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P: I do not understand why you've decided to do a doctorate about repairing some bloody electricals, you could have been a solicitor, a politician, in finance, making mounds of money, instead you convinced yourself that you could save the world with a spanner and foolishly forgot to save herself''?  M: I always intended to do it all, do a doctorate, be a solicitor, politician, in finance, making mounds of money, save the world with all tools available to me as well as save myself. P: Truly, I always dreamt for you to be a writer M: You already know I am. I just needed to take the long road to have enough materials to share P:  Happiness and joy M: as well as pain and sorrow More importantly to be honest, true so the reader and I can become true friends, venture in and out on the rive of life together

For the first time in many years, I considered returning to the corporate sector so I can gather all the learnng that I ne

September is always a special month. It is the beginning of the artistic season. In our family, it was always the month when my father would also present a new production. Fo r the first time, In September, this year, I am delivering a show - an exhibition to be exact called Stor ies of Change.  My brother is also opening the season with.a play called Catch! at Le Theatre de La Tempete directed by Clement Poiree and I shall join him in October to watch him. The old man would be proud! So yes, I feel supra connected to him this month at so many different levels. On the 6th September 2018, I wrote an article called  Freedom Time - We heard you .  about a message my father passed to me and my mother in his cloud. The article included my response to his message. He said:  'Why do you stay at home? You and Marie Toto. You have to come out of the house sometimes if you want to start collaborating with people.'' My response in summary was "at home I can be the whole me'...

Lightseekers is a creative social enterprise that uses photography and storytelling as a platform to learn about and engage with important social issues. They specialise in cross-cultural education and deliver thought provoking programmes to low-income areas, where creative engagement is low and students are likely to experience exclusion and discrimination. How did I get involved with Lightseekers? I started Yoga in 2019 while finishing my doctorate and I met Kajal Nisha Patel, founder of Lightseekers and yoga teacher at Nilu.Yoga. The rest is history. We became friends and collaborators through the Breaking the Silence Initiative at Quetzal. Over the pandemic, we discussed in great details the impacts of poor mental health on wellbeing and physical health. Through our discussion, a project started emerging that will become Ways to Wellbeing - a 9 online session programme providing the tools and knowledge to communities to enhance their wellbeing. She invited me to become a director a...

For the prolific academic writers, I am yet to add one more to the list. For now I will populate the internet. Lefebvre, Marie; Lofthouse, Vicky; Wilson, Garrath (2018): Towards a circular economy: exploring factors to repair broken electrical and electronics products by users with pro-environmental inclination. Loughborough University. Conference contribution.  https://hdl.handle.net/2134/34474   Lefebvre, Marie (2019): To repair or not to repair: an investigation of the factors influencing prosumer repair propensity. Loughborough University. Thesis.  https://doi.org/10.26174/thesis.lboro.11365325.v1

What happened this week? I published many resources online for people to pick upon and disseminate.  Our Quetzal Stories of Change event and the list of artists and organisations who will display at the event is on Quetzal Website . On Monday I will send the invitations to all and disseminate across the stratosphere. I also shared the results of our community discussion on what we can do to raise awareness in BAME communities about the trauma of childhood sexual abuse. I had a great meeting with the team if Let's talk about sexual violence about creating a bigger impacts with their exhibition both in Leicester and Liverpool by paying to a pot of fundings and determining some key activities. Watch this space! I had a great conversation with a funder about the questions to ask oneself when applying fundings . To give you a bit of a back story, I applied for some funding to tour the exhibition in Leicestershire. We received only part of the funding to support with our counselling act...

Leicester Fixers   received an invitation to join Climate Action Leicester Leicestershire for the launch of their Climate vigil on Saturday 21st 12-1pm at the Clock Tower, Gallowtree Gate in Leicester .  The vigil are silent, wearing Black or White, and are to show and signal that local groups care and stand together about the issue of climate change and are concerned for all the people and places suffering from climate change across the world. Are you joining?  

Mentoring is critical for leadership development. This week I was reminded of the latter after meeting with my mentor. She has been supporting me for the last 3-4 months in defining further ehat type of leader I want to be and how I want to relate to people around me. It supports with confidence, greater trust in your decision and give a great sounding board when wondering how to navigate a specific issue. They share experience and expertise to guide us in our next steps towards greatness. My mentor suggested that I shall go through a small exercise called the Golden Circle introduced by Simon Sinek to define my why and revisited from time to time. She also said that it is a great exercise to do with a team to ensure vision and purpose are aligned. It became clear to both of us that I had many projects and I needed to think more deeply about my purpose and it will help me to better redefine my relationships with others. Do you have a mentor? How do you find it? Have you use Simon Sinek...

