December News

Children’s Unit
The end of the calendar year also sees the end of the school year here in South Africa so we’ve been busy with various end of year events for the kids. Some of our children are finishing pre-primary and moving into primary school which is a real landmark.

We have also been able to discharge one little boy back to his parents and our little girl with cerebral palsy is doing fantastically – she can now walk with just one stick and her balance is improving every day.

Our relationships with the social workers are continuing to strengthen and Emma now has weekly touch points with them to keep abreast of all the situations.

We’ve been working hard at doing lots of paperwork and getting more policies and procedures in place as well as sorting budgets for next year. Although this is sometimes monotonous and mind-boggling, it is very worthwhile and necessary!

Last week we took the staff to the Caledon Spa for their end of year treat. The destination was a surprise but they all loved it and it was a really fun day. We were thankful to have competent volunteers who could take charge of the children’s unit for a few hours so that all the staff could join in.


Sports
We’re very happy to welcome Greg who has arrived from France to assist with the sports outreach for six months. He’s dived straight in and is a real hit with the mentors. We’ve been partnering with the local day clinic and have been using the sessions over the past few weeks to educate the children on the need for immunisations as well as making them aware of the dangers of diarrhoea - which can fast become a killer in the challenging environments where many of them reside.

Rainbow Smiles –HIV support group for adolescents
Rainbow Smiles is coming on leaps and bounds:

• We have developed a relationship with the Grabouw day clinic, they will be sending a Councillor to the club once a week and will hopefully be involved in planning and moving the club forward.

• We have managed to find some adult education for our 17 year old young leader and are hoping he can start this in January.

• One of our club members wanted to go to a school prom and could not afford to go, so she asked if we could help her in making things so that she can sell them to raise the money. This is really positive that our young people are not just asking for hand-outs but are looking at ways they can try and solve problems.

• The young people also wanted to give back to the community by singing at an old age home. We did this on Friday and we were extremely proud of all the children who sang, danced, played the drums and wrote and read poems out loud. They all did very well particularly as the audience was not very responsive.


Other News:
Volunteers:
As well as Greg we’ve been able to welcome Katie from the UK. She is a youth pastor so has a wonderful knack with the kids!

Last month also saw a visit from our extended family from InFocus Church in Augusta. We love hosting these guys and each time they come the do wonders for us both practically and emotionally. And Helen from the USA board popped over to visit too which is always lovely!

Emerging Leaders:
The Leadership for Hope course that took place in October seems to have had a really positive impact on the community. Those who were on the course were asked to share what they had learned and they are all very passionate about it. One of our House Moms attended and shared it with her brother which inspired him to decide to complete his education and Tim has been approached to see whether it can be rolled out to all the employees in the local municipality. It looks like the community have finally been given some training which they can apply to their lives which is very exciting so watch this space!

Skydive for Thembalitsha:
If you are slightly crazy and live in the UK, Ii is now possible to take part in a skydive to raise funds for Thembalitsha.
This is the chance of a lifetime – the only way to experience a skydive without spending thousands of pounds becoming a free-fall parachutist.

• Jump and training completed in one day

• Harnessed to an experienced parachute instructor at all times

• Jump from at least 10,000 feet

• Free fall 5,000 feet, falling at 120 mph

• Landing controlled by instructor

• Choose from 1 of 25 British Parachute Association approved centres across the UK.

Cost of challenge:
You don't pay anything; but you will need to fundraise a minimum of £395 in sponsorship money. We can provide you with lots of fundraising support. A minimum of £115 will go directly to Thembalitsha and the rest covers the cost of your jump. Anything raised over the minimum target will also go to Thembalitsha, providing healthcare, education and training to South Africa's poor.

To book your jump, click here: https://www.skylineregistrations.co.uk/parachuting/booking.aspx?&charity=73962

For more information contact Carol at carol@thembalitshauk.org.uk

How You Can Help
We are never short of ideas on how you can help us out!!!!
• Become a regular monthly giver - Regular givers are like gold dust to us!!!
• Fundraise – Commit to shave your head, host a quiz night, do a sporting event!!!!! – The possibilities are endless and can raise R10000s with enough enthusiasm!
• Pray – need we say more?!

For more information contact us fundraiser@thembalitsha.org.za


Volunteering
We rely heavily on committed volunteers to do the stuff here in South Africa. It can be a fantastic way to give (and receive!) However, we do have some criteria you have to meet in order to apply. For more information on volunteering for Thembalitsha please check out our website or email us at volunteer@thembalitsha.org.za.

Also, please do NOT book ANY flights before your application form has been accepted. Thank you!

August News

These past couple of months have been jam-packed with visitors and volunteers and we are feeling very loved!!

Children’s Unit
The unit continues to be a hive of activity! Recently one little girl contracted chicken pox and now she has mumps (poor thing!) but she seems very unaffected by it all considering and with the provision of some new walking sticks (sent from England) she is making wonderful progress, she is now able to stand unaided and this is quite remarkable given the fact that the doctors had told us that she would never walk!!! Obviously it is impossible to stop these viruses spreading in a unit full of kids who are always at close quarters but (thank the Lord) it seems that none of the other children have contracted it!

We are always thankful in these situations that the children are in our care when they are sick with these kinds of illnesses rather than in a more typical community environment where it is harder to manage and the likelihood of a child getting seriously ill (especially and HIV positive child) is increased.
The kids have been spoilt with lots of visitors and wonderful, loving volunteers over the past few weeks, which they have very much enjoyed and the volunteers have also been helping Maz to a huge sort and tidy so everything is looking extremely organised for now – not a puzzle piece out of place!

