"Not today!", Mr R exclaimed as he opened the door. Then he burst into laughter. He was our first beneficiary this Saturday and we knew from the start that it will be a fun task. Mr R, as we later learned from his wife, used to work in a theatre and as a teacher. He threw his best performance for us today, speaking with verve and cracking jokes all the time. Mr R spoke with a Scottish accent which was very easy to understand for Sevan. Finally, we found someone who could understand Sevan too! They both came from the same city!

Mr R explained he and his wife, Mrs S, needed help with their garden. They didn't have the strength to deal with their broken shed. He had an upcoming hernia operation and she had damaged tendons in both shoulders. A two-pint bottle of milk was a limit to lift for both Mr R and his wife. The couple were so upset with their old shed falling apart that they ordered a new one - sadly, that one hadn't arrived yet! Mr R guided Sevan and Kash into the back garden and showed them the old shed. It was leaning back towards the fence, was wrapped up with strings and pieces of tape, and was supported by multiple planks and a pavement slab.

Sevan, Kash and Mr R decided to give the miserable shed another chance and dared to open the door. The construction did not collapse. Phew! A mouse jumped out from the inside and disappeared into the grass. The rest of the shed contents were inanimate objects leaning against the back wall. One of them was an easel. That was when we found out Mrs S used to be an artist! That was also the time for Mrs S to enter the stage and start brushing off dirt of everything we took out of the shed. We used our skill, brains and muscles to realign to pieces of the shed and rearrange the items inside, so that the structure would retain STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY.

The shed operation was such a success that Mr R and Mrs S chellenged us to another assignment: temporary fixing the roof on a second, even shabbier, little shed. Sevan climbed a chair and put two recently found woodchip planks on the top of the little shed. A rogue cat tried to disrupt the task but Sevan remained calm and confident as usual.

We finished off by tidying up the garden, emptying pots full of rain water, bagging some rubbish and scraping some moss. We even managed to fold a plastic chair that was resistant to any attempts of folding earlier on - maybe it got tamed after having us for over an hour in the garden! The grateful couple intived us for tea and biscuits. "It was wonderful to have you", Mrs S said. "It was a joy", her husband added. Sevan and Kash couldn't agree more. "You gave us hope!", Mrs S exclaimed, "Maybe we should cancel the new shed!".

Before we said goodbye, we quickly helped with two heavy chairs that needed to be moved between two floors, and took some cake Mrs S and Mr R had given us. We left to the sound of one more joke from Mr R: "Ah, finally they're gone!".