New Stars Shine

Hello! Interesting karma.. Another day with another day of work, another day of helping. Volunteering has always been a huge passion of mine for years. It is something that I consider a great aspect in my life. This evening I had an opportunity to go and speak with some of the volunteers working at the warehouse, it was interesting to see others with the same determination as myself.  I was speaking to one of the 'experts' as we call it (volunteers who have been at the warehouse for over a week), and he spoke to me on issues that affected him, and why he came to volunteer. It is perceived to be that people chose to do this for a few reasons: A passionate volunteer 1) They have had a difficult past, and think this is the best way to remove the past they've had and to rectify the future. 2) They have had a very fortunate past, and this is how they are returning the favour. 3) They believe they can be the change, and are fed up of what is seen in the media...

"Earlier today the Women and Children's centre in the  Dunkirk camp was burnt down by the Kurdish mafia" " Last night 2 people froze to death in Serbia" "Thousands of children in Greece tonight  going to sleep in temperatures of minus 9" We are living in a genuine crises. People who only a few years ago had a warm bed, ripped from them in an anguish of political warfare. Today was an emotional and difficult day. We worked as hard as we could but still had this anger bubbling inside of us from the difficulties Dunkirk experienced this morning. It is unfathomable that this is happening in our day and age. We continue to help. As it was our last day we had the honour of teaching the new volunteers the way of the warehouse. I also sorted the overflow section to make it easier to stock. It was fantastic to get stuck in to all the work we could, and made today one of our most productive. It was however strange to note those...

Hello! Courtesy of Chanelle Manton photography Courtesy of Chanelle Manton photography Last week I went to an interesting panel named 'Aids Activism', the idea behind this was a Q+A and a open panel discussion on HIV, the movements that have been done around this and discussing the stigmas connected with HIV/AIDS, especially as last week was World Aids Day, it seemed fitting. Sussex, Stop AIDS and LGBTQ+ organised the event, which took place at the Sussex University campus (came with free wine!) with a fantastic panel of speakers including: The speakers + organiser Hugh Stirling and members of the Youth Sussex Stop Aids and Ellie Priest (member of LGBTQ+ community (Courtesy of Chanelle Manton Photography) Courtesy of Chanelle Manton Photography Edwin J. Bernard Edwin is the global co-ordinator of the HIV Justice Network, based in Brighton but with an international reach, which focuses on ending the inappropriate use of the criminal law to regulate...