Sports
To celebrate national womens day our friends at Solid Rock organised their annual Soccer (football) tournament in the town of Worcester which sits around one hour north of Grabouw, although its winter here the weather was beautiful as Josh took 8 of our sports mentors in our mini bus to represent the Village of Hope, as usual the boys behaved impeccability and it's a real pleasure to offer them these simple opportunities to break away from the daily grind of life in the informal areas of Grabouw.

You may remember last year that the boys were unbeaten in 7 games but this year they performed even better winning 11 and drawing one of their 12 games. Our goalkeeper won the 'keeper of the tourament' award and one of the outfield players once again won the 'player of the tournament' award, a feat he completed last year as well....we want to congratate our sports mentors on their performance and for the wonderful work they do day in day out week in week out via our sports outreach into the community, these guys really are true hero's to us and their peers who they share life with.

We were also blessed by the visit our the teachers and pupils from the Aylesbury Grammar School who were in South Africa on a rugby tour, one of their teachers, Gary Ramsbottom (or Sir as he likes to be called!) attends one of our supporting churches in England and it was great to be able to welcome him and his students for an afternoon of fun at one of our sports outreaches. It was also a nice surprise for Josh Houltrum as he is an 'old boy' of the school so for him to be able to show some of his peers, who are only a few years younger than him, the work that he has been doing over the last year was a pleasure for him.

The school raised several thousand Rand and bought out some much needed extra kit, training bibs, balls, cones etc, which was a real blessing and we will ensure that we use the funds to benefit more children over the next weeks and months as the outreach grows from strength to strength.


Rainbow Smiles –HIV support group for adolescents
You might remember in our last newsletter how we had discovered that a girl from our HIV support group was defaulting on her meds. We found that the reason she was choosing not to take them was because of the sheer amount of pills and how hard they were to swallow. Over the last couple of months our fabulous social worker, Emma, has been able to walk with this girl and her family and assist by taking her to the ARV clinic. This has resulted in finding a different type of ARV that can be taken as one pill. This is wonderful as this pill is much easier to take but just goes to prove that this kind of support is really vital for teenagers who don’t necessarily know who else to go to with their issues and often don’t know where to go to find out about their options.

The Rainbow Smiles group is taking a break for a few weeks whilst Emma takes a well-deserved break and visits family back in the UK.

Other News:
Volunteers:
We’ve had a busy time will volunteers and really welcomed the support from Shae and Aubrei (from the USA) and Polly (from the UK) who’ve just been so fantastic with the kids. Those three girls have recently finished serving here, but we were very pleased to have Nakitta and her friend Bex arrive who are volunteering with us for a few weeks. In fact, Nakitta was one of the first volunteers to come to Village of Hope when it opened and was quite bowled over by the change that has taken place within the project since her last visit. Both Nakitta and Bex work in education in the UK so they are also very natural with the children and have been helping to update their developmental charts.

Sandwiched between these sets of girls was a huge mission team from #10Days – an initiative of Every Nation churches in the USA – they came to help on the project and made a huge difference by helping to clear a lot of dead wood from our woodland and turn it into woodchips for the garden areas. Sadly it was very soggy work as the rain came to visit along with them!!! We also received an impromptu visit from a American couple who Tim and Maz bumped in to on the beach one weekend!

Finally, we have to say a special thank you and goodbye to Josh Houltram who has just finished his second stint volunteering with us. Josh coordinated the sports outreach programme whilst he was here, developed a great rapport with the sports mentors and will be sorely missed.

Mandela Day:
Here in South Africa a special day is set aside to encourage volunteering. The idea is to spend 67 minutes of time on that day volunteering (representing 67 years of Nelson Mandela’s service towards the people of South Africa). You may have read on our blog but we received visits and donations from the wonderful folks at Imperial Logistics and Shoprite, The Aleit Group, Pyjamas and Jam, and Appletiser too. The children from Applewood Preparatory reliably made soup and sandwiches which they make year in and year out and we were able to bless our sports mentors with some wonderful home-cooked food in their bellies as a result. We are so SO grateful to have been recognised by so many different groups of people!!

Other Visits:
We’ve also been treated to a visit from AVCC Old Age Home who came to spend some time with the children as well as our board of directors from South Africa and Pastor Joe from the USA board!! It’s always great to know that the people who are working on are behalf are keen to see what’s going on at the coalface!

How You Can Help
We are never short of ideas on how you can help us out!!!!
• Become a regular monthly giver - Regular givers are like gold dust to us!!!
• Fundraise – Commit to shave your head, host a quiz night, do a sporting event!!!!! – The possibilities are endless and can raise R10000s with enough enthusiasm!
• Pray – need we say more?!

For more information contact us fundraiser@thembalitsha.org.za


Volunteering
We rely heavily on committed volunteers to do the stuff here in South Africa. It can be a fantastic way to give (and receive!) However, we do have some criteria you have to meet in order to apply. For more information on volunteering for Thembalitsha please check out our website or email us at volunteer@thembalitsha.org.za.

