The Patchai Kili Play Centre and Centre for the Elderly

As keen readers of George’s blog will know, Bishopston Trading Co has its origins in the Bishopston Kuppam Link, which was established in 1978 as – at the time - quite a groundbreaking link between Bishopston and a small village community in a developing country. Carolyn Whitwell was one of the three founders of this link, and I was another. I remained very active in the Link until 2004, when my husband and I (who by then made up one sixth of the remaining committee) retired to the SW of France.

My first visit to the village was in 1991. Tragically Barbara Jennings who worked in the Glastonbury BTC shop had been killed just before Christmas 1990 on her way to work. Her husband asked for donations in her memory, to the work of the Link, and with this seed money we were able to set up a small play centre in KVKuppam. Subsequently further small versions of the play centre were established in several other villages in the area and I visited over the years to do further training with the teachers. When we wound up the Link in 2004, we decided to put the money remaining in funds towards building a purpose-built play centre which could later become a model centre for training in the play approach to early childhood learning.

Last January we visited for a month and during this time the play centre was set up, equipped and teachers selected and given rudimentary training. We have just come back from a second visit when we were able to see how well the work of the centre was going and to give some guidance for future development. As you can see from the photos, there are some very happy children clearly enjoying their play in the Patchai kili centre. The name incidentally means Green Parrot in Tamil. If things go to plan we will return next year to set the centre up for training other nursery teachers, and thus disseminate the methods more widely. Learning through play is not traditional in India but in recent years has begun to be practised.

In addition this year we opened the centre for a second use, thanks largely to a generous donation from the South Indian Rural Development trust, which is the charity set up by Bishopston Trading Ccompany and into which all profits not used to grow the business are put. The other room in the building is to be a day centre for elderly people who will come five mornings a week to meet together, to play games, to read the newspaper and to watch television. The ayah who looks after the play centre will also make snacks and hot milk for the elderly people. Just before we left the village we were able to meet those who have been chosen to benefit, six women and four men who seemed very happy to be offered this.

The centre is set, as you will see in the photo above, in a grove of coconuts. It is on the outskirts of Seetaramanpet which is near K V Kuppam. The other village from whom children and old people are drawn is Kamanchemanpet, and both villages share the management of the work of the centre. They are both traditionally weavers’ villages and many of the families are dependent on Bishopston Trading Co for their livelihoods. As you can see, and as is very obvious to us during our visits to the area, Bishopston Trading has made such a difference to the lives of many families over the years, in many different ways.

Sally Whittingham

Lighting Candles in K.V.Kuppam

As many of you will know, Bishopston Trading Company grew out of a twinning link that was established in 1978 between the area of Bishopston in Bristol and the South Indian village of K.V.Kuppam. The twinning link is still going strong, and two of its most active members are Sally Whittingham and Pam Morris. Here is something Pam recently wrote for us about one of the projects she runs.

The One Candle Project

“In our village so many poor people are not able to study. Parents have so many dreams about their children’s future. They can only able to dream because they are very poor, but now because of you they are fulfilling their dreams........ Not only you’re fulfilling their dreams, actually you’re fulfilling their golden dreams because you are giving a very good education in English Medium........You people have a place in our heart.”

(Extract from a letter from Balaji who lives in Seetharamanpet village and is a member of the One Candle Fund committee)

In 2004 my husband Brian and I spent several months in the K V Kuppam area, researching many aspects of daily life in order to produce our web site www.kvkuppam.info

Whilst carrying out our research, we made friends with a large number of families. We were shown great hospitality and were privileged to hear about the hopes and fears of these families, both from parents and children. Over time, we began to hear more and more distressing stories of hardships, sometimes caused by illness or death. In times of trouble, people usually strive to help out family members if possible as there is no welfare state safety net for this community.

The concept of the One Candle Project arose out of a desire, shared by other visitors from Bishopston, to do something to help out, specifically when family problems mean that it becomes difficult or impossible to keep a child in education. After discussion with Mr Immanuel, who is the administrator of the Rural Unit for Health and Social Affairs (RUHSA), the development organization based in K V Kuppam Block, the simple structure of the One Candle Project was agreed. We made a bursary available for families who would otherwise not be able to afford to support their children to continue in school. This is for approximately £20-£25 per year and is paid by cheque directly to the children we support and administrated by me with a committee of people from the community and Rural Community Officers from RUHSA. We are extremely fortunate to have the support of RUHSA and some excellent local people. We started with eleven children in 2004 and this number has risen each year as we have been able to raise the funds to support the project. The aim of the fund is simply to enable children from lower income families to complete their education and when a child is granted a bursary we commit to supporting them each year.

