Arusha Round Table Honours Fallen Comrade
By Sonica Naudé-Steyn

The Arusha Round Table (based in Tanzania) recently hosted their second annual Klimb Manjaro event where climbers are challenged to summit Kilimanjaro in aid of raising funds for charity.
This year however the Tablers honoured fallen comrade, Gordon Gray by conducting the event in his honour. Gordon Gray was a local businessman and philanthropist who passed away in a helicopter accident in August last year.
“After Gordon's passing last year, we unanimously took the decision to honour his memory by hosting the KlimbManjaro 2 and every KlimbManjaro event thereafter in his memory and honour,” said Ameet Sidhu, International Relations Officer of Round Table Arusha 14.
According to Ameet, the Klimb Manjaro event is Gordon’s greatest legacy to the organisation: “Gordon was a massive part of Round Table Arusha since its inception in June 2014. He visited us on average two to three times a year and we enjoyed his humour and company whilst benefiting from his ideas. KlimbManjaro was his idea and with his advice and support, RT14 brought it to life in February 2016.”
The Klimb Manjaro event raises funds for the Arusha based New Paradise Outlook Centre which supports young orphans through secondary school. Funds are used to provide the orphans with all their educational requirements such as school fees, uniforms and other school materials.
“This year we will be using the money raised from our inaugural climb in 2016 to fund three orphans fully and top-up the fund for two more orphans who receive partial funding from another party. Our total contribution for the five teenagers is 4,600,000 Tanzania Shillings, which equates to just over $2,000. In total, the orphanage has seven children who will be in secondary school this year out of a total of 25 orphans, hence a further batch of students will be joining secondary school next year,” said Ameet.
The ultimate goal for the organisation is to raise enough funds to give every orphan at the centre the opportunity to attend secondary school.
“Up to now, the gentleman who runs and looks after the orphanage really struggled to fund the high school orphans, so this is a big relief for a man who looks to be nearing his 80's. That is why Klimb Manjaro is very important to us in terms of raising money for our project. Of course, every year the number of high school attendees from the orphanage grows bigger and so we will continue our efforts to raise funds for the cause. This year we have raised $1,800, largely thanks to Alex Shulze and Sebastian Schreiber from Table 182 in Tuebingen Germany. That's a pretty strong number for us considering we only had 6 climbers this year compared to 16 last year when we raised just over double that figure!” continued Ameet.
In order to share the success of the fundraiser, the Arusha tablers invited Gordon’s fiancé, Lisa Honneysett-Filer to be the guest of honour at the ceremony where the funds were handed over to the orphanage.
“We wanted to grace the occasion with someone who was very dear to Gordon, and we are so glad she could make it and share our experiences and stories of Gordon with the Tabler's who joined us this year from Germany, Austria, Kenya and of course Tanzania. We hope she will climb Kili in 2018 as part of Klimb Manjaro 3, and really hope we can host some more of Gordie's countrymen in the future! We will forever miss him, his generosity, his quick wit and humour and his beaming smile. It was a pleasure and honour knowing him, and I know that the group of us who summited Kili with him in 2016 will always remember him,” Ameet concluded. For more information on the Klimb Manjaro event please visit the Arusha Round Table Facebook page or email rtarusha@gmail.com.