Helping the Third World one stitch at a time

BY ALBERT KRAMBERGER

editor@transcontinental.ca

Dorval resident Jill Stafiej's trip to Uganda last year was more than just a touristy getaway.

She was part of a group of North Americans that travelled to rural villages to teach AIDS orphans and their guardians how to sew. Specifically, they were there to help them sew school uniforms, which are required for students to attend classes. Stafiej will recount her month-long experience during a presentation at the Dorval Library next Wednesday night. Besides a slide show to illustrate her speech, there will also be a display and sale of artifacts and art she brought back from the central-eastern African country.

"It's a very interesting story," Stafiej said in a phone interview. "We went to remote villages that had no heating, no anything. We lived in tents and washed with well water."

She said they taught sewing to about 30 teenage orphans as well as to the women who cared for them. "They had never threaded a needle before," she recalled. "In about two weeks we taught a couple of them to sew and to train others after we left."

She estimated about 60 school uniforms have been made as a result of her group's efforts last year.

Stafiej's first trip to Uganda took place in March 2005 — to mark her 60th birthday — and the second about a year ago as part of the AIDS Orphans and Street Children organization, a Christian missionary group based in Florida.

Stafiej said a small group in Montreal raised funds through rummage sales and brought some sewing machines and donated materials for the trip last year.

Although Stafiej won't be part of another team leaving soon to help the orphans, she vows to return to Africa to lend a hand in the coming years.

Stafiej's lecture starts at 7:30 p.m. next Wednesday at Dorval Library, 1401 Lakeshore Dr. All are welcome but non-library members must pay $3. Space is limited and passes are required. For more information, call 514-633-4170.