Also, please do NOT book ANY flights before your application form has been accepted. Thank you!

visits, concerts and poorly babies

frank and mommy trulene!

this new year is already racing away with us and as you know we like to keep the blog updated at least once a week but the usual busyness of our project has meant that we weren't able to do that last week....so here's a quick catch up on some of the things that have been happening.

our first news is that we have been running backwards and forwards to the caledon hospital with our little 10 week old baby boy who is very sick at the moment, he seems bright enough but has had a harrowing start to his life (can't go into too much detail here) and his health is very compromised.

the thembalitsha stand at the concert

our house moms take turns to complete a 12 hour shift sitting with the baby and liaising with the hospital staff and our wonderful volunteer team have done an amazing job in driving to and fro as we rotate those shifts.

on some more positive news we were delighted to receive a visit from our good friends frank and leigh rautenbach, we first met frank when we were still in england and he has made a couple of visits since we moved out in 2008. frank is somewhat of a celebrity in south africa, having stared in the soap 'sewende laan' and a few films, and our house moms were falling over themselves trying to get their photo taken with him.

crowds enjoying the music

frank and leigh now live in LA and we are hoping for some sort of partnering with their church over there, it was great to catch up with all their news and it was exciting to chat around how the links with another church in america might come about.

and last but not least emily once again pulled out all the stops to put on a truly amazing gig at the hope@paul cluver amphitheater last friday evening, the stars of the show were the south african rock band 'the parlotones' who also headlined at our hope2012 concert last year.

the parlotones singing out for hope!

our volunteers once again hosted the thembalitsha stand at the event which raised funds and the profile of the foundation to the sell out crowd of 600 people who were also able to enjoying the balmy summers evening listening to the guys perform some of their top hits.

funnily enough the parlotones have also moved to LA to further their musical careers....are there some uncanny links starting to form?


-thanks to david morris (our local grabouw photographer) for allowing us to use his photos on this post-

thoughts from the village of hope around world AIDS day...

stories in the news around HIV can be confusing, on the one hand we hear that there has been a 'dramatic drop in new infection rates' and 'that mother to child transmission is falling', and on the other hand there are 'reports of a more dangerous strain of the HIV virus in west africa' and that 'adolescence dying from AIDS in south africa is on the increase', what are we to believe on 'world aids day' in 2013?

well we will now provide you with four stories that have impacted us in grabouw over the last four weeks where we are really feeling the effects of the loss of our full time ARV doctor at our local hospital, not all of these stories can be attributed to the fact that we have lost probably one of the most amazing and caring HIV specialists in south africa and we don't want to get into the politics of all that here but the facts on the ground are pointing to more suffering and even deaths due to the changes that have been made.

the facts are that two of our children, one who we discharged back to his mother in 2010 and another who is still living with us have had mothers dying due to the effects of HIV, with another mother of two siblings who were placed with us for a period, also 2010, dying of cancer, perhaps with HIV complications during this last month.

further to the news of those dear mom's, two of whom were still in their twenties, and the other under the age of forty passing, one of our security guards has been off ill and upon his return he looked awfully gaunt and told us that he was suffering from TB, another disease which is prevalent in our town and is often linked to HIV, we are praying that he continues to take his medication and that he welcomes the home visits that our wonderful thembacare careworks will make to ensure he follows his course to the end, however he didn't report for work this morning and we are full of worries about his health.

it's not all doom and gloom as we are seeing progress via our careworkers, rainbow smiles (our weekly adolescent support group) and our sports outreach health and lifeskills training but when we were discussing the worries around our patients one colleague said that 'we aren't waiting for the time bomb to go off' we are literally 'picking up the pieces of a bomb that has already exploded'.....

...therefore please think and pray for us on this world AIDS day 2013 as we seek to serve our children, their parents and the wider community, all of whom are affected by HIV and TB and many of whom are infected by those two debilitating but not life threatening diseases!

stories of hope!

as you might be aware myself (tim) and maz have been enjoying some much needed family and holiday time in europe over the last few weeks and we are so thankful to the team of wonderful volunteers and staff who valiantly held the fort whilst we were away....to have such a team around us takes away that stress and strain when we are away and the legacy of the project is the fact that the project can run without us being as involved in the day to day stuff which is really cool.

whilst we were away we had the opportunity to meet up with family and friends in england and france and we were able to share highlights and update people on the work we are doing both at the village of hope and the wider thembalitsha foundation. we also had the chance to speak at a couple of churches and a surprise fundraising event with our main focus on encouraging everyone that they can make a difference whether they are called to set up a HIV project in south africa or called to provide a hot meal to a needy neighbour wherever they live!

upon our return we were able to celebrate the amazing news of our successful application for the village of hope to be registered as a temporary place of safety which we have been waiting and praying for over the last year or so, as has been highlighted before much credit for this must go to maz who has been a stalwart in ensuring that this registration came through under the correct government department and within the new children's act, of which she is an expert.

however our successful registration wasn't the only incredible news that we are able to share, what must go down as a true miracle happened yesterday as two of our village of hope children have been officially adopted by an amazing american family, who we were able to join for a celebration braai at the elgin country club last night. the parents, brent and karla, have been visiting our thembalitsha projects for a number of years now and we are so pleased that these two children will now have the opportunity of a lifetime to grow up in a stable loving home with a mum and dad who can provide the basis of a life in the united states.

the underlying success of the village of hope is the fact that around 40 children have now been placed back home with their own families here in south africa and that continues to be desire, however for some that isn't that easy so we are so pleased in the outcome that has happened to these two dear little ones...should you want to read more about this fantastic story then please visit the families blog by clicking on this link, we are sure you will be inspired.

