Serve the City Brussels

Brussels – Saturday 19 May, Spring Cleaning

Communications Team — Thu, 10 May 2012 15:54:55 +0000

Join Serve the City on Saturday, 19 May for a Big Volunteer Day when we will give Brussels a Spring Cleaning!

15 projects have been organized to help us make a difference together in our city. Sign-up today to cross the line on the 19th!

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER TODAY

Project Categories:

Arts & Crafts
Volunteers will spend an afternoon with children helping them express their creative side! Teams will be spread out at orphanages, youth centers, squats and homes for underprivileged women and children throughout Brussels creating beauty and joy everywhere they go!

Clean & Green
Volunteers will serve some of our favourite organizations in Brussels with various practical projects such as gardening, cleaning, painting and more. Wear your casual clothing and be ready to get some dirt under your nails.

You Look Marvelous!
Volunteers will help mothers living in shelters for abused women and refugees living in a center and a squat feel lovely and beautiful on the inside and out through friendship, manicures, hand massages and makeovers. Join this team to remind these mothers that they are marvelous!

Food4Friends
Volunteers will prepare and distribute food to our friends who live on the street at Gare du Nord and in the Marolles at the Porte de Hal parc. Volunteers will be spend time connecting with our friends as people, reminding them that they are not forgotten.

Fun & Games
Teams of volunteers will play Bingo and other games with the homeless at a social restaurant and also at a center for asylum seekers. Volunteers will bring many smiles to people’s faces.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER TODAY

Schedule for 19 May
12:30 Registration at EPPE
13:00 Welcome/Introduction
13:30 Dismissed to Projects
14:00 Projects Start
16:30 Projects End
17:00 Debrief/After-Party

EPPE, Rue de l’Epée 8 – Bruxelles 1000

To see the address in Google Maps>

Belgium – “WE ARE NOT TACKLING POVERTY ADEQUATELY”

Communications Team — Thu, 10 May 2012 15:25:00 +0000

10/05/12 – Jos Geysels, speaking for an umbrella organisation concerned with poverty and welfare, says that the targets that had been set to combat poverty in Belgium are far from being met. “We are halfway, but have only reached 10 to 15 percent of the targets”, he explains, pointing to the fact that these targets were still quite modest, that is, reducing poverty by half.

Video>

Spring Clean Focus Day – 19 May 2012

Communications Team — Mon, 07 May 2012 09:25:01 +0000

Every year in May, the Serve the City team hit the streets of Brussels with spring-cleaning in mind. This volunteer day supports key non-profits in our community by sprucing up their environments, ushering out the winter and in the summer activities and projects that lay ahead.

We shall post more detail very soon – for the moment please mark the date down in your agenda.

If you have an urgent question, please do contact chalks@servethecity.be

VICTIMS OF ABUSE

Communications Team — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 11:53:03 +0000

Focus Day

Details to follow

21 April: Victims of Abuse Focus Day

Communications Team — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 20:35:16 +0000

Join Serve the City on Saturday, 21 April for a Focus Day serving Victims of Abuse with many projects, including several new opportunities to cross the line.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER TODAY!

Project Categories

Game On

Volunteers will play sports with children and adults. Bring your best football, basketball and board game skills!

Arts & Crafts

Teams of volunteers will help brighten the day and bring out the creative side of children at several shelters that support mothers and children.

You Look Marvelous!

Volunteers will help mothers living in shelters for abused women feel lovely and beautiful on the inside and out through friendship, manicures, hand massages and makeovers. Join this team to remind these mothers that they are marvelous!

Food4Friends

Not your usual Food4Friends at the train stations! We’ll end this Focus Day with a picnic at the Porte de Hal parc for volunteers and all the people we’ve served throughout the day. Volunteers will prepare & share food, time and happiness with friends in that area.

Music to the Ears

A local musician plus 3 musical volunteers will spend the afternoon with our elderly friends. It will be a fun-filled afternoon sure to make you tap your toes!

Listen, Learn, Act

This group will spend time with members from the Roma community in 2 dialogue sessions. The first will involve meeting a Roma family and hearing about their situation, their needs and issues. The second session will be with experts dealing with the issues to hear about the complexity they deal with in representing the Roma community.

