So, as we gear up to leave for the far north of Queensland – Cape York and the Torres Strait, we are surrounded by 40 ukes in our living room.
We need to tune them almost daily to get them used to staying in tune, and also label them with a message and photo of the donor who put up $20 or $40 to buy a half or whole uke.
Craig Claxton of Guitar Brothers at Red Hill kindly donated a further 10 ukes as well as selling the balance of 30 ukes at cost price to us.
As well as the ukes, we need to have enough money to buy enough spare strings and tuners to keep everyone happy as well as try to cover the cost of the excess baggage fees we will incur at Qantas check-in.
So far, we haven’t been able to reach anyone at Qantas who’s willing to do this, but we live in hope!
It’s been a fun journey of seeking donations and it has reached as far as Dubbo, NSW, to a small group of enthusiastic uke players from Red Earth Ukes Band who got together and donated $170 to our cause. It’s this kind of outreach that really makes you smile. When people can converge for a cause that makes them put their hand in their pocket so someone else can find out how much fun it is to do something that they are passionate about already. A big thank you to Di Clifford for arranging those donations from Red Earth Ukes.
Tangatours in Brisbane, with John Sharpe CEO at the helm, also felt it was a nice “practical” donation to participate in and they sponsored $200 (5 ukes).
Councillor Jenny Breene of Logan City Council also contributed $200 as did Billy Gordon MP up at Mareeba. Very grateful for those donations too!
We are conducting a free concert at Beenleigh Town Square this Saturday 2nd July from 5pm in the hope that the large ATSI population in the Logan catchment might throw in a few more gold coins to help us buy some more goodies for the kids.
So, from Sean and I, it’s a big thank-you to all who supported our little philanthropic journey and we’ll be sure to post some videos of the kids all playing a tune together with the gorgeous new ukes.
Our tour itinerary for the “Making Waves in the Strait” Tour:
11th July – Wongai Beach
14th July – Thursday Island Bowls Club
15th July – Bamaga Tavern
17th July – Cape York Lodge – Punsand Bay