During the October school holidays, Lake Aid decided to offer activities in and around Annecy for our community of asylum-seeking teens and unaccompanied minors. We reached out to our volunteers and they responded with lots of ideas and proposals.
We kicked off the week in Talloires with a pizza lunch and an afternoon at accrobranche for six teens led by Felicity and Carolina. At the same time, Suzanne and Aleks took a group of eight to the ice rink!
On Tuesday, mountain guide Aurore took a small group to the top of the Parmelan mountain, the weather was perfect and the views outstanding! Four younger children went to a woodwork workshop in Thones with Yvonne. Such a great effort by our volunteers to offer several activities in one day to make sure we have something for everyone!
Tired legs from the hike didn’t not stop the bike ride on Wednesday! Volunteer Rino had his hands full with six boys!
Thursday was more relaxing with a trip to the cinema and a delicious crepe afterwards! Thanks to Britta for letting the teens have a rest day!
On Friday, super bowling coach Joy and I took ten teens bowling in Annecy. A great time was had by all, we found some new bowling talent and we finished off the afternoon feasting on homemade cakes and sandwiches from volunteer Lisa!
Luckily we made the most of the first week of the holidays because the second week was cut short by the announcement of new Covid restrictions but we still managed to organise a ‘girly’ day in town for three teenage girls with Britta! The majority of teens in the Lake Aid community are boys so it was nice to create a special day for the girls.
The events that were cancelled due to Covid were yoga, football tournament and watching an ice hockey match but we hope to organise these activities another time when it is safe to do so.
Overall, 20 children aged 11-18 joined in at least one activity event during the holiday with 15 participating in 2 or more activities. The children came from 8 different countries, Kosovo, Armenia, Albania, Ukraine, Burkina Faso, Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Venezuela
Many thanks to our volunteers Felicity, Carolina, Suzanne, Yvonne, Aleks, Khaled, Ciro, Rosalinda, Aurore, Claude, Rino, Britta, Joy, Lisa, Nerys, Sam – also 8 different nationalities! We also received some very generous donations to fund the activities via our website www.lakeaid74.org, for which we are extremely grateful.