Another group of volunteers will take to the streets of an area such as Gare du Nord, and survey the passers by about our disadvantaged community. The objective is to find out people’s attitudes those who have found themselves in a difficult place, and to see how much people know about the homeless, victims of abuse and disabled.

Loving Our Neighbours

Volunteers will spend time, learn from, and get to know a local artist that has experienced first hand the issues of abuse. We hope that this group can both get to know Christian and develop a creative project as part of this session.

Pick your project and register here today!

Schedule for 21 April

12:30 Registration

13:00 Welcome/Introduction

13:30 Dismissed to Projects

14:00 Projects Start

16:30 Projects End

16:30 Picnic

Please note: Registration is at a different location!

Bouillon Kube

Rue Vlogaert 4,

1060 Bruxelles (Saint-Gilles).

Public Transport access to registration location:
Metro: 2 or 6
Tram: 3, 4, 23 or 51
Bus: 27, 48, 134, 136, 137, 365

Give a Hand this week

Communications Team — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 19:03:36 +0000

Many people doing small things together makes a big difference.

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Celebrate Spring!
As the sun has appeared over Brussels many of us are crawling out from under the grey sheet of winter feeling refreshed, renewed, and re-energized! Welcome back! Let spring be the reason for re-connecting with the city. We are are waiting for you and look forward to seeing you soon. Save the date for our next Focus Day on April 21st where we will be serving those who have suffered as victims of abuse. As we celebrate freedom in so many ways, help us connect to those who have lost a sense of freedom for one reason or another to remind them that there are those who care for them, who have their best interest at heart, to remind them of their worth and value and to spend time relating to them. Imagine what we will also discover about ourselves along the way! The most important step in serving is just accepting the invitation! We invite you to Serve the City. Email thisweek@servethecity.be for more information or with any questions.

Food4Friends:
Monday/Thursday

Join us every Monday and Thursday at the Gare du Nord (train station), Schaerbeek in the main hall, where volunteers will be serving soup, coffee, tea and waffles. This is a time of great conversation with our friends. We learn their stories, we hear their needs, we build relationships and leave lasting impressions on one another. We are in great need of someone with a car who can transport the food from our office to the station on Mondays. Can you help? If you are interested in volunteering, driving or donating, contact Nino: 0496.993.390 or Dace: dace@servethecity.be for more information.

Serving our neighbours in Ixelles:

Wednesday–it's NOT the last week at the squat!
A group of volunteers from The Well and Serve the City have been making friends and meeting needs for the past six months at a refugee squat. The families are staying in a building near Place Stephanie and we will be visiting them this week to spread friendship, help with learning languages, and do children’s activities. We are so pleased to announce that the families in the squat have received a two week extension to stay so we will be meeting again this week. We will meet at L'amour Fou [Place Fernand Cocq] at 18:30 and then go to the squat. If you need to meet directly at the squat, please come to Rue de la Concorde 60, just off of Avenue Louise (there is a Cashmere Shop at the corner). All are welcome. Email jodi@servethecity.be or call Jodi at 0498 604 364 if you need more information.

STC Soccer – No soccer this week due to Easter but it will resume the following week!
STC football is on the roll! Join Reinhard, other volunteers and other friends from serving on Sunday evenings at the ACJ sports hall (152, Chaussée de Wavre, Ixelles) to play soccer together. Everyone willing to have fun and share a good sport spirit is welcome! To keep the Serve the City spirit up, young people of marginalized families and various backgrounds are encouraged to join. If you are interested in this opportunity to get a weekly work out with other volunteers, please contact Reinhard at reinhard.drews@ulb.ac.be.

Coming April 28th!
You Look Marvelous

What? A beauty project with the elderly

When? Saturday, 28th of April

Where? Meet at 12h15 in Yser metro station

Marta, our amazing Focus Group Leader for the Eldery visits the ladies (and gents!) at Harmonie Center every month to remind them how beautiful they are on the inside and out. Join Marta on April 28th–no experience necessary, just a willingness to care for others! Marta will explain how to do the make-up/ nails/ hand massages. Then you will go to Harmonie Center (Rue de l'Hamonie n°1), where you'll visit with the residents and give them beauty treatments. The project usually finishes before 15:30. If you want to join Marta, please e-mail (martocax72@hotmail.com) or give her a call (0472 40 53 56).