September News

This month is a cause for much celebration for us here at Village of Hope. Last week we received the news that our project is officially registered with the Department of Social Development. It has taken a very long time to establish with, which government department we should be registered to and what kind of facility we should be registered as. A process of over 4 years to be precise! Maz and her team have had lots of to-ing and fro-ing to do and red tape to wade though, but finally we have the piece of paper (laminated, scanned, copied and soon to be elegantly framed!) to prove that we are acknowledged by the government and officially allowed to be in operation as a 12-bed partial care facility.

What was ‘funny’ was that all the other social service organisations in town found out the result before we did. Apparently it had been confirmed a week previous to us knowing. Slightly back to front we think!

The only slightly element that took the shine of the news is that Tim and Maz weren’t here when we found out but we look forward to celebrating with them when they return from a break in the UK.

Children’s Unit
The unit has been nice and busy with lots of visits from some of the children’s parents. As I mentioned in a previous blog post, we’ve been able to send another little boy home to live with his mother (read the full story here) and another child’s mother, the girl who has difficulty walking, is being given her last chance by the social workers to prove that she wants her daughter back. She has to demonstrate this by coming to visit regularly and taking responsibility of caring for her daughter on those visits. We are hopeful that a reunification is possible for this little girl and her mother too but it has to be for the best intentions of the child.

Sports
This month has been rather frustrating for our sports team with so many afternoon clubs being postponed due to the intense storms we’ve been having. They are trying to make the best of the bad weather and using that time to sort out mountains of kit and prep for a sports Saturday they are planning in a few weeks. We are praying that the weather will be slightly more friendly by then as the children are really looking forward to a bit of healthy competition.

Other News:

Cycling:
On 13 September 12 cyclists in 2 different countries took on Thembalitsha’s cycle to the sea challenge. You can read more in ThembaCare Grabouw’s blog but we wanted to mention it because of the huge representation that came from our Village of Hope volunteers and friends. Shannon, Josh and Emma all completed the cycle here in South Africa covering 200km in three days (in awful weather sometimes) and our friends in the UK: Trefor. Dan and Cara Williams and Andy Gilbert completed the UK challenge which was to cycle to the sea, 100 miles in 1 day! Way to go guys!!!

Dancing:
Over the same weekend as the cycle, we were also given the opportunity to benefit from auction items sold at the annual Elgin Barn Dance fundraiser which is held here in Grabouw. Seeing as though most of the rest of the VoH team was off cycling, it was up to Emily to represent the project! Thankfully she didn’t have to dance too much and only had to speak on stage for a couple of minutes. Getting guests to bid on the items was a hard sell but the evening resulted in a haul of R5000 which is not to be sniffed at. Yee Hah!

Volunteers:
Our trusty past volunteer, Tyler Snelson, has popped back for a brief visit. Tyler is from Texas and has volunteered with us numerous times in the past. It’s always great to see people come back and reminds us of how big the Village of Hope family has become. We are sure he craftily planned is trip to coincide with National Braai Day (September 24)!!


How You Can Help
We are never short of ideas on how you can help us out!!!!
• Become a regular monthly giver - Regular givers are like gold dust to us!!!
• Fundraise – Commit to shave your head, host a quiz night, do a sporting event!!!!! – The possibilities are endless and can raise R10000s with enough enthusiasm!
• Pray – need we say more?!

For more information contact us fundraiser@thembalitsha.org.za


Volunteering
We rely heavily on committed volunteers to do the stuff here in South Africa. It can be a fantastic way to give (and receive!) However, we do have some criteria you have to meet in order to apply. For more information on volunteering for Thembalitsha please check out our website or email us at volunteer@thembalitsha.org.za.

Also, please do NOT book ANY flights before your application form has been accepted. Thank you!

into the thirties with another home placement

goodbye uncle rob.....

life at the village of hope can be very fragile, relationships come and go, be they with the volunteers who come to spend time at the project or the children we are here to help, and as we have said before it's never easy to say goodbye.

last week we had another goodbye to go through, this time we said our sad but in some way happy goodbye's to a three year old little girl who had been with us for around three months, and whom we have seen develop beyond recognition since she has been with us.

we didn't have much time to plan for her departure as thing had moved on a pace during the recent unrest but she is a feisty little character who likes to have her own way, and in one way that will prove very useful in the future as she returns to a family in the local formal settlement (township)...the last thing we were able to do before she left was sort out her schooling and she will be starting pre-school on monday morning, where she will be joining two other children from the village of hope, so we are confident that our paths will cross again!

lots of 'rainbow smiles' at the beach...

which colour are you gonna choose?

snacks on the beach

on friday we spent an eventful afternoon with the children from our HIV support group, 'rainbow smiles', as we took them to the beach at gordons bay...eventful in many ways, for some of the children this was the first time at the beach, somewhat crazy to think that it's less than 20 minutes from their homes but in their world it's a million miles from their day to day surroundings. eventful as hardly any of them had a change of clothes, let lone swimming kit and a beach towel, not an everyday item when you live in a home with no running water or electric, eventful as we blessed them with a visit to the ice cream parlor and gave them the option to chose a flavour....not something that many of them have ever had the chance to do before, eventful as some of the ice creams ended up in the sand!.....eventful in the fact that rob's faithful landrover broke down just as we arrived at the beach and we had to not only tow that to the garage but also try to work out how we to get the number of children back up the mountain, all with seat belts, and safely back to their homes.

too much choice!

for us at the village of hope these are some of the items we have to deal with on a daily basis, the disparage between those that have and those who have never had, the fact that most of our vehicles break down at least once a month and with the cost of repairs and fuel rising this is an increasing drain on our resources, in fact the toyota bakkie is back in the garage after a week off the road with gearbox problems!.....but none of these things seem to matter for that short couple of hours when we were able to bless these 15 children who attend our weekly club with some fun and games at the local beach...

