RB Global Community Challenge: Day Five

64 Reckitt Benckiser employees from 33 different countries are in Brazil for this year’s RB Global Challenge in aid of Save the Children.

31 of them are on the Community Challenge in Petrolina, north-east Brazil. The team has raised nearly £300,000 for Save the Children over the past nine months.

Some of these funds are being used to renovate and rebuild two creches in the Joao de Deus community of Petrolina.

Samir Mohan from RB USA recounts his fifth day:

‘I can’t believe a week has flown by and so much was accomplished! As I reflect back through this past week I am filled with many emotions that no words would do justice describing.

I feel honoured and privileged to be part of this great group of people who I shared this past week with and to be affiliated with Save The Children Foundation through RB.

The creche looks completely different from when we arrived and I can’t wait to see all the children and parents’ reactions tomorrow at the re-opening.

We started off the day with the local minister of sports leading off a group stretch to iron out a weeks worth of knots, aches and pains.

We also had the teachers from the creche bring us local fruit that was delicious.

No water

Did I forget to mention we had no running water in the morning!  We had no running water this morning but we made the most of what we had and spent a lot of the day organizing/decorating the classrooms, cleaning up around the courtyard, cafeteria, front lawn and playground.

Once we got the water back we finished up any painting that needed to be done outside and inside for the murals – basically having the creche ready to host around 1,500 people on Saturday for a re-opening.

Today we also had some local children from a school near by visit us. They were all keen to find out where we were all from and hear us speak English.

At the end of the day we all ‘left our mark’ on the crèche by leaving our handprints, name and country of origin on the wall near the front entrance. I couldn’t have imagined a better way to end such a great experience that words just can’t describe!