Celebration, rough seas & festival fever
Celebrating 3 years of empowering and supporting Fiji women and youth
Since its inception just three years ago, MSP has delivered clinical and information services to over 66,000 women, men and youth through our mobile outreach team and walk-in clinic programs.
We marked our third anniversary with a celebratory event at the Fiji Club in Suva on Friday 20th September, sponsored by SCA Libra and supported by Jokhan Realtors Ltd.
MSP’s patron, His Excellency Ratu Epeli Nailatika, President of Fiji, gave the key address and cut the obligatory celebratory cake – as we do like to mark our celebrations in this manner 🙂
Then the night ratched up a notch with local band Deja Vu playing til late.
Jennifer Poole, MSP Executive Director, said: “I want to thank our funders and supporters who have enabled us to grow from strength to strength. As a relatively new organisation, we feel privileged to have had the opportunity to assist and support so many individuals and communities, especially women and youth, over the past three years, and we look forward to celebrating future milestones.”
All at sea
Our dedicated staff survived a grueling, jam-packed, 12-hour ferry crossing to Labasa last month – enduring rough seas and sea sickness – to deliver the final workshop in the series Engaging Youth in Child Protection & Women’s Empowerment to End Violence Against Women & Girls to Northern Division youth. But the participants’ appreciation of the opportunity to gain knowledge from experts in the field more than made up for the staff’s tiring travel experience.
After the two-day Workshop, the team carried out community outreach in Labasa before returning to Suva.
Festival fever
Business was brisk at the MSP stand, located in the Wellness Centre tent, at the Hibiscus Festival this year. More than 3,000, mainly young, festival goers took advantage of the reproductive information and awareness offered by our nurse and youth mentors.
Check out what we’ve acheived over the past two years
Our first Review is now available. You can download it from our website, request a hard copy by emailing info@medicalservicespacific.org.fj, or drop into our office at 355 Waimanu Road. We want to give a big thanks to Quality Print Ltd and Julie Barron Design for sponsoring the production of this report.
The MSP pocket size Referral Directory is also hot off the press. It’s been produced to make it easier for our clients to access the wide range of services delivered by our partner organisations.
International Day of Non Violence 2013
“There are many causes that I am prepared to die for but no causes that I am prepared to kill for.”
Mahatma Gandhi, The Story of My Experiences with Truth, 1927
International Day of Non-Violence is marked on 2 October, the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi, leader of the Indian independence movement and pioneer of the philosophy and strategy of non-violence. Taking a stand for peace, tolerance, understanding and non-violence isn’t such a bad approach in the current times.
Corona busy bees
Our clients and staff are benefitting from the generosity and labour of Corona Worldwide Fiji, who organized a ‘Working Bee’ in August to help transform our clinic. Over the past weeks interior and external walls have been painted, old chairs and sofa replaced and new curtains hung to complete the transformation.
Jennifer Poole says: “As a small Fijian charity, we are so grateful for the support and hard work of the Suva Corona club and its army of volunteers who were involved in refurbishing our clinic to make it more inviting and comfortable for our clients. Our clients welcome and appreciate the new environment as much as our staff.”
You can see ‘before’ and ‘after’ pics on our Facebook page.