..the lives they live are very complex, living with HIV comes with it's obvious health issues but the social and economic issues that surround and overwhelm them as perhaps unseen by many, but to see the joy in their eyes at the sight of the sea, the sand beneath their feet and the happiness at being able to be a child for just a moment as they splashed around in the water was another amazing experience and its great to be able to invest in their lives in this small way. so we want to thank all our supporters for the funds that are donated so we can do what we do for these very special kids.

providing new hope to another child in need...

the first meal for our new child, given
by our house mom at the village of hope

some days the day to day chores that come with running a home for 9 children infected or affected by HIV, AIDS and TB, along side our daily sports and health awareness programmes into the local formal and informal settlements, can become so overwhelming that we have little time to really stand back to see the ways in which we are really making a difference to the people we have been called to work with..

...however there are some days where our eyes are opened to the amazing work that is undertaken at the village of hope, and today is one of those days as we successful see the fruits of the work of placing stabilised children home with families.....what do i mean by that?....

...well due to the recent successful placements of some of our longer term children (see their stories by clicking here, or here, or here) we have been able to create some more bed space to provide accommodation for more needy children, and today we are back up to our full compliment as we have welcomed another 2 year old girl into our home.

this dear little girl will be loved and cared for by our wonderful house moms and we hope that she will soon be back home with her family after we work with the local day hospital in addressing her immediate medical needs.

Reality Bites

Mummy Netty taking good care of the new arrival

We are always very excited to have a new admission to the children's unit and last week we were able to welcome a gorgeous little two-year old girl (although she looks more like a one year old than two because she is so under-developed). She has settled in really well, is smiley, affectionate and definitely has some dance moves on her! She even has a pronounceable name which is always a relief for us English speakers!

She was referred to us because her mother, who is HIV positive, was too ill and had been taken to hospital because of TB. The social worker had said that the mother looked like she wouldn't survive much longer but we have often been told such things and then seen dramatic restorations to health so we didn't give it too much attention.

This week we heard that the mother had died. Just like that.  Of course, we don't know the reasons why this lady got so ill but it does make me wonder....Was she born with HIV or was she given it unknowingly? How did she find out? Did she know to take her ARVs regularly without fail? Was she getting any support from anyone? How did she get so poorly with TB? Did she even know she had TB or did she think it was just a cough and ignore it? If this woman had been born in another country or in this country but with money would her life have been the same?

We do have to be thankful that there is a possibility of this gorgeous girl going to live with her Grandmother in the Eastern Cape but it still doesn't detract from the fact that she will never know her mother....in this life anyway.

Emily

The Perfect Reason To Celebrate!

Last week, our little girl, who has been living at Village of Hope since we opened three years ago, celebrated her 5th birthday! It is hard to believe she is so big! She truly is a reason to celebrate because, even at 5 years old, she is one of life's survivors. Not only is she living with HIV but she also was a foetal alcohol syndrome baby. Her mother came from a farm that used the dop farm system (where workers were paid in alcohol rather than cash) and drank heavily during the pregnancy which has stunted her mental and physical development. When she arrived at Village of Hope she was severely malnourished and neglected and had to be fed via a tube in her stomach. Goodness knows what would have happened to her if she had not been discovered by the social workers! Now, although she is slightly smaller than the average five year old and has a short attention span, you would not be able to see there is anything wrong with her. She is such fun to be around and a cheeky little monkey to boot!


Maz and the rest of the team have been working very hard to progress her case. Despite all the hard work there is still a long way to go. Please join us in praying for the future of precious girl.

August News

Well we have certainly been battening down the hatches this month. The storms that have been blowing through here have been rather wild. We’ve had trees blowing down all over the property (thankfully not near buildings or people) and anything that has not been tied down has been found in a foreign place. Perhaps the biggest casualty on the farm has been a pre-fabricated shed, fondly known as The Cabin. We use it to store lots of bits and bobs and, though it has never been water-tight, it has always been good for some kind of storage……Not so now! After the wind and rain this weekend the poor old cabin is as flat as a pancake and the roof is nowhere to be seen! Thankfully Mel and her friend as well as two of our fabulously multi-talented House Moms, were on hand to move the items quickly out of the wet weather. Those girls do have some muscles on them! Now it’s down to the maintenance team to sort out somewhere to store all the homeless items and clear up the mess!

We are having a giggle amongst the team because the cabin episode happened the night that Tim and Maz, our trusty Project Managers, left for a six week, much needed holiday! Let’s hope by the time they return we have managed to keep everything together. We have done it before so we can do it again!! Please keep us in your prayers!

Children’s Unit
With all the wintry weather the children and House Moms have been keeping safely tucked indoors a lot of the time but we are not short of news as ever!

We are most excited to welcome a new little one to the Village of Hope family. As with many of the children here, they all have their story to tell, but we are just happy that we can offer some relief and some loving care whilst he is with us. Along with a new child we have also been able to receive Marlise, a social work student from the HAN university in Holland. Marlise is going to be with us for a year and is already getting stuck in!