Please "like" (the new page for) Serve the City Brussels on Facebook!

We've started new page on Facebookd for Serve the City Brussels, please move on over to the new page today!

	Friend on Facebook
	Follow on Twitter
	Forward to a Friend

Donate now!

If you would like to give a monetary donation to Serve the City, here’s how:

Serve the City A.S.B.L.
Bank: BNP Paribas Fortis
IBAN: BE62 0015 2682 4961
BIC: GEBABEBB

If you represent a corporation, please visit our website's page on Corporate Social Responsibility. We would love to speak with you about partnering with your corporation.

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Contact Us! Place Van Meyel 15A 1040 Brussels Belgium Or call: 02 734 35 02
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Give a Hand this week

Communications Team — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 10:34:40 +0000

Many people doing small things together makes a big difference.

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Did you know?
As we all enjoy the arrival of spring, this time of year signals the closing of many extra homeless shelters that were opened up during the cold months of winter. While we are thankful that many of our homeless friends had warm places to lodge on cold winter nights, we remain mindful that many of our friends will now be faced again with finding regular accommodation and meals. What can we do? We can gather and distribute sleeping bags or tents and increase our food distribution while our friends are in a time of transition. We are always so grateful that when we put out the call for help, we see a response from the community to meet these needs. Our hands are extended in both directions across the line. What an encouragement this is and we thank you for ongoing response to the call to serve. If you have any of these items to donate; sleeping bags, tents or non-perishable food/toiletry items, please contact the Serve the City office and we can let you know when and where we can receive these donations. If you want to join us in distributing these items and connecting directly with our friends in need, you will find a list of our ongoing service activities below. You are always welcome to join. Email thisweek@servethecity.be for more information or with any questions.

Food4Friends:
Monday/Thursday

A BIG thank you to the youth groups at Our Lady of Mercy who packed and donated over 90 sack meals for our friends at the station last week. We are so grateful! Join us every Monday and Thursday at the Gare du Nord (train station), Schaerbeek in the main hall, where volunteers will be serving soup, coffee, tea and waffles. This is a time of great conversation with our friends. We learn their stories, we hear their needs, we build relationships and leave lasting impressions on one another. If you are interested in volunteering or donating, contact Nino: 0496.993.390 or Dace: dace@servethecity.be for more information.

Serving our neighbours in Ixelles:

Wednesday–it's the last week at the squat!
A group of volunteers from The Well and Serve the City have been making friends and meeting needs for the past six months at a refugee squat. The families are staying in a building near Place Stephanie and we will be visiting them this week to spread friendship, help with learning languages, and do children’s activities. This is the families last week in the squat, so we are planning a special picnic to share hope and friendship. We will meet directly at the squat at 18:30. The address is Rue de la Concorde 60, just off of Avenue Louise (there is a Cashmere Shop at the corner). All are welcome. Email jodi@servethecity.be or call Jodi at 0498 604 364 if you need more information.

STC Soccer
STC football is on the roll! Join Reinhard, other volunteers and other friends from serving on Sunday evenings at the ACJ sports hall (152, Chaussée de Wavre, Ixelles) to play soccer together. Everyone willing to have fun and share a good sport spirit is welcome! To keep the Serve the City spirit up, young people of marginalized families and various backgrounds are encouraged to join. If you are interested in this opportunity to get a weekly work out with other volunteers, please contact Reinhard at reinhard.drews@ulb.ac.be.

This Saturday:
You Look Marvelous

What? A beauty project with the elderly

When? Saturday, 31 of March

Where? Meet at 12h15 in Yser metro station

Marta, our amazing Focus Group Leader for the Eldery visits the ladies (and gents!) at Harmonie Center every month to remind them how beautiful they are on the inside and out. Join Marta on 31 March–no experience necessary, just a willingness to care for others! Marta will explain how to do the make-up/ nails/ hand massages. Then you will go to Harmonie Center (Rue de l'Hamonie n°1), where you'll visit with the residents and give them beauty treatments. The project usually finishes before 15:30. If you want to join Marta, please e-mail (martocax72@hotmail.com) or give her a call (0472 40 53 56).
volunteers, please contact Reinhard at reinhard.drews@ulb.ac.be.

