With just two days until the kick off of the 7th annual Homeless World Cup—in Milan, Italy—the United Nations have announced their support. As the Special Adviser to the United Nations Secretary-General on Sport for Development and Peace, Wilfried Lemke said:
It is with great pleasure that I offer my support to the “Milan 2009 Homeless World Cup”, a football initiative which has been uniting teams of homeless people to take a once in a lifetime opportunity to represent their country and change their lives forever. The Homeless World Cup initiative is an extraordinary example of the application of sport as a tool for community development. The Homeless World Cup has triggered the establishment of over 50 local grass roots projects working with people who are homeless and excluded from society. The impact of the Homeless World Cup has been consistently significant with a large majority of players changing their lives for the better, by coming off drugs and alcohol, moving into jobs, education, homes, training, reuniting with families and some even going on to become players and coaches for professional or semi-professional football teams. Considering the increase in the number of participating teams from 18 national teams in the year 2003 to 48 national teams for the current event in Milan, the Homeless World Cup is well on the way to realizing its vision—a healthy, abundant, confident world where everyone has a home, a basic human right. The initiative has been a very successful means to raise awareness of issue surrounding the homeless and to improve the image of homeless people amongst the general public. The positive impact that this project has been able to have on individuals from more than 70 countries makes it an initiative that deserves any additional support it can obtain. I look forward to a continued collaboration with the Homeless World Cup initiative and wish all participants the very best in this life-changing experience!”
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The Milan, Italy 2009 Homeless World Cup takes place in the Arena Civica, Sempione Park from 6-13 September 2009. For more, please visit homelessworldcup.org.
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Over 75 submissions were received from filmmakers from 5 continents. And…
Congratulations to Buzz Films, the winner of the $50,000 Homeless World Cup/Nike film competition (which we first blogged about here). Buzz Films was formed by award-winning directors Jan Bednarz and Robin Schmidt, as a home for diverse documentary and drama projects.
Buzz Films will see up-and-coming presenter Buddy (pictured left) capture the spirit and essence of the Homeless World Cup. Buddy’s last assignment was for National Geographic with a trip through Outer Mongolia.
Follow Jan and Robin’s blog during the creation of the film at: www.buzzfilms.co.uk/blog.
The Milan, Italy 2009 Homeless World Cup takes place in the Arena Civica, Sempione Park from 6-13 September 2009. For more, please visit homelessworldcup.org.
Watch this great TV commercial—funded by Astral Media and the Mira Foundation; created by Publicis Agency—whose goal is to “inform the public about the work done by the Mira Foundation, helping the visually impaired, the physically handicapped as well as children with development problems, by supplying guide/assistance dogs free of charge.”
Even more uniquely, the world-renowned, Quebec-based Mira Foundation even provides guide dogs to blind teens who are younger than 15 years old.
Since its founding in 1981, MIRA has given away over 1700 guide dogs and service dogs.
The cost of a guide dog or a service dog is $20,000 and each of them are given free of charge. MIRA does not receive any government funds, its financing depends entirely on donations from the public, from charitable organizations and from private companies.
Quoting the Friday, August 28th edition of The Chronicle-Herald:
The Saint Mary’s Huskies football team is hosting a car wash Saturday in Halifax to raise funds for Hope Cottage. The team, along with the Halifax RCMP, Halifax Regional Police and Halifax Regional Fire and Emergency Service, will wash cars, with all proceeds going to the non-profit agency, which provides hot meals to the needy. Some other Saint Mary’s athletes will help out, as will players from the Halifax Rainmen basketball team. The car wash will run from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at O’Regan’s Chevrolet Cadillac on Robie Street.
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Quoting halifaxnewsnet.ca:
Hope Cottage [2435 Brunswick Street; (902) 429-7968] is a charitable organization whose mission is to provide meals to those who cannot afford to obtain these meals themselves. Since its inception Hope Cottage has grown into a Halifax institution feeding more than 200 meals a day, Monday to Friday. Each day a brunch of soup and sandwich is served from 10:00 to 11:00 and a hot prepared meal from 5:00 to 6:00. Hope Cottage was originally financed by the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. For the past 15 years or so Hope Cottage has been self sufficient, with all revenues coming from unsolicited donations from individuals and corporations. The annual operating budget for the cottage is approximately $165,000.00. Hope Cottage relies heavily on volunteers. There are three volunteers for each meal, for a total of 30 people working two to three hours a week. Volunteers will work the same meal every week. These people serve meals, serve coffee, wash dishes etc.
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Music and the Deaf was started 2 decades ago by a remarkable man named Dr. Paul Whittaker. Paul, who has a music degree from Oxford University, has been deaf since birth and profoundly deaf since the age of two. In 2007, he became an Officer of the British Empire. Oh yeah, and he trains choirs in his spare time.
First Descents provides whitewater kayaking and other outdoor adventure experiences to promote emotional, psychological and physical healing for young adults with cancer.
The Homeless World Cup is delighted to announce a collaboration with Nike to discover the ideal filmmaker to produce a short, high energy film about the Milan 2009 Homeless World Cup. With its $50,000 prize, and the chance to gain instant fame, this may just be that “perfect opportunity” you’ve been waiting for. Break out your video cameras, and get busy brainstorming. This contest is the real deal. This contest is no joke.
