Julie Hellon is back from her second visit to Kenya, helping children and supporting new projects so I caught up with her to find out how it went...
‘Everyone can make a difference. I had a fantastic time and I’m really pleased that I was able to go again,’ Julie explains.
‘With two weeks in and around Nairobi, where did you start?’
‘One of the most important ways of helping is with the school programmes. What that means in real terms is buying uniforms as although school is free, the children have to have a uniform to be allowed to attend. €20 is enough to provide a whole new school uniform, so that can be a life-changing amount for one child.’
Julie told me she was also able to help a 14-year-old girl called Evelyn during her stay by providing the most basic things like sanitary towels and a tiny bag of toiletries. To own those things for herself made Evelyn cry. Most of us have bathroom cabinets full of these things, which we totally take for granted.
On her first visit Julie had supported a ten-year-old boy called John Felix, so this time it was wonderful to see him again up at the rural area, playing football when she arrived. She explained, ‘Sadly though just a few days later he contracted malaria and I spent the next four days nursing him back to health.’
‘One of my friend’s daughters plans to have a cake sale to raise money and wants to charge 40 centimes per cup cake. That was the exact cost of one packet of malaria tablets to treat a child like John Felix and ultimately save a life. 
It makes you
think doesn’t it?’
The donations that Julie was able to take with her provided 30 young girls with new underwear and personal items. It also paid for a pharmacy cabinet of basic first aid, and it set-up a chicken farming project. The idea behind this is for the villagers to look after and fatten-up chickens, eventually selling them on for a profit which then goes towards buying more to fatten up, vaccinate and sell on. And obviously in the meantime they live off the eggs. Eventually they hope to use profits to provide school places.
One afternoon Julie and the others from the trust organised a little Christmas party for 70 children where they got to play games and eat biscuits for an afternoon of pure fun.
And finally while she was there they started a book collection, Julie explains: ‘That’s one of the questions everyone asks me. People here in France would love to donate their books but getting them out to Kenya where they are desperately needed is impossibly expensive. If there are any transport companies, charities or airline workers out there who know a way of solving this problem we would be grateful.’
Julie is planning to return to Kenya in April and if you’d like to donate or help in any other way then please contact her on 0033 (0)6 12 37 46 74 or email julie.hellon@yahoo.com