Please like (the new page for) Serve the City Brussels on Facebook!

We've started new page on Facebookd for Serve the City Brussels, please move on over to the new page today!

	Friend on Facebook
	Follow on Twitter
	Forward to a Friend

Donate now!

If you would like to give a monetary donation to Serve the City, here’s how:

Serve the City A.S.B.L.
Bank: BNP Paribas Fortis
IBAN: BE62 0015 2682 4961
BIC: GEBABEBB

If you represent a corporation, please visit our website's page on Corporate Social Responsibility. We would love to speak with you about partnering with your corporation.

follow on Twitter \| friend on Facebook \| forward to a friend
Contact Us! Place Van Meyel 15A 1040 Brussels Belgium Or call: 02 734 35 02
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Give a Hand this week

Communications Team — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 14:55:31 +0000

Many people doing small things together makes a big difference.

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On Saturday 17 March, Serve the City volunteers made a SPLASH on the streets of Brussels, with serving projects that included tending gardens, hosting a St. Patrick’s day party at homes for the elderly, playing games with children and their families who are asylum seekers, and preparing and distributing food to our homeless friends at the three main railway stations in Brussels.

The SPLASH theme was in support of World Water Day, as well as the work of African Enterprise projects in Malawi. We take fresh water for granted in our advanced economy and yet over a billion people continue to fight for this basic need. The team from Serve the City will give 1,000 euro to a community in the suburbs of Malawi for a shallow well, which will save them going 4-5 km to find water. The money for this project came from a Disco on 9 March, pub quiz on 15 March, together with donations and money received from the sale of baked goods at the SPLASH! event.

Serve the City wants to send a BIG THANK YOU to all our Project Leaders and volunteers who crossed the line and made a difference in the lives of many on Saturday!

New Volunteer Meeting: Tuesday
Serve the City invites you to come by our office between 18:00 and 19:00 on Tuesday, 20 March to learn more about serving in Brussels. And if you can't make it, just drop Dace (dace@servethecity.be) a note and we'd be happy to meet you for a coffee or lunch to tell you more!
STC New Volunteer Meeting
Place Van Meyel 15A
Etterbeek, 1040
02.734.3502

Food4Friends:
Monday/Thursday
Join us on Thursday, 22 March and Monday 26 March at 18:30, at Gare du Nord, Schaerbeek in the main hall, where the volunteers will be serving soup, coffee, tea and waffles, at the same time you will have a nice conversation with our friends. If you are interested in volunteering or donating, contact Nino: 0496.993.390 or Dace: dace@servethecity.be for more information.

Serving our neighbours in Ixelles:
Wednesday
A group of volunteers from The Well and Serve the City have been making friends and meeting needs for the past six months at a refugee squat. The families are staying in a building near Place Stephanie and we will be visiting them this week to spread friendship, help with learning languages, and do children’s activities. This is an ongoing opportunity to serve, but these are the last two weeks the families will be able to stay in this squat. Meet at L'Amour Fou (place Fernand Cocq, Ixelles) at 18h30. Email jodi@servethecity.be or call Jodi at 0498 604 364 if you need more information.

STC Soccer
STC Brussels volunteer, Reinhard Drews, is looking for STC volunteers interested to meet weekly, on Sunday evenings at the ACJ sports hall (152, Chaussée de Wavre, Ixelles) to play soccer together. Everyone willing to have fun and share a good sport spirit is welcome! To keep the Serve the City spirit up, young people of marginalized families and various backgrounds are encouraged to join. If you are interested in this opportunity to get a weekly work out with other volunteers, please contact Reinhard at reinhard.drews@ulb.ac.be.

Save the Date:
You Look Marvelous

What? A beauty project with the elderly

When? Saturday, 31 of March

Where? Meet at 12h15 in Yser metro station

Marta, our amazing Focus Group Leader for the Eldery visits the ladies (and gents!) at Harmonie Center every month to remind them how beautiful they are on the inside and out. Join Marta on 31 March–no experience necessary, just a willingness to care for others! Marta will explain how to do the make-up/ nails/ hand massages. Then you will go to Harmonie Center (Rue de l'Hamonie n°1), where you'll visit with the residents and give them beauty treatments. The project usually finishes before 15:30. If you want to join Marta, please e-mail (martocax72@hotmail.com) or give her a call (0472 40 53 56).

