Bikes 4 Life in Uganda.
‘I dreamed a Dream’ Performed live by Patrick Roberts at Bikes 4 Life’s Annual Fundraiser in Melbourne.See bikes4life.com.au for more info on the great work by Bikes 4 Life.
I Dreamed a Dream – Uganda from Ebony Butler on Vimeo.
Follow Bikes 4 Life at www.facebook.com/bikes4lifeorg
In 2012 we travelled to Uganda and New Zealand to continue filming for our documentary ‘Child Troopers’.
In early 2013 we then traveled to the UK to find out more information and hear more stories for our film. This continues again in Uganda in the coming months.
We will be posting some clips form the recent filming in London in the next few weeks so please check back soon for a sneak peak!
We are also sending a 2nd container of bikes to Uganda through our partner organisation Bikes 4 Life, helping the lives of former child soldiers and victims of war.
We wish everyone success and happiness in 2013 and hope you continue to follow our progress with Child Troopers as we enter the final stages of post production later in the year!
Please follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/childtroopers and on Twitter at www.twitter.com/madvsbad
Peace!
Hey everyone: friends, fans and dear supporters!
Unsigned Management celebrated it’s 1st year in business last Thursday and they decided to do something a little different by asking various artists both locally and overseas to collaborate with them!
They celebrated with an art exhibition and auction, with all money raised going to us at Bikes 4 Life! The auction started on Thursday night and is still going!
The artwork is up for Auction and will be on display at Artmix studio located at 42 Clifton Street, Prahran Victoria.
Opening times:
Monday 10th – Friday 14th December 2012
10am – 4pm.
Auction is going to be open a little longer than originally planned. Closing Friday 14th at 3pm. So please feel free to pop over to Artmix and take a look.
Size of the pieces are A0.
BIDDING
If you’d like to bid or have a sticky beak at what’s happening,
SMS 0429 362 207 and write: R bikes your full name
eg; R bikes Wendy Lilley.
Pass onto your friends and family as all money raised goes to our current projects in Australia and Abroad!
And, it’s easy to do and loads of fun!
See the link below for more info and to see the art work on auction!!
http://us1.campaign-archive2.com/?u=26b421cd110c38dd708c63982&id=9d9b039291&e=a7eeaa4525
Happy Bidding!
All the Bikes 4 Life teams across Australia are working hard to repair and collect enough bikes, spares and tools for a special Christmas shipment of bikes to Uganda and remote Indigenous communities in Australia.
We would love your help to make this happen and make a real difference to these communities.
BBQ and drinks provided with live acoustic performances from local artists including Zito Ballo and Vinnie Iyer!!
This event is to kick off our weekly Sunday workshops and BBQs and to help get our bikes ready for another shipment to AFRICA!
The event is in support of our Bikes 4 Life Indigenous Program, and to celebrate our recent success in Africa, where we delivered 400 bicycles to remote communities and set up a bike workshop for former child soldiers and victims of Kony’s war in northern Uganda.
There will be food, music, magic and a short film preview of our work in Uganda.
Thanks for your support and I truly hope to see you on Thursday evening!
See: www.bikes4life.com.au and www.facebook.com/bikes4lifeorg
Well it has been an amazing first week in the Pearl of Africa! We spent 6 days in Kampala meeting up with friends and contacts from political and humanitarian roots, while also awaiting the arrival of our container full of bikes from Australia.
A few days in we went to the DAMCO office in Kampala to find out what was happening with our bikes and found out there had been a problem at customs with our mattresses and mobile ambulances.
We got the the required papers arranged to clear the container in Mombasa, and were told that we had to wait for a truck to become available, and 4 days on from that call, we are still waiting for a truck to become available!!
We spent a few days meeting with organisation’s that work with orphans and slum communities in the Kampala region, including Hope Restoration Ministry in Jinja and AFFCAD in Bwaise. We will be delivering bikes to both groups when the container arrives, hopefully by next week!
We were chewing into our time north while waiting for the bikes so decided to travel to Gulu, the biggest town in Northern Uganda. We first had a meting with the President of the Uganda people’s Congress (UPC) Doctor Olara Otunnu. By the time the interview ended it was almost 4pm, and traveling to the north is not advised at night time. However we had people waiting for us so we decided to go anyway!
We made it to Gulu safe and sound, thanks to our top driver Charles… We had some close encounters with trucks and saw the Presidential Convoy thrash by. We also ran over a dog which was terrible. It shocked the whole crew, and we arrived close to 11pm in Gulu in quite a sombre state.
I woke up today with the phone going crazy, emails and facebook all maxed out with stories about Joseph Kony and the LRA (Lords’ Resistance Army). Invisible Children have supposedly launched one of the biggest social media / viral marketing campaigns of all time. Interesting that we are here half an hour from Joseph Kony’s home town and at the centre of where all the worst atrocities took place, yet we have heard no one at all talking about it…!?
Today is International Women’s Day and we are going to celebrate with the Gulu community. After that we will continue our work on the ground, helping communities affected by the war and interviewing people about issues relating the the other side of the coin… Every story has two sides after all!
WOW what an amazing day we have had!
With many thanks to all involved, and special thanks to Visa Global for the shipping and management, Ex-Pat Deli for the container, Nick & co for the Graffiti and art, John Wells & co at Independent Color for the stickers (logo’s) and Bunnings Port Melbourne for the new equipment…!
Our awesome graffiti artists started yesterday at Visa in Yarraville, and spent the whole day painting the container, which when in Africa will become a bike workshop for former child soldiers.
It is with pleasure and great excitement that I announce Bikes 4 Life’s newest sponsor, Visa Global Logistics.
Visa Global came on board with Bikes 4 Life after their marketing manager, Joe Cetin, saw the segment on The Project on Channel 10 just a few weeks ago.
Australian owned company, Visa Global Logistics is now Bikes 4 Life’s official shipping sponsor, who will oversee the first shipment of bikes to Africa, scheduled to leave Melbourne on the 11th of January 2012.
In February, the Bikes 4 Life and Child Troopers crew will be setting up a Bikes 4 Life Workshop and Vocational Training Program in Uganda, at our partner organization and child soldier rehabilitation center, Friends of Orphans. The 40 foot shipping container donated by Ex-Pat Deli and decked out by ANL, will become the actual workshop in Pader, Northern Uganda at the Friends of Orphans site.
The program is aimed at not only assisting in the rehabilitation and re-integration efforts at FRO, for the hundreds of young traumatized victims and former child soldiers of a brutal civil war, but it is also aimed at giving them an opportunity to learn practical and useful skills that can help in securing employment in the future. Furthermore, Bikes 4 Life aims to provide each person at the center with their own bicycle, so they can visit their families without walking for days, giving them the ability provide for their families when they return home to their villages after rehabilitation, allowing faster and easier access to food, water and access education & medical facilities, giving them a real chance at overcoming the traumas of their past and getting ahead in life- against all the odds.
On behalf of the Bikes 4 Life Team and the Child Troopers Crew, thank you Visa Global – for making all of this possible and for helping us to help others….
Merry Christmas!
Justice delayed is justice denied.
Grave human rights violations in Northern Uganda have gone unnoticed for 30 years because no one spoke out.
A wise man once said that 'there comes a time when silence is betrayal'. That time is now. #EndTheSilence
You can make a real difference by sharing and signing our petition at: http://bit.ly/STOPM7 #EndImpunity
HR WatchList Refugee Law Project Global Policy Blog
A BRILLIANT GENOCIDE 