A team of intrepid Biblelands volunteers has just returned from rural Egypt, where they spent ten days helping some of the country's poorest inhabitants to rebuild their homes.

Travelling as part of the Upper Egypt House Building Project funded by Christian charity BibleLands, the 13 team members worked in partnership with Egyptian families determined to work their way out of the poverty trap.

The team worked for approximately five hours each day on vital and diverse tasks such as roofing, plastering, digging foundations, sieving desert sand and carrying hundreds of limestone bricks.

Team member Joan Wells, from Guildford, was keen to do something practical to support the work of BibleLands, which she and her late husband John had been interested in for many years.

|QUOTE|"For some years," she says. "I have felt that I would like, in some small way, to help less fortunate people of the world and at the same time show something of the love of God. When I heard about the volunteer scheme, I felt this would give me an opportunity to make some active contribution to society in general and more particularly to Egypt."

The volunteers have reported that they were struck by the levels of abject poverty in rural Egypt and by the challenges faced by the inhabitants in trying to break this cycle. All have said that they "were humbled and inspired by the villagers' cheerfulness and enthusiasm, and the strong sense of community between neighbours of both Christian and Muslim faith".

The volunteers' trip followed the huge success of a special BibleLands appeal, which earlier this year raised more than £200,000 to support the rebuilding of poverty housing in Egypt.

The project, operating in conjunction with Habitat for Humanity, will help more than 550 families to improve their squalid living conditions over the next three years.