Andrew Ayres
In February a group will be joining Books For Africa (BFA) founder Tom Warth, who will lead a group from BFA and Hand In Health (HIH) to The Gambia to meet with elected officials along with prominent business and university members about ways to help end the book famine and support the United Nations Development Goals of educating women and children.Africa Book Walk
As part of the journey the BFA team will join others from HIH for the first ever African Book Walk. We will do two walks through the capital of The Gambia accompanied by children from many local schools. Then as a team we will walk the Trans-Gambia highway, from the Senegal border on the south to the Senegal border on the north, to raise awareness about the book famine and distribute 22,000 books to Universities, local schools, and co-ops. This collection of books also contains a “law and human rights library” generously donated by our partner Thomson-Reuters. Check out their website here for more information.
Travel Blog Posts
February 19th 2012
After getting to the hotel at 2:30 in the morning after 24 hours in transit, the 9am alarm for breakfast comes entirely too soon. I theory we have a slate of meetings today with the ministry of education and the mayor, the when and where is of course still in flux. A quick breakfast at the hotel, a quick dip in the somewhat chilly (but lovely) Atlantic Ocean and we are ready, but still waiting for word on our schedule and our transport. As Americans it is still an overwhelming case of HUAW (Hurry Up And Wait). We will adapt, though it will take a few days to really get the hang of it. This is the only day of meetings that I will be involved in for a couple of days. We are meeting with ... read more
February 17th 2012
After spending two days in NYC visiting an old friend from college and walking around the city taking in all of the sights and sounds, I rushed off (almost too late) to meet some of my traveling companions from Minnesota. I met my father, Books for Africa founder Tom Warth, and Lang Dibba (a Gambia living in MN) at JFK for the overnight flight to Dakar. Africa really does begin on the plane, where Wolof (the regional native language) seems to be the primary language. Dakar is a crazy place. Dust, pollution, crazy driving, street children everywhere. We met a friend of Lang's and spent a couple of hours at her house resting and eating while they worked to arrange a transport for our drive to The Gambia. Our transport was a beat up old Pegot ... read more
February 11th 2012
The journey has almost begun; at least the actual travel adventure part of it. Over the past two weeks over 110 people have donated money to help us reach our goal (!!) of raising $10,000 dollars to send a container of books to The Gambia! Over the next couple of days our team will be departing the US and Britain and head toward West Africa. We hope to keep you updated as we meet with school children and ambassadors and work on developing connection to end the book famine and the literacy drought in The Gambia. The bags are packed, time to get traveling. Andy and the African Book Walk Team.... read more
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