World Cup Holiday Feeding 3

On Friday 18th June, some of the Lionsraw team helped me out with feeding the kids. Norma and Ian wanted to buy some fruit and some stationery for the children so I took them off the day before to Pavilion to purchase apples, bananas, oranges and pens, pencils and rulers.

There were lots of children waiting for us when we got there and the Inchanga Team building the toilets were on hand to help. Debbie and Alexandra Flint came along to help and so did John Rochester who had all been working on another build project. We'd bought polony and bread to make sandwiches and also gave them crisps. Dan and his dad John Hughes, 2 of the guys from the Inchanga toilet build, had brought many bags of haribo and these were well appreciated by the children too! The children sat patiently while the food was prepared and lined up beautifully to receive their sandwiches and other food. I also gave them a bag of rice and a bag of sugar beans to take home.

A group of older boys had been playing on the soccer field next door and they mooched over to see what was going on. We managed to feed them as well with sandwiches which was appreciated. The boys sat patiently while we gave food to the others first, and they moved on afterwards without any trouble. Most of them are in Grade 9 and so would attend the High School down the road rather than Inchanga, but the number of orphans in this area is so high that I didn't mind giving them something.

After food, Norma and Ian gave the younger kids a pencil, pen and ruler each and for 7 lucky children there was an England top to wear too! At the sight of these, the older boys did look very hopeful and try to press forward, however I'd already worked out who would benefit from those tops the most and so the older boys didn't get a look in! The younger ones were extremely happy to receive the clothes and I've seen them being worn on several days since (although given England's poor performance this weekend, I wonder if they'll still wear them as much!!)

A big thank you to Norma and Ian for the fruit, stationery and tops and to everyone else for helping out!

Lionsraw - the continuing saga..

I hadn't realised that I'd only written about Day 1 of Lionsraw Project and then nothing more. SO much has happened during these past few weeks that it will take me a few days to process it. As I write, half of the team are back in the UK and the other half are packing to leave tomorrow morning early, having been subjected to the sorry state of English soccer this afternoon!

There are so many stories that I will put up over the next few days/weeks, but I need to recuperate on my sleep first as I've been travelling back and forth to Durban every day and coming home fairly late to sleep up here in the mountains and then getting up to photograph builders, buildings, kids and soccer balls each morning. I've really enjoyed the experience but am looking forward to eating at home and getting a few early nights in and back to some semblance of a normal routine here.

So check back here over the next few days for more tales of passion and belief...

Lionsraw Day 1

The day has finally come for the Lionsraw Project to officially start! It's taken 4 years of hard work to come to this point. As often as I can, I'll be writing some of the things I've been up to with the project as well as highlights from the whole event.

Yesterday 60 or so guys flew in to Jo'burg and got a coach down to Durban. They arrived in time to join in the fun at the first World Cup match to take place in the city and many had managed to get tickets to the game. The atmosphere was electric in the city and on the beachfront last night and even more so in the stadium. Germany's triumph over Australia didn't please that many England fans, but they enjoyed the experience nonetheless it seems. I can't comment as I arrived in the Lionsraw Hotel to discover it sold Starbucks coffee so I made the most of the evening restoring my decaf cappuccino deficiency and marvelling at the arrival of one of my favourite coffees to this province!

Today the guys were out to work early and another 60 or so arrived on the next flight, so now there are about 120 team out here for the projects. First thing this morning I took 2 of the guys who'd been staying with me down to Sethani soccer camp, which is the furthest away from us, about 30 minutes down some hairpin bends into the valley, right by beautiful Inanda Dam. It is a breathtaking view all the way down there and a real sense of being right deep in the valley. The team down there looked a little nervous but all seemed keen to get stuck in and reported back this evening that they'd had a great day with the kids from all around coming to play soccer.

After this I was assigned to look after Geoff, who is overseeing all the building projects. The rest of today I've been chauffeuring him around the 4 build projects and taking photos, with a trip to Build It in between to stock up on a few more tools. Morale at each build project is high, despite the buses taking a long time to find the projects this morning. It's difficult giving directions when it's a choice of 2 unmarked tracks in front of you! Anyway, they all got to where they should be in the end. I've lost track of how many times I drove the mountain bends on Old Main Road today though...

Finally this evening we all gathered in the hotel in Durban to watch the Italy - Paraguay match and I got a chance to wear my Italia t-shirt that I bought years ago for such an occasion. It was a great opportunity to meet new people and catch up with old friends and there was a great atmosphere there. After the match, there was a little 'upfront sitting on a couch discussing football and life' time which was amusing and rounded off a great first day nicely.