As well as a new child and new student we also have a lovely shiny new people carrier! Thanks to a lot of hard work and fundraising we finally had enough money to buy a Hyundai H1. It is not brand new but it is the newest vehicle we have ever been able to purchase and will be a lot more reliable than the old VW combi we had previously. We are doing our best to keep it looking new for as long as possible. The maintenance team has created an nice dry area for us to park it so it is less likely to get sandy and muddy with all the bad weather we have been having. The kids use it to go to school each day and we are able to use it for our sports clubs and Rainbow Smiles on Fridays.

Sports Outreach and Community Work
We’ve tried to keep sports clubs as regular as possible despite the weather. Now that we have reliable mentors it allows us to have more flexibility because if the weather is bad they can choose to hold their particular clubs on drier days whereas in times gone by we just didn’t have the capacity to be so flexible.

We also now have our next Dutch students. Yorram and Anna are fantastic and already proving their dedication to our cause by going beyond their brief. They even helped with babysitting in the Children’s Unit whilst we held a staff meeting – and those of you who have volunteered before and helped with that know what kind of dedication that is! It is so exciting to see the relationships developing between us and the HAN university and we know that every student we receive from them is an asset to us.

We are also very excited to be able to re-start our club in the Rooidakke area. We previously had to suspend it due to lack of resources but now we have been able to employ one of our mentors part-time via funding from a Government works programme. This means that he, along with Yorram’s assistance will be running the club and taking on some other duties within the sports outreach team.

Other News
Volunteers:
It has been very quiet on the volunteer front this month. Although that has meant more work for our core team it has also been a good time to regroup. By this time next month we will have welcomed three new volunteers. Two from the USA and one from Holland, so things don’t stay quiet for long and we will be happy for the extra hands - especially with our leaders being away.

Cycle To The Sea:
In a few short days a team of able, willing but crazy people are going to be excitedly donning their lycra and cycling over 100 miles to raise money for us. Please support them in their efforts as this is no mean feat and all the money they raise will come directly to us and the work that we are doing. You can sponsor them online here: www.justgiving.com/CycleToTheSea2012

How You Can Help
We are never short of ideas on how you can help us out!!!!
• Become a regular monthly giver - Regular givers are like gold dust to us!!!
• Fundraise – Commit to shave your head, host a quiz night, do a sporting event!!!!! – The possibilities are endless and can raise R10000s with enough enthusiasm!
• Pray – need we say more?!

For more information contact us fundraiser@thembalitsha.org.za

Volunteering
We rely heavily on committed volunteers to do the stuff here in South Africa. It can be a fantastic way to give (and receive!) However, we do have some criteria you have to meet in order to apply. For more information on volunteering for Thembalitsha please check out our website or email us at volunteer@thembalitsha.org.za.

Also, please do NOT book ANY flights before your application form has been accepted. Thank you!

Up And Coming Events
For further details check out our Facebook page:
www.facebook.com/thembalitshafoundation

can you fill these spaces?

could you be sitting here this time next year?

as you may be aware the village of hope is run by staff of 13 full time paid workers, ranging from our house moms to a maintenance team but these key people are supported by a team of full and mid term volunteers who oversee the management of the project, run sports outreach, invest in the house moms, do the finances, write policies around the care of the children, complete the school and shopping runs, take the children to their medical appointments and assisting in running our adolescent HIV support groups, the list is almost endless and this all takes time and dedication to undertake the running of such a large project which is also linked to our sister project, thembacare grabouw where there are other opportunities to serve.

these mid and long term volunteers also oversee the short term mission teams who join us for 10-14 days throughout the year and who are an invaluable resource to carry out the larger tasks much like this weeks team from augusta have undertaken with the repainting of the children's unit.

we have never been short of volunteers and with the amazing support of the HAN students from holland we are able to undertake the day to day running of the project most of the time.....however we currently have a couple of opportunities for the right people to come and join our team for a mid to long term period.

our sports outreach is growing and with our 40 week programme now in a format which can be rolled out into other areas we are seeking a longer term volunteer/s who can help run and coordinate our sports outreach programme which currently takes place in 7 different areas of grabouw each and every weekday afternoon. this could be an opportunity for an intern or recently qualified student, however before you get too excited there are a few things that you must consider, firstly you must be able to drive a 4x4 vehicle, this is how we transport most of the sports equipment to the clubs, many of which are run in areas where a normal car wouldn't be able to access, you would also be able to lead and stimulating an existing team of willing local mentors (volunteers), and finally and most importantly you would have a passion for children, especially those aged between 9 - 15 years, who we work with bringing life skills, health awareness and the love of Jesus via sports!

...there are other opportunities around social work and our wider children's work, this post or posts would involve supporting the current children who live with us at the village of hope as we seek to place them back into their homes in the community, most of our children have complex medical and social issues which means that this is a job with lots of pressure but is also so rewarding when it comes together with a successful reunification back into their families. with this in mind there is a need for this person/s to complete home visits to ensure the 20 or so children who have already been placed home are still healthy and being looked after by their carers in the community. helping out with support groups and stimulating the children who live with us at the village of hope is also a key area of this role.

if you are interested in coming to live in grabouw, south africa, and are keen to help support our work with those infected and affected by HIV, AIDS and TB in an area which is rife with these health issues, if you are someone happy to share their lives with our other volunteers in the self contained volunteer unit, and are self motivated and have a love of kids and empowering people then we would love to hear from you!

