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Projects 2009
„A chance for every child ” -- a project where by Oaza offeres suport to the families in which children are reintegrated upon their request is an ongoing project. We are currently helping 2 families to fix or build their houses.
For more information on how to help build or repair a house for former homeless people , write to us at: contact@oaza.com
December 2009
As we do every year on 1st of December (National Day of Romania) , kids and adults got together to decorate the house for Christmas. All the hand made decorations made by the kids previously were joyfully distributed on the tree and around the house along side those from the previous years while listening to Christmas Carols.
First weekend in December we received the visit of our friends from Scotland. They brought presents with them for each child . High School Musical and Ben 10 bags were their favourite items. The team spent quality time with the children and took Laura shopping for food and several important items for the Day Centre.
As part of the Federation Plus, Oaza visited the town of Gyula Hungary together with representatives of Arad City and 4 other charities.
Arad and Gyula are twin towns and visits like this one are carefully selected in order to increase collaboration between various institutions of both towns. During the visit the delegation was shown a children’s home, an elderly facility and the Romanian High School.
Winter shown itself too aggressively in December. Temperatures of minus 17 and icy roads made it impossible to drive out of Arad for days.
Our visits to the families we support had to be delayed until right before Christmas / New Year when we went delivering food and Christmas gifts to every child of every family.
November half term
Laura , volunteers and the kids designed various activities for the few Oaza kids found on half term break. One of the activities was visiting their friends, now reintegrated in their natural families.
Another activity was making “sweet ravioli”. It was a difficult but very enjoyable task for Laura and the younger kids. All hard work was rewarded by the praises received by the other kids after testing the fruits of our hard work.
November 13th Open house Day
Second time this year Casa Shalom was opened to the public. We spent 4 wonderful hours in the presence of school friends, teachers, colleagues and guests.
3 volunteers from a Millenium Centre program came over to “close the night” with fun games . They also initiated discussions regarding volunteering, especially sharing with the Oaza young people about opportunities they could also have and work towards as young adults.
Trip to kids park, picnic in nature :
Oaza kids had a special day out with a team of volunteers from Sheffield , Great Britain. They played table tennis, ball games and enjoyed the slides and swings.
Minis 2009
Oaza kids were reunited with those reintegrated for a week of fun. Cezar, Paula and I enjoyed a good time together with 16 kids. We played locally, climbed the hills around, went to open air swimming pool, then took a trip up the hill to see a fortress with the young people from Rushden, UK. Rushden team came over to specifically decorate kids bedrooms while we went away. They did a very good job and we’re very grateful!
21 - 22 nd August 2009
We had the delight of having The Flying Seagull Foundation over for a couple of days. They gave all the Oaza kids and the kids in the community 2 unforgettable days : magic tricks, jokes and lots of fun and music.
12-15 August 2009
“Drum Fest” Christian music festival . It was the real camping experience : sleeping in tents, cooking on small cooker, eating outdoors. Relaxing time in the day time, playing games and lots of music in the evening.
July 2009
Kids, Cezar, Patri, Paula ,Hannah, Noel and I went on an adventure, travelling in our cars to : Hunedoara – Sibiu - Sighisoara. We had never done this before so it was a special treat for both the children and the adults.
We visited a Castle, a Zoo, the Romanian National Folk Museum, enjoyed the beginning of the Medieval Festival. We travelled about 800 km round trip. Kids say it was the best trip we ever took.
july 2009
1.Trip to Curtici : sun, pools and fun… lots of fun.
2. Kids, staff and I were invited to an outdoor event. Mayor was present and accepted to have his picture taken with us.
1st June 2009 – International Children’s Day
We celebrated children’s special day on 30th May together with a group of people from The New Hope Trust in Scotland.
We organised several games ( the parachute was most loved) and competitions. All children received gifts and prizes.
26th May 2009 Neighbours Day
Our local government is getting more and more European. A new tradition has been promoted: Neighbours Day.Oaza was asked to host the event for our neighbours so we were all involved in sharing invitations, decorating, cooking and enjoying a really nice day with our neighbours.
All guests brought food and drinks and of course came equipped with good will to share with the other guests. The children performed in front of the guests and invited them to visit their beautiful house.
In 25th/26th April 2009 , we organised a trip to a place called Sistarovat (seven streams), in Arad county.
We met with people and children from other nations there and enjoyed activities like: music, arts, hiking, different sports. Kids and we had a great time!
18th /19th April Easter Celebrations
At Easter some children visited friends and family. Those that stayed at home, in Casa Shalom, we arganised fun activities such as baking of special cakes, painting of the red eggs, decorating the house according to the celebration. The teenagers went out to the local Church to celebrate Resurrection while the younger ones stayed in the house to watch it on TV. Some of the “lucky” kids even met the Easter Bunny.
14th April 2009 Day out
Laura Andres, Paula Dunn and all Oaza kids went out for the day to visit a family in another county. Children were very happy to spend the day in the company of that family, to play with their son and share gifts with them.
8th March 2009 Celebrating Women’s Day
In a very festive atmosphere, we celebrated Woman’s Day in Casa Shalom. Children performed in front of Oaza staff and several guests (volunteers and friends of the children) .
Special gifts were offered by the children to all present : nicely decorated boxes filled with hand made (by them) cookies/ biscuits.
All ladies present were touched by the children and their gifts.
7th March 2009 the “Open House Day”
In this day , Casa Shalom was open to the public for 6 hours.
People were encouraged to come in and learn of our projects and social services. Children’s friends, teachers, parents and neighbours were our guests throughout the day.
