CANS FOR KIDS - There will shortly be a collection cage for Cans for Kids - this will be placed at the School, in the parking area at the bottom of Mavrovouniou [the road that runs from the new Church down to the school]. It is anticipated that the cage will be in place within the next few weeks so this notice is to make you aware if you wish to support this project so you can start collecting now.
Further advices follow once the cage has been installed.
WHO WE ARE
The Cans For Kids story began in 1990 when founder Rosie Charalambous’ son Christopher was diagnosed with cancer. She soon realised that the children’s wards at the Makarios hospital lacked the state-of-the-art equipment for dealing with childhood cancers that was available in other European hospitals.
When Christopher died, aged two, Rosie wondered what she could do to improve the facilities that would be available in the future. Noticing the huge amounts of rubbish littering the Cypriot countryside – among which were valuable aluminium cans – she formed an association with the aim of collecting the cans, selling them, and using the money raised to buy the much-needed machines that would upgrade the standard of care at Cyprus’ central paediatric hospital. She called it Cans For Kids.
The response has been amazing: over a quarter of a million euros worth of equipment has been donated to the Makarios Hospital, which treats seriously ill children from all over the island .As well as upgrading the equipment, and therefore the standard of care, in Cypriot children’s wards, Cans For Kids raises awareness of the benefits of recycling by visiting schools and organisations to give talks explaining the importance of recycling aluminium and also hosting school/group visits to the Cans For Kids recycling centre in Nicosia.
It’s worth noting that Cans For Kids is run entirely by volunteers, who freely give their time and energy to all aspects of the charity’s work, be it the sometimes messy sorting of cans prior to baling, giving presentations to schools or organising social events and fundraisers. The ethos of volunteerism is one of the pillars that underpins Cans For Kids’ success, and new volunteers are always welcome
HOW TO HELP US RECYCLE
– Rinse your empty cans to remove food or sugary drinks so that our volunteers aren’t greeted by sticky and smelly bags.
– Separate steel cans from aluminium (check with a magnet) and bag them separately – this makes the sorting much quicker for our helpers.
– Please remove straws before you bag your cans for us.
– Some other recyclers in Cyprus ask you to mix up the plastic, metal and drinks cartons (PMD), however this means someone down the road has to ‘un-mix’ them if they are to be successfully recycled.
– Cans For Kids only recycles metal, so if you would like to help, please only put steel and aluminium cans in our can banks. We do pass on other recyclables to the relevant recyclers, but it is very time consuming to separate them!