May News

Well winter is definitely on it’s way and we are thankful that we have log fires to keep us warm on the colder days. We are also very thankful that we have our own supply of wood here on the farm thanks to our small plantation which has always been enough. The maintenance team (as they are now known!) Tim Berger, Heinrich and Johan have been kept busy cutting trees to keep our wood store replenished.


Children’s Unit
Chicken pox has been making its way through the children’s unit!! It’s never ideal for any child to have to deal with such an illness but we were worried that the HIV positive children would really suffer. Thankfully they all seem to be coping very well with it and most of them have only had it mildly. Well done to our House Moms for getting though it too!

Another month generally means another birthday and this time it was for one of our girls who turned four. This particular girl has been with us for over a year and has had no contact with her mother for over six months. The social workers are trying to track down her mother for the purposes of assisting in acquiring a birth certificate so that a foster home place can be found for her. It is crazy that a child can be four years old and still not have been registered! The mother suffers with alcohol addiction and at the moment we have no idea where she is staying. Despite her difficult social situation the birthday girl had a fantastic time celebrating in the traditional way with Maz, Mel and our newest volunteer Lauren organising a lovely party for her. We love spoiling the kids here and being able to love them. We know it doesn’t always make up for a lack of a real family but at least they know that someone is there for them. In the time she has been with us she has really come out of her shell and become a confident, delightful child. We are trusting God for the best family for her, whatever that might look like.

Although we are often battling with frustrating social work cases, it is good to be reminded of those situations which are being resolved and we have a fantastic story of reunification this month. The mother to one of our three year old girls has been told that she will be allowed to have her child returned to her if she can prove her responsibility by following a strict set of guidelines set by the social worker. These guidelines include visiting us every day to learn how to take care of her child and learning how to administer the medication. We are pleased to say that the mother is responding well, adhering to the guidelines and are we are very confident that, in a few weeks, the social worker will agree to the child returning home! The mother is also taking responsibility for her own medication and the Day Hospital are real pleased with her progress. It is always our prayer that a child can go home to a loving and caring family member and for it to be the mother too is just the icing on the cake!

We have also received news that one of the little boys who returned home a few weeks ago is doing very well. His mother, who was defaulting on her HIV medication, has become compliant again and is working hard, along with the grandmother, to improve the house – by putting cardboard on the walls and carpet on the floor -  and keep it clean and tidy. This is truly fantastic news and goes to show how Thembalitsha can make a difference. Watch this space!

Sports Outreach and Community Work
A highlight of this month has to be the fact that we were able to take our eight sports mentors to Cape Town Stadium to watch Cape Ajax v Orlando Pirates. It was fantastic to be able to invest in these boys who are willing to get involved and regularly commit to our weekly sports outreach in their local areas. Many of the boys have been involved in our clubs from a young age and realise the difference they can make. We made a day of it and took them to see some of Cape Town’s sights either side of the match. It was truly a precious experience to share in their first viewing of a proper football stadium and we could see that it was something they would hold in their memories for a long time to come.

This month we also assisted in the Community Police Forum’s (CPF) feeding programme where, for one day, we took over the daily task of providing a basic meal for patients of the TB clinic in town. This meal is essential for the TB medication to work effectively. Providing this meal for fifty was no simple task but we were able to enlist our volunteer, Pauline and Tim’s mum to prepare the food and then use our volunteers to help in the distribution. The food was certainly well received and we had enough left over the take to the ARV clinic too! Our hats go off to Captain Noble and the team of volunteers from his church in Grabouw who usually provide this service – at least we could give them a day off!!!

You may have read in ThembaCare Grabouw’s news about the inpatient who is regressing. Sadly she is the mother of two boys, both of whom attend our clubs. The older boy assists the mentor for our club in Siteview (an area in Grabouw) and the other attends our Rainbow Smiles HIV support group. Please hold them in your prayers. Although it is good that these children are known to us and we can look after them it is still a very sad situation.

Other News
Volunteers:
As another month passes we have to say goodbye to two more volunteers. Heather Moore and Grace Perret have both served here for three months and have been invaluable members of the team. As always, the goodbyes are bittersweet as, though we are sad for them to leave, we are so excited about what is going to happen in the next chapter of their lives. Thank you girls! We can’t wait to hear about what you get up to next!
We were also happy to receive our newest volunteer, Lauren Carmen. Lauren is another Aylesbury (or should we say Quainton) lovely! The Carmen family have been long-standing supporters of the Village of Hope and this is Lauren’s second visit. She is already getting stuck in and brandishing her own form of humour in the team. We can tell we are going to be in for a fun three months.


Ukuquala Two:
Our new building from the Germans has been in need of some TLC whilst it dries out. It was noticed that the walls were starting to sag so we have taken the advice of Ian, our friendly structural engineer and arranged for some bracing to be attached. This was carried out by a team of loyal workers at Rustic Homes. Thanks guys! – we appreciate your skill!! The new bracing will become a feature once the walls are dry and plastered and a bit reminiscent of a tudor house!

Hope2Light:
We cannot end the newsletter without saying a huge thank you to Amanda Nortje, our funding manager, and her friend, Karlien Scholtz who have just completed a cycle from Village of Hope to the Cape Aghulas at the southern tip of Africa. They completed this mission over 4 days in an attempt to raise awareness of the Thembalitsha Foundation but also to raise funds towards a new minibus for us to be able to transport the Village of Hope, Sports and Rainbow Smiles children back and forth. They certainly were pedaling with a purpose and we appreciate all you have done for us, girls!




