Elpida has been helping seniors for 20 years
In September 2022, we celebrated twenty years of existence. For our birthday, we gave ourselves the Old's cool podcast, a birthday collection of Socks from Grandma, started a book from zero to a hundred about aging well, and the next phase of the reconstruction of our headquarters in Prague's Smichov into a modern cultural and educational center for seniors.
When we started, the public usually thought of the term senior as someone who receives a pension and feeds pigeons on a park bench. Such seniors hardly exist anymore. As a group, they are very diverse and don't really deserve a label. We believe that, thanks to what we are doing, this stereotypical perception of seniors is disappearing from society.
We have helped thousands of seniors over the course of our existence. Almost half a million people in crisis have called our Senior Citizen Line 800 200 007, we have taught fifty thousand people how to use computers and the Internet in courses, twenty thousand seniors read Vital magazine regularly, and thousands of customers have Socks from Grandma.
To mark our 20th anniversary, we launched a unique podcast called OLD'S COOL. In it, the presenter Adéla Paulík Lichková opens up topics that seem to be exclusively about old age, but in fact the boundaries of age and generations have long since been crossed. It is also unique in that Adéla will invite not only experts to the microphone, but also seniors themselves. You can already listen to the podcast here.
In January 2023, we will publish the book From Zero to 100, which is intended to be a guide to ageing well. It is made up of ten interviews with seniors who experience first-hand some of the ten themes - home care, losing a partner, lifelong learning, living in a care home, etc. What is exceptional is that the interviews were written by people from Elpida with their loved ones. It was usually the first time they had discussed such sensitive and personal topics with them. The interviews will be complemented by texts by experts who respond to the individual interviews and place the topics in a broader context.
Currently, in cooperation with the Prague City Hall, we are working to reconstruct the former school building on Na Bělidle Street in Prague's Smíchov district, where the school is now located. The aim is to create a modern educational and cultural centre for the elderly, open to all generations. The special birthday collection of Grandma's Socks in Elpida colours can be found here.