	Friend on Facebook
	Follow on Twitter
	Forward to a Friend

Donate now!

If you would like to give a monetary donation to Serve the City, here’s how:

Serve the City A.S.B.L.
Bank: BNP Paribas Fortis
IBAN: BE62 0015 2682 4961
BIC: GEBABEBB

If you represent a corporation, please visit our website's page on Corporate Social Responsibility. We would love to speak with you about partnering with your corporation.

follow on Twitter \| friend on Facebook \| forward to a friend
Contact Us! Place Van Meyel 15A 1040 Brussels Belgium Or call: 02 734 35 02
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Press release

Communications Team — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 12:55:48 +0000

Brussels, 17 March 2012

On Saturday 17 March, around 90 Serve the City volunteers made a SPLASH on the streets of Brussels. There were 24 projects delivered to a growing community of people needing practical help.

Serve the City champions a number of different types of project – such as tending gardens and hosting a St. Patrick’s day party at homes for the elderly, playing games with children and their families who are asylum seekers, preparing and distributing food to our homeless friends at the three main railway stations in Brussels.

The day kicked off with volunteer registration where short presentations were made about the work done by Serve the City and our partners. This helps people know how their efforts make a big difference.

The SPLASH theme is in support of the African Enterprise projects in Malawi.

We take fresh water for granted in our advanced economy and yet over a billion people continue to fight for this basic need. The team from Serve the City will give 1,000 euro to a community in the suburbs of Malawi for a shallow well, which will save them going 4-5 km to find water. The money for this project came from a Disco on 9 March, pub quiz on 15 March, together with donations and money received from the sale of baked goods at the SPLASH registration location.

Chiefs in Malawi reported that having access to clean water in their communities enables the teenage girls to go to school, cuts down cases of cholera deaths (in several places where Serve the City has already assisted it has now been totally eradicated) and cuts the levels of malaria, diarrhea, dysentery and other water-based diseases.

Having a healthy community means fields can be tended properly and the crop yield increases, enabling some to even sell produce. All in all the first step out of the poverty cycle! The community has been visited as part of a number of other well projects that have taken place in the past.

For more information, please do contact:

chalks.corriette@me.com

0478.482023

About us:

Serve the City began in Brussels in 2005, and is now active in 80 cities around the world. Serve the City organizes serving events and provides ongoing serving opportunities. Volunteers sign up to serve in projects that fit their interests and abilities. http://www.servethecity.be/brussels/

SPLASH! Big Volunteer Day: Register for your project today

Communications Team — Sat, 17 Mar 2012 09:20:15 +0000

Join Serve the City on Saturday, 17 March for a Big Volunteer Day sure to make a SPLASH! in Brussels.

More than 10 projects have been organized to help us make a difference together in our city. Sign-up today to cross the line on the 17th!

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER TODAY

Project Categories:

Make a SPLASH!
Volunteers will take a group of men from a homeless shelter swimming at a local pool . Volunteers on this project will literally make a SPLASH! GUYS only for this event, please.

You Look Marvelous!
Volunteers will help mothers living in shelters for abused women feel lovely and beautiful on the inside and out through friendship, manicures, hand massages and makeovers. Join this team to remind these mothers that they are marvelous! Another team of volunteers will visit elderly homes and make our friends there feel beautiful on the inside and out.

Food4Friends
Volunteers will prepare and distribute food to our friends who live on the street, but that’s just part of the project. Volunteers will be spend time connecting with our friends as people, reminding them that they are not forgotten.

Fun & Games
Volunteers will spend an afternoon learning about another culture with our friends in an elderly home. Since it’s St. Patrick’s Day on 17 March, we’re thinking Ireland would be a lot of fun. Another team of volunteers will play Bingo and other games with our elderly friends living in a local centre, bringing many smiles to people’s faces.

We’re also bringing back ‘Rock Around the Clock’ for the third consecutive serving day! Volunteers will join our friends from the street for a dance lesson & festivities at Epee.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER TODAY

Schedule for 17 March

12:30 Registration

13:00 Welcome/Introduction

13:30 Lunch/Dismissed to Projects

14:00 Projects Start

16:30 Projects End

17:00 Debrief/After-Party