For the children of Negombo

Specchio dei tempi has been close to Sri Lanka for over 15 years and it wanted to be so also after the frightening series of attacks that devastated the country at Easter 2019. On that day, in fact, we immediately opened a fundraiser project among our readers to help orphans and families affected by that unprecedented violence. We began to operate immediately, trying to bring practical help to the poorest of those affected together with a sign of friendship: the friendship of a distant country like Italy, which however knows how to share these immense tragedies.

We are working in Negombo, in central Sri Lanka, where two Catholic churches were attacked by Islamic extremists who killed over 200 people. The tragedy of this small Christian enclave, in a country with a strong Buddhist prevalence and an important Islamic component, was soon forgotten. It is in fact a poor area, with little touristic appeal, inhabited mainly by fishermen: Specchio dei tempi has decided to work here, trying to make schoolchildren quickly forget that terrible trauma. In those attacks, many of these children lost grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins, even parents. So we brought comfort and help to the Dundalpitiya public junior school and to the nearby Salesian preschool. In particular, we are changing the face of the poor primary school with renovated classrooms and new play areas. This is because for us at Specchio, children with difficulties, especially those in a poor area like this one, must always be helped. Especially when the others, in this case the great players of the so-called “international community”, forget too quickly.