The African Pulse

The 10th October 2010 is a special day – 10th day of the 10th month in the 10th year of the 21st Century – not to be repeated! So The African Pulse is looking to mark this day in a very special way. We are looking to our supporters and their friends to gather together and see if they can raise money from all sorts of wacky (and not so wacky) activities and events. The theme is ’10′ and so one good way of participating is giving £10 for 10 months via standing order. Details of this and other ideas can be found in the attached flier. Let us know what you are doing and we will publicise it on this blog and on our Facebook group.  10-10-10 flier

What can we say? Such a big thank you to One Water for their support at the Red Lion fundraiser.

They delivered a whole crate of bottled water to the venue for us to give away. And boy, did we need it!

It was a warm June day in 2007. Now the organisation is more than just water – the issues the HIV, sanitation, micro-finance and nutrition.

Take a look at the real difference they are making: www.onedifference.org. Great!

Over the past two year The African Pulse has formalised some strategic partnerships positioning the charity at the cutting edge of service delivery in Africa for vulnerable children and communities through the use of multi-media.  This has led to us securing European Union funding to run a 3 year HIV and AIDS campaign across Southern Africa. This project is called YAX – Youth Action Xchange, partly funded by the European Commission.

The African Pulse educational material on HIV and AIDS and life skills is also currently being realigned and launched to reach millions of African youth through mobile technology.

Together with our partner, Gemin-i (www.gemin-i.org), we are working towards innovating, designing and producing different ways to create better support systems and services to the most poor, isolated and vulnerable children in Africa and to provide effective awareness about HIV to both children in Africa and Europe.  Gemin.i is our key partner based in the UK. The aim of the YAX project in partnership with Gemin.i is to raise awareness and generate understanding amongst young people in the European Union about the global HIV and AIDS epidemic and to mobilise greater support for collaborative action.  This will be done by using innovative web 2.0 technology and new media to better integrate the teaching of HIV&AIDS awareness into the formal education sector.  Using this web technology it will also link children in Europe with children in Southern Africa to share information and experiences about living in a world with HIV&AIDS.  The aim is further to mobilise young people to work together to take action through community campaigns and by engaging with and influencing policy makers.

The project will get participating student to engage in the following activities, via an online and mobile phone community:

• Understanding the global HIV&AIDS epidemic
• Exploring attitudes in the local community
• Understanding current interventions and the role of policymakers
• Conducting interviews with policymakers
• Collaborating and sharing knowledge with partner schools across Europe and in southern Africa
• Designing campaigns and taking appropriate actions to be shared with other participating schools in Europe and southern Africa
• Voicing concerns to policy makers.

Josie Field released her debut album in 2006, entitled Mercury, the abum sold in excess of 7 000 units across South Africa, an astounding achievement for a debut album by an unknown artist.

The first single off her debut album was Every Now And Then, which went to number 1 on 5 FM’s chart and was at number 1 on listener-voted Hi5 @ 5 for 7 weeks.

The single also featured in the Mediaguide National airplay chart which tracks airplay across all stations in the country, peaking at number 43.

Her second single, 10 Years went to number 2 on 5FM and stayed on the number 1 spot on the Hi 5 @ 5 for 3 weeks. 10 Years went all the way to 31 on the Mediaguide National airplay charts as well.

She played her first gig in Europe at our Red Lion fundraiser. This came about because TAP Trustee, Peter Desmond, met her father, Trevor Field, through Kelly Philips of One Water (one of our key sponsors of the Red Lion event). One Water know Trevor because they fund the project he founded called Play Pumps (www.playpumps.co.za) which fresh water to kids in a very innovative way.

So while Peter was visiting a Play Pump school in South Africa, Trevor mentioned that Josie was looking to play in the UK – we jumped at the chance! Where is she now?

Going from strength to strength as you can see from her website (www.josiefield.co.za) and MySpace page (www.myspace.com/josiefield). We’d love to have you back again Josie!

Fiachra Kerrigan, Marner Brown’s lead vocalist, went to St Mark’s School in Hounslow with TAP’s USA Champion, Nick Lee. So when we wanted a local band to play at our Red Lion fundraiser, they were the obvious choice. Where are they now?

Have a look at their website (www.marnerbrown.net) and their MySpace page (www.myspace.com/marnerbrownband).

Some amazing testimonials – “When asked by Graeme Thompson of The Word Magazine… Q : What bands should we be listening to? A : “Another band I saw the other day are Marner Brown – They are really good. They had a bit of a Led Zep / .. n Roses type thing” .”Ronnie Wood (Jan 2008). Last year they wrote the soundtrack to a TV & cinema advert for Grolsh! We better have them back soon.

Doug Veitch and Rise Kagona are still playing the clubs and festivals around the UK. Check out them on MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/cultureclashmusic. For those of you who don’t know the story of Rise and The Bhundu Boys have a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhundu_Boys and http://www.bhunduboy.co.uk/index.html. Jiti on!

Oscar Soiza cycled the 45 miles from London to Brighton and raised over £300 for The African Pulse.

Thanks Oscar, you are a real African Pulse Champion!