“Everyone has been involved and I was very surprised on how keen to help were the top” added Sachetat. “Top shuttlers never hesitated to spend a bit of their time or energy all though out the year to support the foundation and help promote Solibad”. Peter Gade gave his Gold Medal scooped at the European Championships this spring, Koo Kien Keat collected money on his own by selling shirts and rackets and handed over more than 1800 US $. Taufik Hidayat gave rackets for auction, like Korean Super star Lee Yong Dae who offered his racket and shirt from the world championships. Lee Chong Wei also offered shirts and rackets and posed for a special SOLIBAD photo session – as did many others top shuttlers – for a SOLIBAD calendar and photo album soon to be distributed. Players like Cai Yun, Chen Jin, Wang Lin, Wang Yihan, Saina Nehwal, Markis Kido, Hendra Setiawan and more than 50 top shuttlers will feature in this unique Photo Album.
 All together, more than 12 000€ have been collected from various action and already been dispatched to the projects, with no waste whatsoever.

Lots of achievements already

In a year’s time, a lot has been achieved already, with projects related – or not – to badminton. In Kuala Lumpur, Solibad was able to help an orphanage – Sanctuary Care Center – and give funds for the kids’ daily needs. Funding also went to a project in Bali, where a computer science teacher was hired in another orphanage – Careforkids Bali – in order for the elder kids to have an education to get a job when they leave the orphanage.

More recently, and jointly with the foundation “Peace and Sport”, Solibad went to Haiti to continue its  project called “1000 rackets for Haiti”, which aims at bringing funding and badminton equipment to the local population in Haiti. Already more than 750 rackets and a lot of other badminton equipment reached the island and a small delegation from Peace and Sport and Solibad went on site together with Kaveh Meharbi, Iran’s best badminton player, in November to teach physical educators the basics of badminton so that they could go in the schools and in the surviving camps to teach and play with the children. And help them forget about the trauma from the earthquake and the most recent difficult situation

Solibad was also involved in a project in Mauritius, together with the foundation “Badminton Pou Zenfan” (Badminton for Kids in local Creole) started by Karen Foo Kune, Mauritius’s number one badminton player and Olympian in Beijing’s Olympics. More than 50 children from the poor neighborhood of Mauritius were welcomed in a badminton hall for a very special day: they were given badminton rackets, sports equipment and food, and given their first lesson of badminton with Karen as a special coach.

Original projects ahead

Solibad will keep on working with the current projects – in Haiti, Bali, Kuala Lumpur, Mauritius, but also with new projects in mind, in Brazil and Vietnam, where badminton coaches have had amazing ideas to help poor children to get away from their daily lives. Solibad will help these children to make their dreams come true.

A night with the stars.

On March 14th , 2011, the badminton Club of Geneva will welcome some of the world’s top stars for a badminton exhibition, with artists who will be singing to make the evening even more joyful and colorful

World wide “flashmob”

After the success of the French version of the Flashmob – on June 4th 2010 people gathered in many cities in France to play together in symbolic places amongst which under the Eiffel Tower where Pi Hongyan led the choreography – a new edition will take place in 2011. This time, badminton fans from all over the world will be called to come and dance with their rackets during “SOLIBAD Day” next spring – the date is yet to be confirmed.  “I can picture badminton fans with rackets playing in Times square, New York, in front of the Opera house in Sydney, Big Ben in London and the Petronas Tower in Kuala Lumpur and many other places on the same day. It would be extraordinary to achieve something like that. It’s a crazy idea, but we think and hope it will work” said Sachetat.

“We have had an amazing year and I really hope that we can achieve much more for the years to come. We’re working on great projects and we’ll need everyone’s help to promote our work in order to raise more funds and help more children all over the planet. Media, fans, officials, everyone can make a difference.” said Pi Hongyan, the Global Ambassador.