Sunday, November 1, 2009

meanwhile in Cambodia


Here in Toronto, I haven't been knitting at all. Not one stitch. My poor Pomatomus sock is calling out "Knit me, knit me". Coming back from vacation finds me so far behind on my work projects, that I have no choice but to keep my head down and plug away. And it doesn't help at all to know that I've brought this all on myself. Biting off more than I can chew, as usual.

Meanwhile in Cambodia another Canadian woman has started something really ambitious - Cambodia Knits, a knitting co-op of sorts. Monika is training 33 members of the Toul Sambo community to knit. Yarn and patterns are provided to knit toys for sale. With training, supplies and a market for the finished goods provided, the co-op provides accessible, flexible employment. Phew, that's quite an undertaking!

That's not all. As the program develops and expands, Monika hopes to create self-sustaining "knit centres". And then plans to reinvest the profits within the community - building schools, providing scholarships, and investing in development projects. I've sponsored these two knitters shown and I have my fingers firmly crossed.

3 comments:

suse-the-slow-knitta said...

that is a brilliant project!

Frieda said...

Thanks for the heads up , it seems like a wonderful project . Thanks to you they have another sponsor here , after all we have to expand the knitting community :-}

Monika Nowaczyk said...

Hi!

Thanks for posting this here and getting the word out to more people, really appreciate that!

Just want to add further kudos to the two designers that are letting us use their patterns for our first line of products: Raynor Gellatly at http://www.etsy.com/shop/Jellybum and Rebecca Danger at http://www.etsy.com/shop/dangercrafts . Both are super talented and amazing for letting us use their patterns. Check them out!