As you may know about 5000 emergency VISA’s have been granted to Ukrainian people fleeing from the Russian invasion. Almost 800 families have arrived in Australia so far, many have small children with them. These people have had to leave everything behind.
It’s hard to imagine how horrible this is for them, the people they have had to leave behind and the rest of us looking on with a sense of frustration and horror at what’s unfolding.
To help these families settle in I would like to try to organise some children’s books that can be given to them as they arrive and settle in. The children are of various ages, and the topics we want to include cover everything from English language, to animals, family life, health, stories, Indigenous culture and Australiana.
This will help them to get an understanding for Australia, our culture and to help them with learning English. I have addresses to send books directly – for most capital cities, as well as the contact details for the Ukrainian people and organisations coordinating the refugees as they arrive.
New and second hand books are welcome. If you want to buy some books and have them shipped directly to a coordination centre in Australia, that would be amazing as well. We will need about 2500 books in total.
Please follow this link to get the addresses for the contact information and addresses to send any books that you can. ADDRESSES AND CONTACT INFORMATION.
This is a great opportunity to help these people who have been caught up in this terrible situation, through no fault of their own. A small gesture can help to welcome these families to our country.
I would be extremely grateful if you could promote this far and wide.
Thank you for your help and support. It means a lot to me.
Andrew
PS A big thank you to my Ukrainian friend, Natasha Arens, who is working around the clock to help process VISA’s for refugees. She’s doing this, whilst dealing with the fact that her own family are still in the Ukraine. Natasha reached out to me to ask for help and I’m glad she did.
