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This is the first sponsored sport event I’ve ever done.  Six months ago I could barely swim – let alone do the crawl, or even put my face in the water!  But, thanks to a small group of local friends, who have insisted on swimming at 6.30am every Thursday morning, and – even more crazily – at Hampstead women’s outdoor pond throughout this bitterly cold winter, I’m now taking part in the one-mile British Gas Great London Swim on Saturday 2^nd July at Royal Victoria Dock.

I’m doing this to raise money for a story-collecting project run by The Forgiveness Project in collaboration with Fambul Tok International, a Sierra Leone based organization dedicated to advancing peace by mobilizing ordinary people—entire communities ravaged by war—in the hard work of reconciliation.   Collecting stories from both victims and former perpetrators of crime & violence lies at the heart of everything we do at The Forgiveness Project, but has always been the most difficult part of our work to fund raise for.

Sierra Leone is a country still divided and devastated by an 11-year civil war, and Fambul Tok run a brilliant programme which helps former enemies live peacefully together again. By reawakening dormant cultural practices of acknowledgement, apology and forgiveness, the programme helps rebuild communities and lays the groundwork for development and sustainable peace. I believe the Fambul Tok approach has a great deal to offer other post-conflict countries and therefore I’m eager to add several stories from Sierra Leone to The Forgiveness Project’s evolving bank of stories.  The money raised will be used to interview, photograph and film individuals who have turned their back on revenge in the face of atrocity in Sierra Leone.

 

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