“It is very intense for everyone to experience.” Christel de Jong of CS Vincent van Gogh looks back on the past week, in which student Norah van Toor died from the effects of lymphatic cancer.
18-year-old Norah had won a special place in the hearts of the school. Eighteen months ago, she and her twin sister Yasmijn were to participate in the Alpe d’Huzes event, where she would climb the Alpe d’Huez mountain on foot to raise money for cancer research. “She would just participate, there was no further reason,” said De Jong. “And suddenly she got a stomach ache.”
Norah turned out to be very ill. In 2022, she ended up in hospital – on the day she was supposed to climb the Alpe d’Huez.
The school eventually went up and down the mountain under the name Team Assen without Norah. Just like in 2023, because that year the charity campaign was all about Norah. There was a special banner for her in turn fourteen. “Anyone who walked by could put his or her name on the banner,” says De Jong. Nearly a hundred people did the same, to support Norah’s recovery.
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