South Africa vs Mexico - pics

My internet is so temperamental at the moment when it comes to uploading photos so sometimes the pictures might appear after the write-up. Here are a couple from the first match!

The World Cup Opening - a moment in history

To mark the moment in history when the first World Cup was played on African soil, we went down to Makaphutu Children's Village to share the afternoon with the children and staff there. It was a great day, with good braai food and a multitude of noisy vuvuzelas.

My vuvuzela was nabbed by an eleven-year-old boy the moment I got out of my car, but that was ok as I'd prepared for that and had written my name in it just in case it wandered! We watched the opening ceremony on big screen in the little church there and it was very moving to see the different dancers and performers celebrating the culmination of many years' work.

The RSA-Mexico opening match itself brought so much excitement. Everyone was gripped with the action and when it got to half-time and the score was still nil-nil, there was visible concern on the faces of the guys watching. One of the guys who works there came out at half-time and said 'this is difficult, I must pray!' His prayers were obviously answered shortly after when Tshabalala scored the first goal on African soil for Bafana Bafana and the crowd went wild! The guy from before came running into the room with 2 saucepans that he was banging together with all his might.

Excitement and joy turned to brief disappointment when Mexico equalised, but there was happiness all around when the match ended as a draw, and the added bonus of France - Uruguay being also a draw made things even better, so the mood over here is still hopeful that Bafana Bafana will go far in this tournament. For us, it's the start of a month-long football celebration and it's been a great beginning, we are looking forward to everything that's going to happen over the next 4 weeks. Ayoba!

World Cup Holiday Feeding 2

The baseball caps were popular and so was the food parcel.

This morning was my first attempt at taking food for my kids at school and in the valley. Also my first attempt at doing it alone as everyone else is busy with Lionsraw project.

I'd arranged to meet the majority of my 40 kids at school at 10am, but I was reminded of the fact that most kids don't have watches when I got a call about 9.15am saying my kids were waiting for me. Thankfully they waited until I got there. I was met by a few of my eager kids, with a few of their neighbours too, all children from the school but not on my programme. Good news for them, then, when half of my kids didn't show and I could give out their food parcels to these children who patiently waited around. I don't like to send hungry kids away empty-handed and every child got today a bag of maize meal, a box of soya mince, a tin of pilchards and some little juice powder. You are supposed to put it into a bottle of water and shake and drink, but most of the kids seemed to prefer to eat it like sweets.

Keith, from Lionsraw, had also given me lots of baseball caps to give out to the children and quite by chance I took them this morning, not realising that they were the perfect colours of Bafana Bafana, who opened the World Cup this afternoon. The kids were more than excited to get these!

Thanks Keith for making the children's day!

After waiting around for any extra kids to turn up, I headed down the Ehlanzeni in the valley to give 5 of my children the same food parcel. These kids live a long way down a big steep hill and 3 of them were waiting to meet me. They too were excited to see what I had for them and I also gave them a lift up the valley back to nearer their homes so that was a highlight for them!

All in all, it was a good morning and a great start to the feeding programme. I'm looking forward to checking in with the kids throughout this holiday and really making a difference in their lives. Thank you to those who have donated to make this possible, if you'd like to contribute, get in touch!

Animal transportation - the pics!

Whiter than white!

peaceful passengers!

These pictures didn't upload yesterday (something to do with about 10 people all using laptops at the same time - the perils of having a houseful of guests and wireless internet!) But here they are now...

Animal transportation

Russell asked for help this morning in collecting some goats from Camperdown. We set off in the rain to the farm where he selected 2 fine-looking goats which were then tied up and put in the back of my hilux. After the initial bleating they settled down in the back and actually travelled well.

He also put a big box in the back which actually contained 4 white chickens, although I didn't realise that till we got home. I thought it was actually sunlight washing powder, as it said on the box. They too, were quiet for the journey. In fact the chickens weren't that fussed about coming out of the box at Russell's either. Maybe they'd worked out they were dinner this weekend. One was assisted out and Russell ended up chasing it round and round my car and into the house, which was highly amusing!

The goats settled in quite quickly to being tied to the jungle gym. Their destination is Precious's mum's house as final payment in the pre-wedding handovers that go on in Zulu culture. The female goat was straight into a pile of wood and had a nice chew of that. The male goat was a bit more put out about having to travel in the back of a truck and took a little longer to settle. If goats allegedly eat everything, I wonder for how much longer the jungle gym will survive! ;-)

World Cup Holiday Feeding 1

Happy to have some lunch, not so happy about the rain!

