God is our refuge and strength, always ready to help in times of trouble. Psalm 46:1

Hi everyone. I hope you had a wonderful Easter break. We have been in Inverness babysitting our 3 grandchildren so that our daughter can finish her GP training – we will be spending a lot of time up there this year, working for Jacob’s Well Appeal remotely where possible.

The war in the Ukraine continues relentlessly and we have continued to send aid, mostly medical, in curtain-sider lorries and the total now has reached 27. Because the financial aid to this conflict has reduced, we will not be able to continue at the rate we have previously, but we will still send as much as we can.

We continue to work abroad with our partners and we have recently drilled a borehole in a place called Jocheribayiri in Northern Ghana. Alistair and I visited this community in November and they have been without a source of clean water for over 50 years. This is a photo of Alistair and I meeting the community in November.

The initial drilling was unsuccessful – the contractors usually drill 3 times for the price (£4,500) in places they feel they should get water. Fortunately the second attempt was successful and they have now a borehole with an abundant supply of water which has been tested by the Ghanaian water Company to confirm that the water is safe to drink. The community will now have to look after this well – a community team has been appointed to do this and the community will have to save some money to cover any future repairs. This is always challenging in these poor regions.

We have also completed a re-usable sanitary pad project at the request of the Wa Municipal Education Directorate. They had seen how successful our previous re-usable sanitary pad projects have been and asked if we could help reach the girls in several schools in the Wa area, Northern Ghana who they felt would benefit greatly from this help. Our partners worked in 4 schools (Charia Clisters of Schools, Gbegru Basic School, Kperisi Basic School and Wa Municipal Girls Model School) and they teach the girls how to make the re-usable pads and they also give sexual health and menstrual hygiene education. 433 girls were reached by this project and every girl that remains in school due to this training not only helps herself but also the family that she will eventually raise. Below are some photos taken at the various schools – the pupils say that they really enjoy the workshops as well as appreciating their value and its wonderful that they can rely on the sunny weather to work outside!

Thank you as always for all your support – we can only achieve so much because of your generosity.