[PICS] Donor catches 'lying' orphanage

daveza

daveza

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http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_id=vn20100727122441696C884001


A Cape Town orphanage has admitted to doctoring a series of pictures to spare the feelings of a generous donor whose wish was to see poor South African children attending a World Cup game.

The orphanage was caught out by the donor himself, who is an expert in photo retouching and editing.

Carl Stevens, a 54-year-old Englishman living in Australia, saw a documentary on TV a few months ago about poor children in South Africa.

He was moved by what he saw, and wanted to do something to help.

He told the Cape Argus that he did not want to deal with a big charity, so he looked up orphanages online and settled on Al Noor in Woodstock - home to more than 20 children.

He wrote them an email, asking if he could donate money to send the children to see a World Cup match.

"I think the experience of seeing a game may help them realise a dream," he wrote.

Amina Madien, Al Noor's director, wrote back to Stevens, thanking him profusely. Before long, Stevens had transferred about R3 250 into Al Noor's bank account. Madien told Stevens that tickets had been bought for two games.

Her story began to unravel after Stevens asked for a photo of the children at one of the matches. Madien stalled for more than a week, offering Stevens several excuses.

Finally, she sent him the pictures - five of the worst Photoshop jobs he had ever seen, Stevens said.

Stevens said he was familiar with Photoshop, a programme used to retouch, edit and manipulate digital images.

"They did a shoddy job," said Stevens, laughing.

Madien admitted that the pictures had been doctored, but said the orphanage had lied to Stevens to spare his feelings.

"People did not want to hurt the donor's feelings by not going to the stadium, by telling him we didn't find tickets."

She said Al Noor had used the money to rent a bus and take the children to the city's fan park and to buy T-shirts and cooldrinks.

She claimed that the orphanage had spent R9 000 on various field trips during the World Cup.

"The World Cup did make an impact on the children, it just wasn't in the stadium," she said.

Madien admitted that the photos were fakes, and said the organisation was sorry for lying. "It was our duty to explain to Carl, and for that we are sorry," she said.

Al Noor has made headlines before - it was closed once in 2005 and once in 2006 for operating without registration.

It is now operating under conditional registration and gets no money from the government, relying instead on private donors.

Stevens said he harboured no ill will towards the orphanage or Madien.

"She meant well," he said.

"(I'm just the) wrong person to send Photoshopped pics to."
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Oxygen thieves roam our streets.
 
ahahaha... but seriously. You don't just hand over cash. If he was serious about helping the kids he should have got the tickets himself.

If you live in South Africa you should know better than to trust most people with hard cash.
 
daveza said:
Oxygen thieves roam our streets.
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If those pictures in the article are the ones they sent to him I'm not surprised he realised they were fakes. Those were horrific. Even I could have done a better job with GIMP on a monochromatic screen that kept randomly switching on and off.
 
Fcking agents with their photo-analysis tendencies.
 
Garyvdh said:
ahahaha... but seriously. You don't just hand over cash. If he was serious about helping the kids he should have got the tickets himself.

If you live in South Africa you should know better than to trust most people with hard cash.
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think the guy was from australia...
 
Shame. Blame this on those ***** who bought tickets just for resale, and FIFA for allowing it to happen.
 
the kids at the back are just very, very, very tall, that's all?
 
Keeper said:
the kids at the back are just very, very, very tall, that's all?
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Well, I quite liked the fact that they sent the dude the same pic twice with one shopped more than the other. Kind of like, wow! Those kids sit awfully still while two guys vuvu in their ears. And that ungrateful little **** on the right is fast asleep at the World Cup!!! Unbelievable! Kids of today :rolleyes:
 
makes you wonder what else this person has been lying about. I feel that the best way to con overseas investors is to tell them you need this and that for poor aids orphans and what.
 
ponder said:
Don't go giving people ideas :D
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ha ha i did not mean it that way but everyone knows that talking about AIDS in this day and age is a sure money spinner so as long as it's around someone will be getting money for some sort of workshop or discussion group.
 
"It is estimated that only 5% of all money donated to all charities actually ends up benefiting the people it was originally intended for."

I've heard that statistic bandied about many times... not sure where it is from or who said it.
 
Garyvdh said:
"It is estimated that only 5% of all money donated to all charities actually ends up benefiting the people it was originally intended for."

I've heard that statistic bandied about many times... not sure where it is from or who said it.
Click to expand...

I think it's a bit more but not much. I recall hearing the stats when they did that red nose day thing. They collected millions and only a pittance of that made it to the charities.
 
I recall hearing that 'statistic' was manufactured to make stingy people feel good about themselves.
 
like the Ward Counselor on SABC2 this morning and this case we are talking about they both are like a Beauty Pageant contestant cause they ALL only tell the people what the people want to hear.
 
I say we spam them with email asking questions or just giving them a piece of your mind
I would submit my email on this forum but there would be to many superlatives to make to any sense of it lol

their email address is
[email protected]
 
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