alot for the motivation E! And here we are...just a few days after i had talked to my friend E i talked to Sol and told him i wanted to do it differently... from scratch...my way. Thanks Sol for all your help thus far and for the help and support i know you will give for as long as we do this. This far the connection between my kids and two kids in Gambia, africa has been made and now as i sit here writing this note i have three extra letters from three more kids in Jasmine and Indigos school awaiting to be sent off to kids in Serrekunda Gambia. Im so excited!! So happy my kids and many more will learn about a different life, in The Gambia. This is just the start.....//Teresia