Walmer Angel Project

On a school reunion visit 'back to my roots' in the Eastern Cape, I learnt about the fantastic work that Glenda, my school friend and dynamic business woman, is involved in.  Alerted by a staff member to the dire conditions in the little day care creches in the nearby Walmer Township, Port Elizabeth, Glenda decided to help.  She is now involved in helping 8 creches and has started a soup kitchen.  She is being assisted by local business but the needs are never ending and every little bit helps.

She took three of us (her old school friends) to see how she is making a difference to the less fortunate residents and this is a selection of some of the pictures from our visit.

Inseparable friends

Note the condition of the building that is in desperate need of replacing

Glenda has raised donations for two new wooden rooms to serve as a classroom and day care room at one of the creches

 

The kitchen desperately needs replacing, rebuilding

Yours truly being mobbed for hugs

We passed this little girl along the street.  She clearly adores her little dog she is carrying on her back.  Note the state of the street.  The shanty shacks are typical of most houses in the township

Babies and toddlers sleeping in a day care room of one of the little creches

Happy smiling children in a classroom

Children singing greetings as they saw us get out of the car

Children between the new classroom (left) and the kitchen which desperately needs to be replaced

The toilet the children have to use.  Bucket system as there are no toilets, pipes, etc.

Marlene in one of the shacks that Glenda is hoping to raise enough money to replace with a wooden room which will be another desperately needed classroom

Being mobbed for hugs before we left.

Leave a message in the Comments Box and I will put you in contact Glenda if you'd like to help in any way.

Where, what is Midway?

Midway Atoll, Midway Island - approximately midway in the Pacific, between between Asia and North America.  Wikipedia tells us it was a focal point of an important Pacific naval battle in World War II.  Chris Jordan tells us it should be the focal point of an ongoing war against mankind's destruction of our planet.  A shocking environmental tragedy slowly killing us all.  By our own hands.

MIDWAY - a film by Chris Jordan

Betrayal

I find the South Africa government's treatment of education is a blantant betrayal of its people, especially children.

This is an article written by Jonathan Jansen (pictured below) one of the few not afraid of speaking out on the dire state of education in our country.

 

Where is our dignity?

I am sure she must regret saying it, but it was a disturbing revelation. In an interview with a Sunday paper, our Minister of Basic Education let slip on the real reason government persists with the passing standard of 30% for subjects in the National Senior Certificate. It stays at 30%, she said, to allow "slow learners" to exit the system with dignity.

My thoughts drifted back in time to great historical figures like Dr John Dube and Dr Abdullah Abdurahman, from a century ago, to more recent intellectuals like Steve Biko and Neville Alexander, and wondered how their restless spirits must be choking when they hear this kind of utterance by an irresponsible and reckless class of politicians.

These educated activists all agitated for the black child, and they would say there is no connection between a 30% pass and human dignity. They would argue, no doubt, that providing a high-quality education to the first generation of high school graduates not to live under apartheid was in fact a sacred commitment of that long and costly struggle for freedom.

And then my thoughts turned to a contemporary heroine, an ordinary young woman called Zandile Kwela.

She appeared on television with her mother and they openly shared their mixed emotions. Zandile scored seven subject distinctions in the 2012 NSC examinations, including mathematics and physical science.

But her mother had no funds to send her to university. In the background offered by the TV shots you saw the rickety shack and you heard there was no electricity; this remarkable young woman from Menzi High School in Umlazi studied by candlelight. It would surely be a severe injustice if this bright student, despite overcoming incredible odds, would be denied higher education because she lacked money.

We sent the message into cyberspace: try to find the contact details for Zandile. Strangers sprang into action and eventually one of my Facebook "friends" found a set of numbers. I called, congratulated her and introduced myself.

"I have heard of you, professor," she said, with an elegance of voice that told me she had those other qualities required for success at university: personal confidence and a command of the language of instruction.

"We would like to invite you to study at our university without paying a cent. Are you interested?"

She is packing her bags and I have no doubt she will soon become one of the still too few black chartered accountants. I am not sure what happens at Menzi High, but there were a few students clutching bunches of distinctions from this school in a poor, unstable township. Those teachers must have worked very hard and the principal must have led from the front.

