Ō Mātou Kōrero
Our Members’ Stories

Timebank Taranaki has been a rich source of community for me.

I have only been a member for about 7 months now but have already interacted with so many new people in my community. Several friends were members before I joined and hearing about their trades was so inspiring. I joined for a couple of reasons: I wanted to meet new people and make new friends, and I wanted to share the skills I had been using in my business, which I was wrapping up.

I put up offers for 3 areas of skills I could share and immediately had several people interested in me helping them create websites. I met and worked with several of them within the first few months and now two of them are up and running with theirs! Both are small businesses that would otherwise not have been able to afford to have the websites they do. This gives them a stronger presence for their business and hopefully means they can flourish.

Because I had earned some hours quite quickly, I was looking at what I could trade them for. Initially I was hoping to find someone to help me with my vege patch and had a woman help weed the garden on a few occasions - sometimes along-side me. It was a lovely way to get to know someone and now I often run into her around town.
 

The Taranaki Timebank runs a "speed meeting" session from time to time and after attending one of those, I also met someone who is now a friend. She did some dog sitting for me through Timebank and we found we had a lot in common so started spending time together. The range of skills I've been able to find in Timebank is amazing - I've had haircuts, fresh pasta, and reiki!

I look forward to deepening my connection with the organisation and members with future get togethers. Having Timebank in our community makes us all richer and allows us to feel good about sharing our skills with others. It's an incredible resource and the people running it put a lot of effort into engaging members and growing the community. We appreciate it!