Whilst some were watching and bemoaning the standard of Welsh Rugby, others were very busy for HBTSR this weekend.

Raffle sales continued at Hay Winter Festival, Food Festival and Hay does Vintage. Despite the cold, Virginia nearly sold out of tickets. She says having known nothing about the practicalities of hosting a raffle previously, that she has found it interesting and instructive. From Zero to Hero- to coin a phrase! She has  enormously benefited from the help of  a number of people who have been on stalls or sold to friends etc -Erica, Trevor, Pauline, Rachel, Dante, Janet B, Penny, Sue G, Alene, Lynne, Philip, Melrose to mention but  a few[ sorry if we’ve missed people out – your contribution has been helpful even if not acknowledged here]. The Draw will be at Gwernyfed Rugby Club on 20th December at 6.30 pm when the massive numbers of prizes* will be awarded and HBTSR will have raised extra funds thanks to everyone’s efforts and the kind donors of prizes.

Meanwhile in Brecon, a small family seeking asylum were given a weekend break by Rowland. The placement was arranged by Thanu, Maria and Naeema in Swansea and coordinated by Lynne for HBTSR. Lynne was helped to welcome and support the family on this occasion by Margaret, Pat and Marian.  The family were able to go to the Gurkha Restaurant and said that they had forgotten that they were asylum seekers for the weekend. Others are already linked to  Lynne to support on future occasions. We have had a number of kind offers of free holiday accommodation  in the Beacons’ area but for logistical reasons have only so far used two places that are in town and accessible by public transport. We are gaining confidence in arranging these breaks and knowing that the recipients will have a good time but still are apprehensive, that however beautiful and welcoming a place is, that placing someone for a few days in a very isolated area  when they don’t have access to transport may feel like being abandoned however supportive our volunteers  and the owners are. So at present we are immensely grateful for the kind offers but may not be able to take these up.

And back to Hay and to Drovers Cycles who had kindly offered a day of cycle repair to Space4U participants. Sam, Ruth and Jenny came from Cardiff with 10 young people seeking sanctuary and were shown how to repair and maintain a bike by Anna, Luke, Andy, Paige and Eleanor. Our group were represented by Steve, Brian, Rachel, Dante, Simon and Sean . Sean will ensure that the repaired cycles get to their new owners next week. More cycles in need of some TLC have been offered. Steve has agreed to store them at Tregoyd PGL and Sean has agreed to transport them to Cardiff periodically where a cycle maintenance group is operating at Oasis on Thursdays. This was a very successful day with food kindly donated by Thom,Martin and Steve from PGL Tregoyd and Alex the baker supplied cakes in addition to some catering from Anna at Drovers. Steve reported that the new cycle owners were very pleased with their bikes and set off on a tour of Hay  once these were ready.

Grateful thanks to all involved in the weekend activities especially Drovers Cycles, PGL , Sean,  Virginia and Rowland.

*HBTSR Raffle Prizes

2 tickets for Wales v France the Six Nations Rugby Match, 17 March 2018
Short break in flat in central Oxford (sleeps 4)
Lunch for two with a bottle of wine at the Felinfach Griffin
Handmade Quilt
Large Studio Pottery Jug made by Pauline Paterson
Lunch for two at the Bakers Table, Talgarth Mill
Christmas Hamper
Use of Tandem Mountain Bike for one day
A Hayley Hanson Hide Door stop
£10 Voucher Old Railway Line Garden Centre
Theatre Brycheiniog Pantomime tickets
Tea and cake for two at the River Café, Glasbury
£10 voucher from smallfarms Butcher Hay
Chicken from W J George Butchers Talgarth
Prize from Morgans of Pontybat Lifestyle and Cookshop
Molton Brown toiletry items
Ann Dierikx Photography 1 hour photo session
£20 voucher for Booth’s Hay (cinema, books or café)

Further feedback is that the family are going through a lot and it was amazing the feeliing the opportunity for a break made.’Thank you all of  you  for being lovely, amazing and kind to to all of us.”