Locals may remember Spurtle reader Richard Burrell, the former Bellevue resident who recently moved away to take up a Modern Studies teaching post at Earlston in the Borders.
Next summer, Richard will lead a party of 10 young people to Peru, and is now organising an auction in Edinburgh to help raise the necessary funds for himself.
The trip is in support of the Vine Trust, a Leith-based charity which supports streetchildren around the world. Richard and the secondary-school students he's travelling with will help to fix up and maintain orphanages like the one pictured (below) at Kusi.
Each member of the party needs to find over £2,000 for the journey costs, and to this end Richard has secured some wonderful lots. (You can peruse the whole list in the file at the foot of this page.) They include a designer red, fish skin sporran which, allegedly, 'will draw many looks of admiration', theatre and paintball tickets, signed books, food, tooth-whitening, football, hooch, golf, personal training and 10 hours of one-to-one Modern Studies tuition. And we haven't even mentioned the raffle yet.
The auction will begin in the Counting House (above the Pear Tree) on West Newington Street at 7.30pm on Friday 30 November.
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