News Briefs & Upcoming Events

Teen Transforms Children’s Orphanage

Milena Lurie reading with Indian students

Milena in her own words…

“About a year ago I decided that for a community service project, I wanted to make a difference for an orphanage in Southern India. Our family friends, Lynn and her husband Evelyn, support orphanage in a village in southern india and suggested that I work on creating a library there. My mother’s other friends the Vanechs had told us about Global Literacy Project, an organisation there daughter Christina had had a good experience with service oriented work in Africa. We got in touch with them and they helped us plan out what we would do with the library. I began emailing tons of people and I started a book drive and received around 42,000 books by the end. The books were all sent to India and I visited the orphanage in early June of 2008. I read to the kids and i danced and played many games with them. They were amazing and so thrilled to be learning how to read the donated books. This year I have been working on a short documentary of my visit that I recently finished. The documentary shows tons of pictures from my trip there with all of the kids. It was a wonderful trip and I cannot wait to return this summer to work with the kids again.”

Visit with Milena at the Lady Lynn Joyful Home in this video -> milena_at_lady_lynn_orphanage

See more about Milena’s efforts in SPAN, the magazine of the American Embassy, New Delhi. http://span.state.gov/wwwhspseptoct0810.html

Also, local coverage in the Indian news… http://www.hindu.com/2008/06/16/stories/2008061659881100.htm