Civic initiative collects money for the needy by partnering with venues where people can symbolically drink tea and donate.
Activists of the charity fund “Everyone Can” call upon all willing to help the vulnerable part of internally displaced (IDPs) persons through a series of charity tea parties “Cherry Tea”. The ultimate goal is to collect UAH 100 thousand that will be used to purchase medicine for elderly, disabled and children with serious illness. Tetyana Vitkovska, communications manager at the International charity fund “Everybody can”, presented ways to join the action as well as first results of the initiative at a press-briefing at Ukraine Crisis Media Center (UCMC) in the framework of UCMC’s project “Spokesperson of peaceful life” implemented with the support of the Foreign Affairs Ministry of the Federal Republic of Germany.
The event was supposed to take place on November 21-27, however the organizers decided to extend it. People from twelve more countries including the US, Canada, the Netherlands and Georgia joined the initiative.
Last year UAH 44 thousand was raised through the tea parties
The initiative is on for the second year. Last year over UAH 44 thousand (over USD 1,700) was collected over the week of charitable tea parties. “Thanks to it we bought medicine for about 50 people. Each person received the medicine worth of UAH 900-1,000 according to the requests from the vulnerable part of the displaced,” Vitkovska noted.
Ways to join the action
“First way is to invite your friends, colleagues or people you have not seen for a while. You enjoy yourselves and donate a certain amount for charity. Or you can visit any partner coffee shop on the week of charity tea parties, drink some tea there and it will be the coffee shop that will send the amount for charity,” Vitkovska explained.
The following Kyiv venues are taking part in the event: Engineer RestoBar, PREGO cafe, “Rybny Bazar” (fish market) restaurant, Tsymes restaurant, “Lito” coffee shop, L’KAFA CAFE, Espresso Bar and book shop café “My book shelf”. Each venue takes part in the charity action in its own way: in some these are all items in the menu, others offer just some tea. Amount of donation also differs from venue to venue. Participants may use the hashtags #коженможе (eng. – everybody can) and #ЧеріТі (eng. – cherry tea / charity) when posting pictures of the tea parties on social networks. Money raised at individually organized tea parties, can be transferred to the fund via their website or through the platform “Ukrainian charity stock”.
Other projects of the fund
Another big project that the fund is implementing is “Children’s leadership camp” for teenagers. “Unique approach of our camp helps develop not only leadership but also social responsibility. We are trying to enlist children from vulnerable families, internally displaced families, families of the fallen warfighters. However the camp is open for each teen who would like to create her/his own “grown-up” social projects,” Vitkovska said. Participants are split in group of 10-15 persons. They study three modules learning to plan projects, at the final stage of the project participants implement them. “We already have five projects running. At the end of the year we will summarize the results,” she said.