Our third ‘Sparkle’ Event and the Homemade Cupcake and Biscuits Competition
Tragically a homeless young man passed away on 5 November in Leigh town centre. He was on his own, cold and lost, not knowing how to find help. It was a shocking story which touched the hearts of many people who live in the area.
Each year, people enabled to live with greater independence with support from ubu look for a way to bring happiness and ‘sparkle’ to the lives of other people in their own communities. ubu donates some money to enable the people we serve to find a way to make a difference to someone’s life or to help a group of people to achieve something special at Christmas time.
This year, a group of people we serve in Wigan decided that they wanted to make a very special hamper, filled with useful little luxuries for homeless people who are cared for and supported at The Railway Road Project in Leigh, near where they live. The Railway Road Project helps single homeless men and women to find a way to get on their feet again. They offer a friendly and welcoming atmosphere and provide somewhere for rough sleepers to stay so they don’t have to sleep out in the cold on the streets. There is a homely lounge and other facilities to help people find positive ways to socialise, meet others and talk about their problems in a safe environment.
The people served by ubu have come to understand just how important having time together is. “It helps us to feel more connected to other people, especially our neighbours and the community around us. So then we feel less lonely and worried about the future because we’ve talked about the things that seem difficult or impossible to do…”
The team of volunteers and professional helpers at the Railway Road Project work hard to help people that go there to find ways to work towards achieving their ambitions and goals in life. A lot of the team of volunteers have brought their own life experiences in being homeless to being able to support the people who go to the project for help.
People we serve and ubu team members visited the Project recently to find out a bit more about what they do and how we can help on a regular basis in the future. We were asked to collect warm clothes, towels and toiletries as these were things they were always short of but are essential to someone who does not have anything.
It was really heart-warming to speak to the people involved and they inspired us to help out more with collecting and donating the things that people who use the homelessness Project actually need. “It was great that we could put a hamper of goods together that will really make a difference to someone's life…”
“We’re proud to support our local community and to help people less fortunate than ourselves to get the help they need, and some independence and security in the future.”
At the Hub in Harrogate we celebrated today by singing one of our all-time favourite seasonal songs “Mary’s Boy Child/Oh My Lord”. The competition today was Christmas cupcakes and biscuits. There were some lovely-looking entries and people we serve had obviously enjoyed baking and decorating their cakes and biscuits because the results were fantastic!
It was of course, hard to choose winners but Kieran from Leeds had made some scrumptious Christmas cupcakes and some beautifully decorated gingerbread people from Trudy in the East Midlands. It was another day with lots of dancing and singing and writing our wishes for the future onto Christmas stars to hang on the trees around the Hub in Harrogate.
