Seven years ago, Frank Gish was deeply moved by a story in the Vancouver Sun about a young woman who could no longer blithely walk by a group of abandoned children in the streets of Kampala.
Just as Carli Travers, a social work graduate from Vancouver, was compelled to do something to help these children, Gish knew he too could not stand idly by.
"I think sometimes you're just ready for something," Gish says of why this story more than all the others he'd read, resonated so strongly. "It was Carli's courage and compassion that jumped out at me. I needed to find out more about her."
Travers' email was in the story and so he wrote her a note, asking how to make a donation.
The email exchange continued and evolved into a friendship. A few years ago, Gish and his wife, Joanna Mereu, who live on Bowen Island, travelled to the Ugandan home that Travers' has created for abandoned children and got a sense of the chaos that is her everyday life.
As the legal guardian of 16 children and mother to five sons of her own, there is constant chaos and activity even before you add in the five dogs, three cats and a monkey.
"You just kind of roll with it," says Gish.
Travers and her husband Robert Birungi will be making a presentation in North Vancouver the evening of Oct. 8. Gish encourages people to hear Travers' story, which she's recounted in a book called And Then She was Free, so they know that there is so much we all can do.
"She's given children, with no chance at all, security. They're safe, they don't have to steal to eat, they have a chance to get an education. Just come out and hear the story and be inspired. What I've learned is we don't have to be a Carli to make a difference. There are some things you can do to help her. She needs us.
"If we all do something, we'll make a difference."
To learn more about the community that Travers has created, go to Abetavu.com. Contact her at [email protected] for the location of the Oct. 8 event, where handmade crafts from Uganda will also be available.
