A Party To Celebrate Three Years Together

Thanks to Laura for these reflections on New Beginnings Mentoring's impressive first three years.

There is always a good reason to celebrate...especially if we talk about our achievements over the last three years! The New Beginnings project turned three years old and we celebrated it on 31st May. Many people gathered at The Forum to enjoy a fun day together with music, food and good memories. In front of an enthusiastic audience, our trained music group performed at Café Nova for the second time, playing a wide range of songs, from the Wizard of Oz soundtrack's “Over the Rainbow," to George Gershwin's “I Got Rhythm,” and The Sound of Music soundtrack's “Edelweiss,” when everybody stood up, chose a partner and started dancing together. The concert masterpiece was Aziza’s solo of “Ego,” a song composed and performed by herself with the choir as back-up. Very catchy and performed with passion, you couldn’t get its rhythm out of your head!

The party then moved to The Forum's office, where we enjoyed a lovely video put together by Milca and Martina on our activities and events over the last year. Interviews and photos followed, and you realized how people have benefitted and enjoyed every class, and how strong their bond is with The Forum and among each other. 

Some of their comments were:

“I look forward to coming every Monday, particularly because I do what I love and I can learn from other people”-Knitting group
“I am happy I learned this new ability. Before, I didn’t know how to sew"-Sewing class
“It’s maths for everyday life”- Maths class
“English class is helpful. Before coming here I couldn’t speak any English”-English class

We do owe a big THANKS to Comic Relief who permitted us to keep this project alive and helped so many people. 

Here are only few of New Beginnings' achievements over the last three years:

· The project has been very successful in engaging vulnerable individuals from refugee and migrant backgrounds in activities that help self awareness and self advocacy.
· Through creative writing workshops, mentees have been able to vocalise the frustration and hardships suffered in a safe group setting and to obtain feedback from talented writers from English Pen.
· A football match involved 30 players from the Forum, Evelyn Oldfield Unit and the Department of Transport. It was a great opportunity to socialise and mix with people from different backgrounds.
· Our target was to support 30 service users over the year, but we made 78 matches in this period-73% above target.
· The theatre group performed Moliere’s “The Hypochondriac” as a way of exploring health issues in an open way.
· Thanks to a collaboration with Live Music Now, our music group met for six weeks, which culminated in a concert on 22nd March 2013.

·       129 matches (for a total of 258 people involved)
·       84 ex-mentees involved in self-advocacy activities
·       56 people engaged with our support groups
·       161 new and old mentees established links outside the home and joined activities
·       63 have started volunteering or mainstream education
·       143 people were involved in activities at The Forum
·       192 people took part in events to challenge stigmas

Another BIG THANKS to all the people that helped us throughout these years:

Agnes, Agnieszka, Alessandra, Amandine, Amelia, Amell, Amy, Andrea, Andres, Annik, Anthony, Carola, Caroline, Caspar, Joan, Charlene, Charles, Chiara, Claudia, Dario, Erica , Francesca, Frieda, Gemma, Heike, Ibrahim , James, Jeffery , Joana, Julie, Karen, Katie, Kokila, Laura, Ljiljana, Madalina, Maja, Margaret, Margarida, Maro, Martina, Milca, Mohini, Muna, Neil, Nora, Omid, Philip, Sanaa, Salma, Silvana, Silvia, Sonia, Sophie, Stephen, Suzanne, Sue, Tina, Tish, Ujwala, Valentina, Vittoria...

And if you missed this party, don’t worry: on 22nd June we are going to have the END-OF-THE-YEAR PARTY! 

Let’s meet at Ladbroke Grove Station at 2pm, and we’ll go to Holland Park for an afternoon of games, music, picnic, food, football and more...EVERYBODY IS WELCOME!!