On October 31st, a townhall took place in Henkel Amsterdam with the objective of presenting the newly created organization, Peace’s Hope, and the Sonrise orphanage to the Henkel colleagues. Gabriele Haak, Warren Weidorn, Sameh Fares and his wife Hadeel Khallouf, four of the currently 21 members of Peace’s Hope, traveled from Duesseldorf to Amsterdam for the townhall.
Gabi, Julia and Silvia shared, in a session full of emotions and participation, their MIT experience in Uganda in December 2016 and the journey from Gabi’s first trip to Jinja in 2014 until the creation of Peace’s Hope. Currently running projects were also presented, such as the construction works for the new Children’s Home and Mirembe Cottage. Finally, three ways in which Henkel colleagues can get involved were also discussed, that is 1) Financially, 2) Volunteering from Home and 3) Volunteering in Uganda.
With the help of Henkel colleague Gaula Hababa, we were able to prepare beautiful cards describing each one of the projects currently running at Peace’s Hope. On the back of the card, one can find a description about the projects and ways to contribute including, but not only, financials details for donations. The cards are placed on a board currently located next to the office reception for employees and visitors to see.
The town hall was a success. Many colleagues came to us in the following days with ideas on how they would like to contribute, and two colleagues are joining the current team on their next trip to Uganda, on December 13th. How exciting!
In the meanwhile, as announced during the town hall, this week is St. Martin collection week in Henkel Amsterdam. Employees can bring to work their old clothes and other items they would like to donate, including baby toys, pens, pencils, toothbrushes, razors and any basic need item. Donations will then be packed and shipped to Sonrise directly from Amsterdam.
We would like to thank everybody who contributed to this initiative, especially Bertrand Conqueret, Corporate Senior VP of Henkel Global Supply chain, who offered his precious support to this and any future initiative of Peace’s Hope in the Benelux region!