In January 2010 we once again visited India and celebrated six years of this successful project with almost one hundred children attending a gathering in the new Pachai Kili Centre which houses the play centre and our new centre for the elderly. The One Candle Fund is now helping sixty children and we are extremely grateful to Bishopston Trading Company for their recent generous support which enables us to help an additional thirty four children from weaving families. It was heart warming to meet so many young ‘Candles’ and to hear them express their thanks so eloquently. It is very humbling to realise what a difference a relatively small amount of support can make. If anyone would like to know more about The One Candle Project, The Pachai Kili Play Centre and/or the latest exciting project with the elderly I would love to hear from you. Also if anyone would like to support us please get in touch.

There are further details about the One Candle Project online here, and Pam welcomes emails from interested people: pam@kvkuppam.info

Sally's daughter, Rosie, will be running the Indian Queen's Half Marathon on August 1st and all funds she raises will be donated to the projects run by Sally and Pam in K.V.Kuppam. Sponsorship donations can be placed online here.

The Bishopston-Kuppam link is a registered charity (number 283659).

The One Candle Project takes its name from a saying sometimes attributed to Gandhi:

‘It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness’

Bishopston Trading Opens in Clifton

On Friday of last week we opened the doors of our new outlet store in Clifton village, Bristol. The shop can be found at 14 Clifton Down Road, see here for a map of the area. The shop is just open for four weeks, and is full of our organic Fairtrade cotton clothing at reduced prices. We're very happy to be adding this temporary outlet to our chain of shops as part of the celebrations of our 25th anniversary. Our other shops can be found in Bishopston-Bristol, Bradford on Avon, Glastonbury, Malmesbury and Totnes.

For 25 years this year, we have worked in partnership with the South Indian village of K.V.Kuppam, providing long-term, stable employment to hundreds of local villagers. The original inspiration for the business was a simple statement made by one of the villagers that as skilled craftspeople they need work not charity: this has remained the founding principle of the business since then.

Career Opportunity with Bishopston Trading

We are currently looking for a dynamic person with retail sales experience to lead the team in our Malmesbury store. This is great opportunity for someone who is motivated by Fair Trade and passionate about fashion to join our pioneer Fair Trade company.

Have a look here for further details.

Ethical Clothing Questionaire

My colleague Judi was recently accosted in Camden Lock Market by a student undertaking some research into how personal values relate to our decisions to buy ethical clothing.

You can complete her survey here, it sounds like a very interesting research project.

500 Fairtrade Towns, Boroughs, Counties, Kingdoms and Villages

Take a look at this short video clip on the guardian site with soundbites from Fairtrade campaigners from across the country.

Video: Fairtrade heroes: 'It's bigger than a money thing' Society guardian.co.uk

The Fair Trade movement is about to celebrate the 500th Fairtrade town in Britain - here town is used in quite a loose sense: it covers Boroughs, Counties, Villages and even Kingdoms! Many of the Fairtrade groups behind these campaigns have had Fairtrade cotton bags produced for them by Bishopston Trading Company, some have gone on to have their own promotional Fairtrade cotton tea towels as well.

We're happy to say we're members of the Bristol Fairtrade Network which is the steering group behind Bristol's Fairtrade City status. We're also proud to say that the spirit of solidarity and justice that underpins the whole Fair Trade movement runs deep in our veins here at Bishopston Trading. The company grew out of a twinning link that was established between the area of Bishopston in Bristol and the South Indian village of K.V.Kuppam all the way back in 1978.

Bishopstonians have been supporting social development projects in K.V.Kuppam since that time and the trading company itself grew out of a direct request from some of the villagers for stable jobs. As a company we exist solely to provide stable, well-paid employment for the people of K.V.Kuppam; any profits that we make which aren't used to grow the business and generate further employment are donated to our sister charity to fund development projects in the area.

Here's to the next 500 Fairtrade towns!

Eco-Fashion in Greece

For anyone planning a holiday to the beautiful Greek islands, we recommend a visit to sun-soaked Syros. In the picturesque town of Ermoupoli, you'll find Mumu, an eco-boutique selling stylish summer frocks designed and made by Athena Bentila using our organic Fairtrade cotton cloth.

Read her blog here and find her shop on Google Earth lat=37.4444484519, lon=24.9432047814. I tried installing a gadget to embed Google Earth into this post, but my technical skills failed me, so instead I've put an old-fashioned photo of the town, one of the map and a couple of Athena's beautiful designs.

For those of us not fortunate to be holidaying in Syros this year, you can instead visit Mumu's online Etsy shop.