Croydon Advertiser may be a firm fixture of the Coulsdon community – but Nathalie Gager’s impending adventure will drive her right back to her Franco-African roots.
Swapping surburban streets for shifting sands, Nathalie will be rallying across the Sahara Desert and Atlas Mountains of Africa in aid of charities helping disadvantaged people from both Morocco and her native France.
Nathalie gets ready for her desert challenge
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Nathalie, 39, was born in France to a Franco-Algerian mother and lived in Le Havre during the 70s and 80s. When she met her husband Jeff 21 years ago, the pair moved to the UK to start a new life and a new family.
Now, she lives with her husband and two children in Chaldon Way.
However, Nathalie’s ambitions have always reached further than her French and British identities. Her Algerian descent has always been close to heart and has helped to drive her towards the expedition across the Maghreb.
“My maternal grandparents moved to France in 1962”, she told the Advertiser. “They were Blackfeet [French citizens living in Algeria] and left after Algerian independence”.
Paris, however, proved less than inviting to the former colonists. The extended family of 15 lived together in a flat in Paris and were treated “as foreigners” by locals.
Nathalie sadly noted that “my grandad still feels that way, even though he is French”.
Despite a difficult start, they found their footing.
Her grandfather found a job as a train driver, having previously driven steam-trains across the Sahara, and her lifelong desire to visit the sands which run in her blood was born.
In October, Nathalie will be competing in the CAP Femina Adventure: a cross-country car rally which challenges 40 teams of women to navigate the Moroccan wilderness with only the aid of traditional maps and good, old-fashioned planning.
The teams raise money through public donations and sponsorship which they use to support humanitarian projects along the way.
Nathalie and her co-driver Lila Tarsitano-Sahraoui will be spending a day renovating a primary school in Merzouga, as well as providing educational and sporting equipment, toys and clothes to the 300 children who are taught there.
In addition, they will be collecting donations to help the weaving school established by some of last year’s competitors. This school teaches adult women a trade they can use to help support their families, having a long term impact on the sustainability of the community.
As this would be a daunting task for an experienced navigator, her husband had doubts at first: “[Jeff] had his concerns”, Nathalie said, “but the region has been secure for years. It’s very safe”.
Concerns over getting lost have also been quelled, as the team will be equipped with GPS trackers. “You may not know where you are”, she joked, “but the organisers do!”
A devout Christian, Nathalie, who worships at St Joseph’s Church, said her faith was a key part of what drove her to become involved in fundraising.
“I’m Catholic, so I try to help as much as I can at church,” she said. “I’ve seen the people [of Morocco], and I so, so want to help them. It is so nice to bring them some education so they can make something of themselves; why should we abandon them?”
Nathalie works part-time for Moving On; a project helping young people to develop skills and get into employment.
She added: “We arrange them a flat, help them pay the bills and teach them skills to manage their money. I’m not a care worker, but I’m in the background and it’s nice to be in the background.”
A family fundraiser will be held at Godstone Farm on August 30.
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