Russian Students Gather 45 Tons-Worth of Holiday gifts for Syrian Children

         

Through the month of December, students from across Russia participated in a donation drive to collect gifts for Syrian children. The effort, organized under the 'Children of Russia to Children of Syria' campaign, has culminated in the Russian military delivering over 45 tons-worth of presents to the war-torn country in time for the holidays.

On Tuesday, a Defense Ministry spokesman confirmed that about 45 metric tons of gifts have been delivered during the course of the campaign, including individualized greetings and a wide variety of presents, which differed from region to region. For example, the spokesman said, "students in the Kursk and Vologda regions...collected over a thousand boxes with gifts, including traditional crafts, postcards, and stationery, but also keepsakes specific to those regions."
 Children from the icy northern city of Vologda are reported to have sent a variety of handicrafts, including birch bark boxes, soft toys made out of wool, and ceramic trinkets. Their counterparts from Kursk in the country's southwest, meanwhile, purchased and made gifts featuring the traditional symbol of that region - the Kursk nightingale.
Russian children send 40 tons of holiday gifts to children in Syria.

The gifts, collected all through the month of December, were gathered at the Chkalovsky Airbase outside Moscow, from where they have since been flown to Hmeymim Airbase in northwest Syria's Latakia province. A portion of the gifts was immediately delivered to a school in Tartus, where soldiers from the Russian Center for Reconciliation handed them out students.

Speaking to journalists, Tartus-based Hashinm Yousef School director Asif Asaad said that the gifts will allow young Syrians to get into the spirit of the holidays. "This raises their morale, and the holiday takes on a positive note. Moreover, this year the New Year and the birthday of the Prophet (one of the major Muslim holidays), will take place close together," the director explained.

https://www.sott.net/article/337917-Russian-Students-Gather-45-Tons-Worth-of-Holiday-gifts-for-Syrian-Children