  Ways to Wellbeing is a 9 online session programme delivered by Lightseekers  in May 2021 featuring 10 practitioners The project aimed to equip communities with   techniques, knowledge and information to support individuals and communities in their journey towards better mental, physical, social, environmental and spiritual wellbeing. The project was funded by Near Neighbours. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Founded by @kajalnp (@lightseekers)

Quetzal is a charity supporting female survivors of childhood sexual abuse aged 16 and above living in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland More about the project visit Quetzal website Read our latest blog posts related to the project Quetzal on social media Instagram Facebook Twitter Linkedin Update by Marlefeed Marlefeed Projects at Quetzal 2019 Breaking the Silence Initiative 2019-2022 Service Improvement Quetzal Heartbeat 2020 Event production Community Awareness-Raising Session Programme Breaking The Silence Initiative Resource design and development Self-Help Guide Quetzal Website Fundraising Campaigns Crush the Hush Covid-19 Edition Communication Campaign Let's Talk About Sexual Violence Online Exhibition Launch White Ribbon 2020 Service Improvement Lamplight 2021 Event Production Bhensexplaining Kitty Party Breaking the Silence Key Learning Webinar Community discussion about what we can do better to support South Asian Female Survivors Ways To Wellbeing 9 session online pr...

Bitty Adrien is a family invested in creating bridges, through visual arts, theatre and cinema, between cultures. Projects 1995-2005 Actor,  Acting in various plays over Les Rencontres à La Cartoucherie de Vincennes Mefiez Vous de La Pierre à Barbe written by Ahmed Madani Le Songe d'une Nuit d'éte by Shakespeare 2009 Communication & PR Assistant, Théatre de La Tempête Assistant, Poetry Event by Nazim Hikmet, with Carolyn Carlson directed by Philippe Adrien Exhibition for Eugénie Bitty, Maison de Houphouet Boigny, Paris 2021 June, Collective Exhibition, Expo 3 Femmes 3 Artistes 3 Axes, Maison Muller, Paris December, Exhibition Solo, La Maison d'à Côté, Théatre de l'Épée de Bois, Cartoucherie de Vincennes, Paris December, Christmas Market with Eugénie Bitty Creation C'est Beau et C'est Triste à La Fois, lecture Learn more about Eugenie Bitty Arts Their Website

Leicester Fixers met this week with FlowFinder to discuss areas of focus and next steps to consolidate what has been and do better moving forward. In the next few months, Leicester Fixers will do the following activities: redefine their vision, mission, objectives and value with the input of all the fixers. Here is a first draft Consider their delivery focus against their aims, objectives, funding streams and operations Develop their delivery plans A meeting will be organised to discuss some of the elements with people working together to repair and mend items.

Leicester Fixers is a community of citizens  that work together to mend the broken, reduce waste going into landfills, and campaign for the right to repair.  We operate under the umbrella of Transition Leicester which aims to create more resilient and sustainable communities. They do this by  Sharing tips and suggestions on how to repair  Promoting repair and upcycling businesses Organising Restart Parties and Festival - e.g. Green Festival of Making and Mending Delivering Outreach Programme to support citizens to start their own repair group - e.g. Leicestershire Community Repair Outreach Programme Delivering presentations and talks to inspire others to start their own repair community Contributing to research and discussion about the Right to Repair and the factors influencing prosumers to repair Delivering training and workshops Participating in National and International Days of Repair How can you connect with Leicester Fixers FB Group Instagram Restarters Footpa...

