About Laing House
Laing House is a support centre for youth living with mental illness. It is a youth-driven and community-based organization where young people between 16 and 30 years of age, who are living with a mental illness, can get the support they need to rebuild their lives. Since opening in 2001, Laing House has assisted over 300 youth from across the Maritimes. There are currently 100 members of Laing House. Programs, including employment, healthy living, education, and peer and family support, help youth recognize and develop their own strengths, talents and resources in a welcoming, respectful and collaborative environment. Laing House is the first of its kind in Canada.
The supportive environment of Laing House allows youth and staff to build meaningful relationships. They work together to create personal development, community education, and advocacy programs. These experiences and opportunities provide youth with support and resources to further educational and vocational paths. They develop the life skills needed to form relationships, secure safe housing, and experience hope for their futures. A variety of unique programs and services are employed to attain these goals. Laing House looks forward to a day where the stigma surrounding mental illness has dissipated and there is equal opportunity for all.
Thank you to all Laing House supporters!
The support that Laing House has received as a result of this climb has been fantastic. We wish to express our gratitude to all of you. Like all charities, Laing House feels the impact of the recession. The extra funds raised as a result of this climb will provide Laing House with the resources to continue to serve young people struggling with mental health issues. Thank you!
We all slept really well as a result of our exhaustion from the previous day. We would be starting our descent at Barafu in the high alpine desert, and descend down to and through the heath and moorland to the edge of the rain forest where Mweka was located. We were all feeling very good as a result of the good night's sleep plus the extra oxygen that we were beathing with each step.
We had been descending for about 1.5 hours when we saw the evacuation stretcher beside the trail. It is a stretcher fastened to a mountain bike wheel. The guides use this to evacuate climbers suffering from severe altitude sickness. We were all happy not to have had the need to use it!
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As we descended the temperature got warmer and warmer and the trail got dustier and dustier. We arrived in Mweka after 4 hours on the trail. We had a hot lunch, cleaned up and enjoyed the afternoon. We decided to visit Albert, our cook, in his tent as he prepared dinner. He had done an amazing job of preparing hot delicious meals with very little equipment on the side of a mountain at high elevations. The photos show the beauty of the African people. Africa has all of the problems that we read about. However, Africans as individuals are wonderful people. We will all miss hearing the early chatter in Swahili, which we heard as we awakened every morning. Check out these pictures of Albert and his team. There was no need to ask them to smile.
Our dinner that evening would be our last evening meal with the guides. We had a great discussion about our climb, all of which was positive. However, two points were special:
- Paula and David made it to the summit in spite of never receiving their luggage. In the experience of our guides, they had NEVER seen this happen. Usually it is too much of a motivational setback to make it to the summit if your luggage never arrives. Paula and David did an amazing job of not letting these negative thoughts deter them.
- We had a climb with three Mamas and they all got along. In Africa, women are referred to as Mama once they have children. The guides have seen many climbs with three Mamas. Usually, the stress of the climb leads to that old saying, "two's company, three's a crowd". However, our three Mamas got along from the first day until the last.
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