Jane A. Bramhill (from emails sent on 8 and 9 August 2016)

I was at Homerton from ’73-76, am now Head of Science / Dean of Students at the International School of Indiana, USA, and have just received July’s ‘Homertonian’ and read the article about CRI.

Although studying Biology and Chemistry, I spoke fluent German and volunteered to help with a camp in Germany in the summer of 1974. I remember how hard we worked to give underprivileged children from Mannheim a vacation in stunning surroundings, and how privileged my life was in comparison. I had met the team leader (Chris Cox, I think) but not the others but we settled quickly into our roles and schedules.

It was my first introduction to volunteerism, which is highly regarded in the USA to the extent that GIs from a base nearby volunteered to occupy the children while we prepared the evening meal. We had been advised to take the absolute minimum with us, and I left without any hair grips/hair slides or toiletries as this was all I had to give the children. I also remember driving a mini bus full of children to Strasbourg (to the zoo I think) – and had the most unnerving flashback in March this year when I took a group of year 11 students from my USA school to visit Strasbourg and suddenly found myself on the same street!

CRI didn’t just benefit the children, it was an experience that is still with me 40+ years later, and showed what a difference people can make.