The end of term is here and the playground was filled with children in their coats and hats and scarves blowing on their vuvuzelas and generally making a lot of holiday noise this morning!

I took some food down for my 40 orphans for the end of term. As I was leaving from my house there was a man scavenging through our binbags at the end of the drive. I stopped to chat to him and then drove off but then decided to turn back and gave him a couple of pieces of fruit and a few bread rolls that were extra from the kids' food. He looked bewildered but thanked me and shuffled off to the next house's binbags. He can't have been more than about 20 years' old. We live on top of a mountain in a village of big houses and mostly inhabited by whites. He would have had to walk a long way out of the valley to get to our house. An all too familiar reality here in South Africa.

After that, I made my way down to the school where my car was quickly surrounded by eager children. There are many hungry kids in the school and there was no lunch today as it's the end of term. With the translation help of one of my older boys we managed to get the children I worked with into one area and all the other kids somewhere else, but it was too exciting for the children to see what was happening and they still pressed in to see if they could get something.

I took a basic lunch for the children today. They had a bread roll, cheese triangle, packet of crisps, orange and apple. It's not much but anything is welcome to them. The school also gave all the 300 orphans some morvite porridge and some future life porridge, both of which had been donated by other organisations. My children lined up beautifully and waited patiently afterwards for me to take the above photo. Halfway through giving out the bags the heavens opened and it chucked it down with rain so the kids were eager for me to take the photo and let them shelter! It's the first time it's rained here for a very long time and it was strange to see the kids all dressed up with coats and jumpers.

28 of the 40 got a bag today. The others were absent, but word of mouth will let them know when and where to come for more food later this week. I gave the leftover food to Mrs Msomi, who oversees the orphans and she distributed it to other needy children, so nothing went to waste. Although other kids were pressing in to see what they could get out of me, they didn't mind not having anything and just mooched off when told to disappear by a teacher!

Seeing all the kids' hungry faces, I wished I had the funds and the manpower to feed all 300 kids, but I can only do so much. If anyone would like to donate money towards feeding kids during the holiday please get in touch with me at grapevinemanager@gmail.com Food for them will come from various sources but I'll be feeding my kids at least once a week during the next few weeks. If you can't donate, please pray for them during this World Cup holiday. Pray for protection as they play, especially from traffikers who are reported to be lurking as the football brings the world here. As the weather turns colder, pray too for them to keep warm in their places of residences, many of the homes are simple mudhuts that don't cope well with rain and get damaged easily, with big holes in the corrugated roofs. This is a stark difference from the beautiful hotel rooms and guest houses that our foreign football fans will be enjoying over the next few weeks.

The World Cup cometh...

World Cup fever is reaching boiling point here with 0nly a few days to go until the first match. I've finally managed to get myself a Bafana Bafana t-shirt and also an England one. This complements my Italy t-shirt that I intend to wear for their games (cos I might have been born in England but my football love was birthed in Italia). I also got a vuvuzela this morning so now I'm ready to be loud at the games!

Term ends tomorrow and the five week holidays begin for children all over South Africa. I've arranged to feed my 40 over that time and will put more up about that soon and as it happens. During the last week of term it's been hard to catch up with all my children as many of them have just not bothered coming into school for the last week of term. But the younger ones have been around, it's the Grade 6 and 7's who haven't made it. They'll all be back tomorrow I would imagine as it's the last morning and they might get some food.

My younger group has come on loads and are understanding a lot more English now. I taught them 'colours' in English a few weeks' ago and they seemed to understand everything. They especially loved colouring in a sheet I'd drawn for them, even if they did muddle all the colours up! The nice people at Orange donated some of those little toys which I gave to them last week and they loved them. Thank you Orange for the cute little black creatures!

Safari Saturday

I might look gentle, but don't mess with me, or my tree.

Elephants are rapidly becoming my favourite safari animal. I've always favoured the big cats, but they are disappointing and are eluding me time and again, whereas the elephants are always on hand to impress!

On Saturday we took a quick day trip up to the game reserve in Hluhluwe-Imfolowzi with some of the guys on the foundations team for Lionsraw. It was their only day off and they had to get up VERY early to set off up North. It was a long day, but well worth it.

The day was spoilt slightly by a couple of accidents on the road up, we didn't see them happen but we were pre-warned on the radio at 5am that there were 'bodies lying in the middle of the N2' and, this being Africa, no attempt had been made to shield passing motorists from the horror of the scene. That stretch of the N2, heading to the new airport, has always been a nightmare as locals from Kwa Mashu and Inanda rush across a busy 3 lane motorway to get to work and shop and back. This isn't the first time I've come across an accident there but to see dead bodies so early in the morning wasn't pleasant. And to top it off on the way home we passed yet another accident scene which was equally distressing. This is the reality of what happens here in Durban.