What I know for sure is that they set the bar high for all their pupils, and they now reap the fruit of their labours. I am absolutely convinced there are tens of thousands of students who failed and passed poorly in the recent NSC examinations who have the same potential as Zandile to achieve distinctions in their school subjects.

To call them "slow learners" is an insult for they faced two problems: one is poor educational inputs in their 12 years of schooling (poor teaching, lack of textbooks, limited instructional time, and more) and another is the low expectations by the officials serving them. Thirty per cent does not offer dignity; it offers a dead-end street to the children of the poor - no job, no further education, no skills. It is, in fact, a massive indignity being suffered.

Unlike 10 or 15 years ago, from scores of weekly e-mails and direct feedback in public meetings, I now find that the general public knows very well that we are being shafted by these 30% politicians.

And the Grade 12 pupils know it too.

"I'll take this B-pass," a young man told his relative the other day, "but how on earth are these results a B?"

Then there is the story of another young man who wrote to me on Facebook: "How can they tell me I qualify to study for a Bachelor's degree when I got 49% in mathematics?"

It dawned on him that no serious university would take him without a real pass in maths.

Dignity, says my dictionary, means worthiness and self-regard, a sense of honour. In the South African context it means restoring that which was taken away from black people over centuries - a belief that all of us can achieve regardless of skin colour.

Source:  TimesLive

 

Trees for Bikes

I was invited to a bike handover which took place in Section 28, Vosloorus on the East Rand. My interest was sparked when I read the invitation, ” . . . guests will experience the handover of bikes to the tree-preneurs and waste-preneurs.”

BACKGROUND

Qhubeka is an Nguni (Zulu, Xhosa) word that means “to carry on”, “to progress”, “to move forward”.  The projects aim to help rural communities move forward and progress by giving bicycles to children in return for work done to improve their environment and their community.  (More than 100,000 Qhubeka bikes distributed since 2004)

Working in partnership with Wildlands Conservation Trust, this Vosloorus project provides bicycles in return for planting trees and recycling waste.  Participation is not limited to children.  The project has 100s of tree-preneurs growing indigenous trees at their homes and bartering trees for groceries, building materials and bicycles.  When trees reach a certain height they can be “sold” to the nearby Wildlands nursery in return for tree-credits.  Meticulous records are kept and 100 tree credits can be ‘cashed in’ for a bicycle.  The bicycles are handed over on certain dates throughout the year.

Tree-preneurs are recruited by Wildlands staff who go from door to door explaining to residents how the project works and providing interested people with starter kits.  Seeds are indigenous to the area and are species that occurred naturally within a 50 km radius and do not require much water.  I saw a Combretum and a couple of acacias species being grown.   Tree size is divided in categories.  Category A is trees of 30cm worth R5,00 and gets 1 tree-credit.  I do not know the values for the other categories yet.  A Qhubeka bicycle is traded for 100 tree-credits.

THE HANDOVER

There were 120 bikes in this handover.  These pictures tell the story.

Residents waiting to collect their bicycle

This woman collects litter – 2litre plastic bottles.  She uses these to grow her trees in!

Seeds are planted in all sorts of containers in the backyard (notice collection of plastic bottles in the black bags

Polycarp is a successful tree-preneur and has 1200 seedings growing in his tiny garden.  He was later to collect 3 more bicycles for trees he has already ‘sold’ to Wildlands

Polycarp with his three new bicycles.  He is going to sell them at R850 each to residents in Thokoza where the project does not operate.  He is saving money to buy a laptop as he wants to apply for a job.  His story is typical of our country – he has a diploma in business administration from Milpark Business College, but he is unable to find work.  The positive is that instead of lamenting his situation, he is growing trees to help earn money to survive.

Kathlego is 11 years old and collected her 3^rd and 4^th bikes.  She hires out her bikes to friends who want to go to distant parts of Vosloorus – R20 per hire!  She intends selling these two bikes for R800 each and wants to save the money to buy a laptop.

This Gogo with her grandson, collecting 2 bikes

 

"I pimped my ride" (previous recipient who is still growing trees to get more bikes)

The Wildlands nursery now has stock of 80,000 trees and selling them on to corporates who often use them in Arbour Day celebrations and other similar initiatives. 

Going nowhere fast

Is it just me or is life whizzing by?