it all comes together with sport

now how did this go together again?!

on saturday morning we held our latest sports saturday at the elgin country club, the event was made possible by our wonderful volunteers, the HAN students and the german architect students who took some time off of their busy building schedule.

we host these sports saturdays for the 7 different groups of children that we work with throughout our daily sports outreach projects in the different communities and farms in grabouw and elgin valley. it was with deep regret that we had to restrict each of the teams to 8 players, meaning that some of the children were unable to attend but due to limited resources, in transportation and kit, we were still able to provide over 150 children with a fantastic morning of sport.

the 'set up team' arrived at the country club under grey sky's with drizzle in the air at 8am and by 9am the two 65 seater coaches provided by our local transport company, gaffley's, were making the trip around the townships to pick up the teams arriving with 129 joyful and expectant children at about 10am!....(it's amazing that we had just one seat left on the buses, only God could provide just what we needed)......the children from our farm outreach were already there waiting with the managers who greeted us from the buses.

finalists of the over 13's football

after introducing the children to their managers we were then set the task of distributing the kits for each of the teams, all the children were so well behaved, they listened to their managers really well and by 10.30 we had opened in prayer and the games began.

as the morning went on the weather improved and we were more worried about sun stroke than waterproofs........the girls played a netball tournament with 5 teams, some had more than the 8 players so they shared the games with substitutions and whilst they were waiting for their games they could also play a game of volleyball......the boys were split into under and over 13 age groups, a total of 10 teams, once again some with more than the 8 players we had wanted, played until a winner was found.

the children played so well, it was great to see some of the skills that we have been working on, both in the netball and soccer games and also in the way that they treated and respected each other.....the lifeskills programme is such a success and an article written by one of the HAN students appeared in the local grabouwer newspaper captures that...maybe click on the image to have a read about his experience?

report about village of hope sports
outreach in the local grabouwer

for record 'site view' beat 'remhoogte' in the final of the under 13's football, a mixed group of girls from 'remhoogte and rooidakke' won the netball and once again the boys from 'waterwerks' informal settlement beat iraq on penalties in the over 13 football tournament.

the day was a huge success and culminated in the guys from the round table providing the children, and helpers, with hot dog rolls and cool drinks.....it was a truly multicultural and international event with our referees from canada and south africa (our local sports mentors), managers from south africa, germany, holland and england...and we even welcomed some norwegians who were showing their support on their visit to grabouw.

the children made their way home at around 2pm and after a long clear up operation the dutch and german students (with a little help from the canadians) had a game of football together, our sports mentors also made up the teams with holland putting last years defeat behind them to over come the german international team 4-1 with 3 goals from michael from our waterwerks sports mentor programme!

it just shows that if we put our differences a side we can all come together and have a fantastic day which benefits everyone on different levels...thanks guys for your help and support and to the children you truly are amazing and demonstrate what a real rainbow nation could look like!