house break in

unfortunately we experienced our second house break in within a couple of weeks, this has put a bit of a downer on the whole situation and the loss of our laptop and my cameras was annoying as we had so much data and photo images of the last 9 months work on the village of hope. we are still smiling and praying that those who stole from us will see sense and return our possessions......this is south africa you know!

south african health!

living in south africa for the last 9 months has been a life changing experience in many ways, some preconceived ideas have been blown out the water, others challenged and still others were confirmed.

i (tim) have found it so hard living with all that we have right next to those with absolutely nothing, that could be possessions but also the health that we enjoy and the education that we take for granted...

many people have asked me if what we are doing is really making a difference, aren't 'the people' so set in their ways that they won't change?, do they really appreciate all you are doing?......and sometimes i ask myself that too. why don't these people change their ways, why do they continue to sleep around spreading this awful disease......however when you look at it so many of the people we work with and who we call neighbours have no chance to the news media that we have access to and here in lies a problem.

so much of our info now comes to us via the internet, tv and then radio.....we don't have a tv so i spend my last minutes at night and first minutes in the morning catching up with the news on the national broadcaster (sabc) for the local south african news and then a few minutes each day reading the bbc web pages for a fuller world picture.

the radio station often broadcast info about health, especially hiv, aids and tb and refer to a web site called health-e.......(which is well worth a look at here), the site is full of the basic info on these three major killers here in south africa however those who need to hear often don't have radio and defo no internet, or the education to read english, so how can they read up on this info......aaargh.

life over here is so unfair and as i pack my suitcase for a 6 week return trip to england today my heart is overwhelmed by the problems, are we really making a difference or just putting a patch on a gaping hole....for me i can say that the work is more than fulfilling, that the lives of the children living with us are being changed but we need more hands, more funds to really get the message out there into the communities...informing people of those basic things we just take for granted.....

winter has arrived

last night we had one massive storm, not only wind and rain but also lighting and hail, whist we are feeling a little on the cold side our hearts really go out those around us who are living in the tin shacks with no electric, little heating and maybe even water coming through the roof into the beds/bed....

people have this crazy view that south africa is hot all the time, but what with cape towns position it's also known as the cape of storms, a name that is very apt at all times of the year.

pancakes all-round

our 8 month old baby, hloma's first tooth appeared over the weekend and the house mums made pancakes for all the children, with hloma having to eat the first one!...not sure that that was too healthy but we were told that it was 'the tradition'!....

voh in local press

to celebrate national youth day our local paper, the elgin grabouwer, ran a great piece about the village of hope, i have attached a scan copy so have a read if you have time and good eyesight!

youth day

today, in south africa, we have a public holiday, where we are encouraged to remember the plight of our youth, the day centers around the soweto uprising which took place on the 16th june 1976, for more info you can have a look at a post i wrote on my 'old' blog e-holiness three years ago today!

we are full+1

our childrens care centre is designed and set up to take up to 9 children, however today we welcomed in our 10th child, yes we know that doesn't make much sense but the need is so great here and how could we turn down the plea of the auntie who needed us to take in another 2 year old girl to provide her (the aunt) with some rest bite whilst she gets herself sorted with her antiretrovirals for the HIV virus that has already claimed the life of this little girls mother and father.

thanks to all our kind donors who enable us to make a small difference in the childrens and the wider families lives.

kind donations

there is a real problem with poverty here in grabouw and whilst thembalitsha try to work with people to bring them to a place of self reliance there are some days where you just have to reach out and help those in dire need. today we have received a kind donation of over R1000 worth of food from our local superspar and we are going to make up emergency food parcels and take these to the most needy families in the townships and squatter camps tomorrow morning.

if you would like to know how you might be able to help us as we seek to share with those in need then please contact us via the thembalitshauk web page here.

we are full

for the first time since we opened our doors we are up to full capacity, 9 children, after we were joined by our latest children on thursday and friday last week.

both of the new children are little girls (we now have 3 girls and six boys), one of 2 years old has been placed with us from a home where both parents have passed on from the AIDS virus and it is our aim to work with the remaining family members for her to be placed back out into the community, the other a 7 year old girl is a xhosa speaking child and has a wonderful nature considering the pain and trauma she has already experienced in her young life.

please pray for us, our careworkers and the amazing children God has placed into our care.

local paper covers village of hope

on monday morning we were interviewed for the local somerset west paper, the districtmail, a weekly publication, who covered the story of our (tim, maz and arron's) move to work full time in grabouw and also how other volunteers (saul and angela) have joined us to help with the building of the village of hope.....other than stating that we all hail from london (not something that i think saul, a proud yorkshireman will be too pleased with) and that our project is 'school of hope' not the 'village of hope', i think that the article captures the essence of all we want to do here and the way we are looking for people to join us as we seek to serve the poor and needy children in south africa, also a nice photo of maz and tim (although the scanner cut off my head!).

if you would like to have a read visit the papers web site here.

ross' team leave....shame

yesterday we said goodbye to the team from aylesbury who had joined us for 12 days, serving in the community, building homes for a careworker, playing with our children and just giving the whole village of hope team a lift with their servant hearts and not so funny jokes!.....thanks to ross, david, barbara, jess, alinda and keith (pictured in that order)...

for more info on how you might come and serve at the village of hope then please contact us.

village of hope officially opens

today, international childrens day, we had the official blessing of the village of hope. the morning was filled with preparations, with lawns being cut, sandwiches being prepared and speeches written, but by 3pm we were ready to thank God for his amazing provision over the last year and to thank him for placing this project into our safe hands.

we had over 100 guests from around the town, local churches, we sang some songs, one the anthem 'God of this city' and another xhosa song led by some of the thembacare staff, a dance was performed by some of the children we work with from the local community and the blessing was lead by gerrit from the corpus christi church in grabouw. members of the wider thembalitsha family also joined us to give their support, this was a great day and one which we will never forget.