Leicester Fixers is in the process of redefining its vision, mission, values, as well as its delivery focus and operations. Here is what they drafted so far and we are looking for feedback, please comment: Our vision is To make repair always the best, easiest, cheapest option for citizens and their broken items in Leicester Their mission is  To empower individuals and organisations to repair and mend in Leicester  Their objectives Reduce Carbon Emissions  Increase number of items repaired Improve Communities Connection and Wellbeing Improve Individual and Community Training Achieve Financial Sustainability Their Values Fairshare,  People Care Earth Care Embrace an asset-based community approach where all are recognised and identified as having a gift that they can share with their community What do you think? There is definitely more work to do on this - It is the first draft - Looking forward to hearing your thoughts Email LeicesterFixers[at]Gmail.com

I was asked to provide an update about My Monday Email Run It is now my third week sending only emails on Monday. It remains very rewarding, though it is long stretch of work. Today, I started replying to emails at 6am this morning. It is now 9pm and I am on the last stretch dealing with my personal emails. Why did it take me all that long? Well today, I changed slightly my schedule. I had a meeting with a coach to support Leicester Fixers - Durgha from Flow Finder (a bit about this in this Last Update ). It meant that 3hours of my time were dedicated to travelling, chatting, planning and more.  Writing emails on Mondays also include writing articles, newsletters as well as updating websites including Quetzal and Marlefeed plus doing a bit of design work. It is required since I want to update my teams about upcoming events and resources to share. I am working towards writing most of the content to send on Monday - On Thursday instead so I can reduce the workload for Monday. Once ...

Quetzal Stories of Change Exhibition opens on the 18th September 2021 . I am well looking forward to pulling it all together. One of my goals is to tour all or part of the exhibition in various venues in and out of Leicester.  In this process, I identified some funding to support the tour as well as venues that could host the exhibition. This week on Wednesday in particular, I had a field trip and visited the Marlene Reid Centre , a long standing community centre in Coalville. On the Wednesday, they host a food market with a cooking station, a café, they also sell clothes uniform. They invited me to fill a bag of veg for £1, browse the charity and their furniture shop and even snacks on some lovely Turkish food. Stories were shared with me about how women in the area used the centres and how significant it is to educate about trauma, sexual and domestic violence. They had in the past training with Women's Aid s uprooting female survivors on their journey. Anywoo, we agreed on the ...

A team meeting is in order, yet the team was not ready to engage this week. One of the collaborators contracted COVID and oh well Summer is here. It allowed me to focus on fostering our relationship with T. It led to the development of documentation that we will be able to disseminate to our network. After the encounter, I thought that the next team meeting, I will invite T. to come along to gauge the energy and see how we will work together. Other elements, I asked for some quotes for the print and consciously waiting for their reply. 

Leicester  Fixers won some time ago a £500 voucher to get tools from Ifixit . It was a thrilling gift to receive. This week, I moved forward in defining the toolkit we will order by making some enquiries to Loughborough Fixers as well as Leicester Fixers . Thanks to those who came back to me, I will study your reply and make an order. Even though, there is no plan as such to have any repair event in Leicester in the upcoming year, Thinking about it is a start in possibly doing something about it.  I also had a discussion with Durgha from Flow Finder about her coaching consultancy services I am considering to use to support Leicester Fixers. She suggested for me to restart our newsletter updating our mailing list about our activities and gather a bit energy there.  About my personal repair, I returned to Woodgate Computer this week to fetch a data stick and bring some mobile phone. I had four in total. Amongst the four, they took three to give me a quote. Amongst the th...

Dr Rob Watson interviewed me as part of Leicester Stories series #BuildBackBetter in July 2021.  Prior to the interview, he sent me few questions for me to prepare the interview and start thinking about what it means to Build Back Better post-pandemic. In the following post, I answer one of the questions augmented after reflecting upon the interview R: I’d like to know what conversations and discussions people living and working in Leicester had during the lockdown, especially when these conversations started to focus on the idea of Building Back Better? Through the lockdown, my discussion were upon the tools available to people to support their mental health and connections with others. In a trauma-informed programme, the first steps are stabilisation and regulation. In other words, if someone is in a state of shock, the first step is to ground them and help them manage their emotions. In our community, we experienced first hand what it is to be in a state of shock during the pand...

There is not a time when I speak to my mother that she does not say to me that she is tidying up and putting things together. It feels like a constant journey of messing and tidying. At the moment, she is creating a space within our home where she will work on her arts. This translates into moving things about across the house to create the space where she will strive. I am counting the weeks until she is able to do such work. On my side, I had confirmation that we have the possibility to exhibit her work in the UK and I am looking to get some print to display her wonderful work. I will ask for quotes withn the next week or so. My sister is currently unavailable to support at the moment. I look forward though for her to have a wake up call and realise how significant her role is in this enterprise. I am sure the universe will let her know soon.