London 'Table Football Challenge' Raises Cash for Development Projects

A Chessington man has raised almost £1,500 by carrying a table football game across London, playing members of the public on 10 of the city's bridges.

Pedro de Barros, a member of Duke Street Baptist Church in Richmond, is raising cash to help paint a clinic in a slum area of Delhi, India when he visits the country in April. The project is being run by Tearfund, a Christian development charity based in Teddington.

Pedro and friends Andy Hambleton and Nathan Burley undertook the ten-hour sponsored challenge on 3rd March, starting at Battersea Bridge, crossing every major bridge and ending on Tower Bridge. But throughout the day, the three challengers remained undefeated.

Pedro said, "My arms were aching before we'd even made it to the first bridge, so I knew the day was going to be a real challenge. We took the table up to London on public transport from its home in Richmond which was a massive challenge in itself. Trying to get the table onto a bus was interesting!"

Added Pedro, "The toughest part was just after Lambeth Bridge approaching Waterloo Bridge. It was 3pm, we were just halfway through but were very tired. But seeing the lights of Tower Bridge on the horizon from the penultimate bridge was an unforgettable moment and gave me that last burst of energy! Climbing steps was a bit of a problem but we kept on going till the end and pulled off a remarkable day for raising those funds to get to India, £1,417.80 in total."

Pedro, a Tearfund staff member, will travel to India on 2 April joined by nine others from around the country as part of a Tearfund Transform Team.

Pedro says, "I have always wanted to get a view of life from outside the western perspective, and spend time serving others who get by life on the bare essentials. As the days and weeks pass I am getting more and more excited as I feel this trip will be like nothing I have ever done before!"

Tearfund's Transform Programme enables Christians to spend from two weeks to four months working hand in hand with local partners in Africa, Asia and Central and South America. Transform Teams undertake a wide variety of relief activities, from building houses for widows and orphans from Rwanda's genocide, to working with children orphaned by AIDS in Thailand and working with street children in Brazil.

Last year Tearfund dispatched 35 Transform Teams - a total of 428 people - to development projects in 18 developing countries throughout Africa, Asia and Central and South America.

For more information about Transform visit www.tearfund.org/transform