1st March 2009 “Matisor”
“Martisor”(read murtsishor) is a piece of decoration tied with red and white ribbon. It is worn by children and ladies and it represents a way of telling each other that harsh winter is over and warm spring is coming.
Under the guidance of our director, Patricia Mircea, students from a local high school and the oaza kids got together to design and make such decorations. The students sold the decorations and used the money to buy food supplies for a number of very elderly people from the community.
Residential Services:
Our hope for all of our children is that they will be raised in a healthy environment of love and care having their physical, emotional, and spiritual needs met. We endeavor to help them realize their individual worth and potential.
Being part of a family is difficult for children who have spent the early, formidable years of their lives in an environment where survival is the focus.
We desire to bring peace and a sense of belonging to our children through healthy relationships within their "family home" and with the other children of Oaza and staff. In the cases of siblings within Oaza, the children remain together.
In the situations where appropriate, we encourage the children and their birth families to have healthy contact and in some circumstances help with support, counsel, and reunification of the children with their birth parent(s).
The children attend local schools and the older teenagers receive practical work training.
Once they reach 18 years of age, we continue to train and prepare them in order that they may one day support themselves physically and emotionally as they are able.
The children are encouraged to participate in the church activities of Emmanuel Christian Centre, a Free Methodist Church in Arad.
The church members are very supportive of the Oaza children and include them as part of the fellowship.
When the children are home from school for a long weekend or at half term periods, we like to give the children the opportunity to spend time out in nature or visiting the history of their country.
These excursions include day trips, a weekend activity, and camping experiences.
We believe such excursions are a necessary part of normal, healthy development.
In order to keep our staff and volunteers growing in their skills, Oaza holds periodic training events by inviting professionals to teach and demonstrate skills in a variety of areas.
We invite other organizations with similar services to that of Oaza to join us in order to work in partnership with our community.
Casa Shalom (House of Peace)
Currently 14 children call Casa Shalom home ranging in age from 7 to 19 years.
This home has been built by the generous donations of others providing well for the childrens' daily needs.
It also serves as the center for our community club programs.
Casa Bucuriei (House of Joy)
House of Joy (Casa Bucuriei) who used to be a family home to 9 children is in need of serious repairs.
Currently is sitting empty.
We are considering different possibilities and options for ministry in this building ; for more information write to us : contact@oaza.com
Community Clubs:
“Noi si Copiii Nostri” (For Us and Our Children) – This club is a service to parents and caregivers with young children, providing parent-to-parent, child-to-child and parent-child socialization.
It also helps mothers who stay home to escape feelings of isolation and catch-up with things in their community.
Professionals are often invited to come and speak with them about various topics. This project was initially funded in cooperation with Alcoa Foundation’s small grant investments in community projects.
15 moms from this Club have been given a second chance to further education. A partnership was formed in a Grundtvig project for adult education between three European Universities.
Oaza was chosen by the „Vasile Goldis ” University of Vest of Arad as the practical application in the project giving 15 moms free training and another qualification.
After-school activity clubs:
We continue to see the needs of the community around us, and we realize that early intervention into the lives of children is the best way to impact them for the long term. Based on these facts, we have developed childrens’ clubs beginning with Oaza’s local neighborhood of Bujac.These clubs seek to provide an environment of continued learning and of healthy relationship building between peers and between children and adults. Our clubs include puppetry, music (instrumental), English, and arts and crafts. We desire to add additional clubs for computers and sports as well as others in the future.
We now have the following summer activity clubs for kids in our community : English language Club (3 different groups of children) ; music club and computer club.
Homeless community assistance:
Laura continues to interact with the homeless community by sharing clothes, medicine and counsel.As an organization we realize we cannot solve the problems of the homeless community.
To maximize our impact, we joined with other similar organizations and work together to achieve similar goals.
The problem is still there under our eyes.
Camping Opportunities:
The children need opportunities for social interaction between themselves, staff, volunteers, and other children who join us from the church and community.
Summer camping provides a safe and fun environment for this interaction to take place.
It also provides the opportunity to take the children out of a normal city environment into a nature setting with engaging activities.
Teams are invited to come and help with camp, which adds another component to the social experience.
Oaza 2008 projects :
- Official opening of Shalom House (May 2008) – an excellent home for 12 children.
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- Holiday clubs – during summer months, foreign volunteers come to us with new and fun ideeas for the children and their friends;
- Day trips – children enjoy days out visiting hystorichal places (the ruins in Siria and Soimos are on top of childrens lists).
- „We are friends although we are different” a summer project in collaboration with Arad County Cultural Centre another charity and local School. It brought together young people of different ethnic groups to work together and learn to share their own particularities. The project ended with a camp in a town called Moneasa.
- „A chance for each ” -- a project where by Oaza offeres suport to the families in which children are reintegrated upon their request.
- Flying seagul weekend We made an unusual partnership in September with representatives of Flying Seagul Foundation, from Great Britain. I have never seen people with more enthusiasm and dedication for childrens entertainment work . Over the weekend they performed circus type activities, dressed in funny clothes and accompanied by loud music, before around 80 children in our neighbourhood, even gatherring a large number of the parents who enjoyed it as much as their children. We look forward to working with them again.
- Participation to NGO’s Fare in Arad
Oaza participated to the NGO’s Fare just outside of Arad city hall on a very rainy day along side 30 other NGO’s.
We displayed the children art work and informed people of Arad of what we stand for. Local and national television stations were present and interviewed Laura.