Many refugees who are living near Athens, Greece are in camps or lodging in unsafe buildings. But these aren't exactly most people's preferred housing options. So a lot of folks are looking for alternate options - this is where the Orange House comes in. The Orange House takes in 200 refugees a day. With its community services and safe place to sleep, many refugee choose to stay at the Orange House as long as they can. It's a great place to get to know people, and share a cup of tea or two. But there was one problem - the kitchen is out of commission. For a place like the Orange House, this is a big deal. It means they can't provide healthy, nutritious food to its visitors. This house is one of the only times refugee families in the area may have access to a good home cooked food. So, we thought, we can do something about it. On day 34, we fixed up that kitchen! We purchased a new sink, put in new shelving, and got brand new cooking and eating utensils. It's incredible … [Read more...] about Cooks in the Kitchen

Thousands of people living in Athens, refugees and migrants, do not have access to books in their own languages. Being able to read is so important for learning, entertainment, and relaxation. We Need Books is an organization that is doing the doable and providing books and libraries to refugees in Greece and we wanted to help. We teamed up with our friends Communitere and We Need Books to get the job done. “We wanted to create a space where everyone can find books in their natural language. An environment that feels like home, where people feel safe to meet and accept each other, exchange ideas and express their feelings and opinions," said Giorgos, a member of Communitere. We Need Books is working towards collecting 15,000 books to give to refugees. “There have been 5000 books collected thus far, and the goal is 15,000. The area of focus are books in Arabic, Farsi and Urdu,” said Giorgos. On Day 333, we gave brand new books written in Urdu, the native language in … [Read more...] about Readers are Leaders