It has been a while since we gave you some feedback. First, before I forget again: Alfons and Yvonne van Galien of the Rehoboth Children’s Village would like to personally thank each donor and sponsor of Heart for Children that contributed to the R200000 that we collected for the children of the village. I am so glad to be able to report that, so far,

• All 17 children’s homes in the village now have a full gas stove!

• All the stoves have been installed and certified by an approved supplier. Unfortunately, this turned out to be a rather large cost factor.

• 20 x 9kg gas bottles were purchased as well.

• All lights in the homes were replaced with 56 LED back-up lights. These will keep on giving light for a few hours after the power goes off.

The cost for the above was almost R115000. We are all satisfied that this would enable the children’s homes to still function well in case of a power failure or load shedding.

The intention is that the remainder of the money be spent on adding pure solar power to the children’s village. Note that in the office, solar had already been installed. The solar of the school and education center had also been installed already but did not function due to a faulty inverter.

• The faulty inverter at the school/education center has now been replaced for a little more than R10000 which included installation and certification costs.

This means that, so far, the office and the school & education center in the children’s village are now covered with power, especially in case of load shedding. What remains is the activity center of the village which also includes the clinic and the cooling/freezer room. There is a quote for a complete 3kW solar system servicing this building for R80750. We want to approve this expenditure but if you did the sums: yes, indeed, this is just ca. R5750 above our budget. However, considering such a large project, this is not really that much. I am sure we all wish to bring our help to the Rehoboth Children’s Village to a successful end. I just realized that we are really doing miracles, right here! We can do this. I am sure of it. I will also donate an extra R500 for this. May I once more ask for your assistance as well, please? Just click here, and maybe you can give as reference: your name + Rehoboth.

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(Please remember that we also still need your regular monthly contributions to keep up with our monthly assistance to the safe houses that we have committed to!)

Note that we have sent all donors of Heart for Children the certificate for the tax year ending 29/2/2024. Please let us know if you have not received it. Just send e-mail us or send us an SMS (for our addresses and numbers: see at the end of this letter).

Thanking you for any contribution and wishing you God’s richest blessings!

Henry Pool

henrypool7@gmail.com

0836297690

We did it!!! Altogether we collected R200000 for the solar/gas project for the Rehoboth Children’s Village in Murchison near Port Shepstone. On behalf of the children of the village, I would like to thank everyone who helped us to realize this fantastic goal. 100000x thanks to Hart voor Kinderen in the Netherlands who kept their promise to match our fund-raising effort here in South Africa Rand for Rand. Then, a special word of thanks to all of you who made sizeable contributions for this project: Hatfield Christian Church, Savannah Chemicals and John B. We also want to thank Christine, Alida, Deon, Hanli, Thiru, Hazel, George, Karin, Annetjie, Ingrid and Yvonne for making extra contributions for this project. May God bless you richly for your superb generosity.

The next step would be for Heart for Children (Henry & Annette) to consult with the founders of the Rehoboth’s Children Village, namely Alfonse and Yvonne van Galen, to determine how best to utilize the funds that we have now available for them. They are such lovely people. The goal would be for Rehoboth to become as near as possible to total independence from Eskom power. Priority should perhaps be given to putting all the children’s homes on gas cooking. Then, for the remainder, we are looking at various solar applications. I heard that it might be cheaper to build a field with solar panels for the whole village rather than to put up solar at each of the individual homes – this would be something worth investigating. Perhaps there are some consulting engineers amongst us who are willing to help by giving a free consultation to see exactly what they have in place already and what best can be done with the available funds? Or perhaps you know a friend whom you could ask to help us out here? Please let us know, and then, God willing, we can decide to visit the village at some time soon.

Whatever happens, obviously we will keep all of you informed and make some pictures for you to show the progress being made! Wishing you God’s richest blessings,

Henry and Annette Pool

Cel. +27836297690

E-mail: henrypool7@gmail.com

HEART FOR CHILDREN

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