Dubai A former Emirates airline hostess-turned-charity worker is running against time to get jobs for slum dwellers she brought to Dubai from Dhaka.
Maria Cristina Conceicao, who has helped 600 children and youngsters escape their slum life since her charity project began in the Bangladeshi capital in 2005, flew in seven more youth on July 30.
She’s desperate to find them entry-level jobs before their month-long visas run out.
Maria had earlier brought students from the shantytown on scholarships with Dubai’s Gems schools. She also managed to find jobs in Dubai hotels and airlines for about 20 men trained in the Dhaka community school she founded.
“We brought a diverse batch this time. The group was provided with month-long visas by the office of Shaikh Nahyan Bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research.”
Etihad Airways flew the latest batch to the UAE for free. “Yes, I’m currently a sort of ‘job agent’, grooming consultant, an educator and agony aunt,” she admits.
Maria founded the Dhaka Project in 2005. In 2011, she registered the Maria Cristina Foundation (MCF) with the UAE Red Crescent and the Dubai Islamic Affairs Department.
She has literally climbed mountains to fund her work to help turn around the lives of the slum dwellers “one child or one family at a time”.
In addition to donations, Maria’s adventures partly fund her foundation.
Earlier this year, Maria was stuck at 14,000 feet on Mount McKinley in Alaska for a week due to bad weather.
One of Maria’s new wards is Mintu Mia, 23, the elder brother of Milon Mia, 14, who is currently studying in Dubai on a Gems School scholarship arranged by Maria. Both siblings started with Maria’s school project in 2005.
Maria first brought to Dubai Nurul Islam in 2009. He found a job as an office boy in the Emirates airline headquarters.
“He was the very first to break the cycle. He inspired an entire community who believed they, too, could break the umbilical cord of poverty. They started learning English at school. But the recession came and job employment was frozen for nearly two years.”
In Dubai, the Dhaka slum dwellers go through an intensive boot camp where they learn grooming, etiquette, social, telephone and job interview skills.
The latest batch occupy her two-bedroom apartment — four in her bedroom, three in the guest room. On Tuesday she took them to Jumeirah Beach where Maria trains regularly for her planned charity climb to summit Mount Everest in April 2013 to raise money for her Dhaka work.
Maria is ecstatic about her formula. “The 20 people who luckily found jobs was just the start. It was a huge success in the sense that they are now employed by companies like Emirates and big hotels. The monthly salaries they earn are equivalent one or two years’ pay back home. They don’t need me anymore.”
In preparation for her biggest challenge thus far — Mt. Everest, Maria has been running several kilometres daily as part of endurance training in a regimen that also includes tyre pulling, weights and yoga.
Maria also climbs up and down her 25-storey building for six days a week for up to two hours daily with a 22-kg load and hopes to train in the Burj Khalifa before her attempt to summit Mr Aconcagua in Argentina in December and Mt Everest next April.