Anyway, back to happier thoughts. Elephants! The guidebook for the park tells you clearly to maintain a distance of more than 50m from any elephants, who look like gentle giants but can in fact be very aggressive and cause damage to one's vehicle. Sometimes it's not so easy to keep that distance though, as we discovered again this weekend.

We knew there were herds around as the road was strewn with bits of tree that had been pulled off as the elephants crossed, and all around one area of the park the grasses were trampled down. The most telling sign was the large amount of dung on the road and the smell of elephants! I don't know why you always think you'll see animals in the same area on subsequent visits, but we returned to the site of our elephant viewings a few months ago but there were none there, just a solitary baby crocodile sunning himself on the river bank. However, they weren't far away and it wasn't long before we came across a huge elephant bull near the road quietly munching a tree. There were gasps of appreciation from our guests in the back seat, who were experiencing the safari side of Africa for the first time.

I always think it's amazing that these beautiful creatures, who watch you whilst munching grasses and seem so placid and chilled out, can, in an instant, turn into crazy monsters who will turn your car over and stomp all over you. But it happens. Thankfully not to us. The first elephant did move closer towards us, but only because there was a tasty tree nearer to the road!

Moving on we saw a few more elephants, but the best one was a mother elephant. As we turned a corner there was a huge elephant right next to the road and at the very moment we turned up, she was wrenching the top off a tree and making quite a commotion about it. Angela, who was in the back, got a massive shock and squealed loudly! Further investigation revealed a whole family of baby elephants behind Mrs elephant. She wasn't in the mood for being messed with and moved herself very definitely in between us and the young, who weren't that bothered by our presence. Just to make sure that we didn't do anything to her family she then moved slightly closer and we moved our car on fairly fast at that point. We reversed slightly to see if she was just munching a tree but by this point Mummy elephant had had enough of us and all it took was one raised elephant paw/hoof/foot(??) to see us on our way! It's brilliant how these animals protect their young. I wouldn't want to be a lion trying to get one of those babies. Not with that attentive mother around. I'd stick to warthog.

As usual, we didn't see any big cats, but we did see many many zebra, impala, wildebeest, giraffe and the like and also this time a family of warthogs who stuck around to be photographed instead of scrambling off at the sight of the car. Strange sightings include a group of donkeys (not in the guidebook), a solitary vulture and a hyaena who ran across in front of the car. On every trip a mongoose or springhare darts out from the bush and in again inmmediately and this time was no exception. We saw the usual white rhino up close and we were blessed with a whole herd of buffalo crossing in front of us, within 5 minutes of getting into the park. So, all in all, a good day for animal spotting. But my ambition to see a leopard in the wild still remains unfulfilled, so that will have to be for another occasion.

Foundations 3 - progress

Sithembakuye foundations are ready!

A lot can happen in a week of foundation laying and good progress is being made by the Lionsraw boys.

At the end of last week the boys completed the foundations for Sithembakuye orphanage and had time to dig the septic tank and get that in place. It's now ready for the team to come and build up the house next week. The Lionsraw teams fly in on Sunday and Monday and will be straight into working hard.

The foundations are coming along nicely at Inchanga School for the new toilets block. A team from another local organisation Arauna Ark are doing these ones and they should be ready by the weekend for the team doing that build project to arrive. The preschool too is almost ready.

This week the boys are spending their time at Makaphutu Children's Village, laying the foundations for a Changing rooms block there. The Children's Village is in the process of putting a new sports pitch in and these changing rooms will come in very handy. Makaphutu is situated on a small hill overlooking the valley and is perfectly placed for events for children from the local community so many will benefit from this new building. At the time of writing, the boys are in the process of putting blocks into the foundations and the fun of laying a slab floor comes in a few days' time.

We've been blessed with sunny weather and no rain, typical KZN Winter. However yesterday it was blisteringly hot (my washing dried completely in about 20 minutes!!) and the cement mixer and sand etc was down a slope so the poor boys had to run up and down to get the cement into the right place - it was one of the most challenging days yet. Plus they had to do it in record time as the mixer was delivered 3 hours after it was due to be there! This is also typical Africa.

Today the sun has still be shining but the wind's come up more. This makes working conditions better, until a dust cloud is blown over the site. In addition they've had to cope with bushfires springing up around them. None of them too close to destroy their work, thankfully, but there was a lot of hot smoke around to contend with as well!! It all adds to the charm and fun of working in the valley.