Up and Coming Events


Head’s Up For Father’s Day 19th June

Last year our alternative gifts for Father’s Day were a real hit so we are going to repeat it again. So, if you would like to buy your Dad a gift that counts instead of a comedy tie or pair of socks follow this link:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=290717510664

• British 10k London Run

We have six places available and the run takes place on Sunday 8th July. This really is a fantastic race – you get to run past major London landmarks like Big Ben and St Paul’s cathedral. It costs £30 to enter and you need to be willing to commit to raising at least £250 for us. So, whether you are new to running and looking for a challenge, or an old hand looking to beat your personal best, this is a great opportunity to get into training and to run for a great cause. Contact us at office@thembalitshauk.org.uk for more information.

• Thembalitsha Bike Challenge 
Can you cycle 10 miles? 100 miles? Either way we’d love you to join us on Saturday 8 September as we challenge ourselves to cycle whilst raising money for Thembalitsha.
 The challenge:

8  - 16 Miles: A there and back again route from Aylesbury on picturesque lanes in the Chilterns, suitable for all kinds of cyclists and all ages and including families, you just need to be able to cycle comfortably for around an hour at an easy pace. Entry fee is £5 for adults, £2 for children.

100 Miles: A wonderful route through the Chilterns and the Thames Valley before lunch at a riverside inn, then on to the South Downs and the sea at Brighton. You’ll be rewarded with a stopover at a farm and a hearty breakfast before being driven home the next day. Suitable for regular or more experienced cyclists, you need to be able to cycle at a moderate pace for most of the day. Entry fee is £25, which includes overnight accommodation, breakfast and return transport.

Whichever personal challenge you choose, our challenge to you is to raise as much money as you can for Thembalitsha in sponsorship. Are you up for it?!
Contact us: office@thembalitshauk.org.uk to sign up!

How You Can Help
We are never short of ideas on how you can help us out!!!!
• Become a regular monthly giver - Regular givers are like gold dust to us!!!
• Fundraise – Commit to shave your head, host a quiz night, do a sporting event!!!!! – The possibilities are endless and can raise R10000s with enough enthusiasm!
• Pray – need we say more?!

For more information contact us fundraiser@thembalitsha.org.za


Volunteering
We rely heavily on committed volunteers to do the stuff here in South Africa. It can be a fantastic way to give (and receive!) However, we do have some criteria you have to meet in order to apply. For more information on volunteering for Thembalitsha please check out our website or email us at volunteer@thembalitsha.org.za

Also, please do NOT book ANY flights before your application form has been accepted. Thank you!

time to play

up up and away!

one of the most disappointing and frustrating things about running the village of hope is the limited amount of time we have to just play with the kids that God has placed here. much of mine and maz' (as well as our longer term volunteers like rob and em, or tim, mel or even johan and heinrich) time is spent on completing the long list of daily tasks, such as shopping, or admin for social workers, or finances or report writing for our stats given to the department of health.. we seem to spend more time cutting grass, mending the myriad of broken things, taps, cars, toys etc......rarely do we have chance just to chill with the kids.

however just before i went out to run a sports outreach at a local farm yesterday (which in itself is an amazing part of what we do!) i passed the kids lying around on the newly transformed trampoline and grabbed a minute or so just to support them as they jumped into the air....as you can see by the photo they are somewhat fearless and reached heights which would have turned maz' stomach but we had such a cool time just playing....

...oh for more of those....life is so full and i miss just being a dad to these precious little ones.

community works

healthy meals......happy patients
.......helpful volunteers

it's hard to convey just want we do do via the them thembalitsha foundation's projects here in grabouw, maybe you think that our work is confined to our village of hope children's unit and thembacare hospice work (both inpatient and outpatient) but a lot of our time is given to work in the community. this can be seen via our sports based outreach to over 200 children a week or our rainbow smiles club which our volunteers help with every friday afternoon, all of which remain within the foundations scope by providing healthcare, education or training, but with so much need on our doorstep and a plethora of volunteers who's hearts are broken for the poor and needy its really hard to remain focused and therefore limit our work to those infected or affected by HIV, AIDS and TB.

however as part of our support to the community i (tim) sit on the community police forum (CPF), and although it's hard to remember how one gets involved in such a wide way i do believe that God has placed us here to work with and assist the local community in various ways and with the basic education, provided by my secondary schooling in aylesbury that we so often take for granted, we have the skills and abilities to help in many different areas.

last week under our CPF 'projects' banner we were able to take over the daily task of providing a basic healthy meal to the 50 or so people who attend the day hospital to take their TB medication. the meal is vital for the medication to be effective and the day hospital are grateful to captain noble and a team of volunteers from his church who undertake this task each and everyday.

for us it was a once off and we were not only able to hand out this meal, which was made by one of our volunteers (pauline) and my mum, but also a leaflet informing people of some simple facts to enable them to live a safe and healthy life supported by our local police service. i was joined by a couple of the CPF members and four of our thembalitsha volunteers (three shown in the photo, which appeared in our local paper, plus katia) who got up early to hand out the food and documents, we prayed for each patient and found that we had so much food that we were able to bless all the patients who were attending the ARV (antiretroviral) clinic as well.

if you would like to get involved in our work either via prayer, volunteering or giving regularly enabling us to reach more people with practical and effective care then please visit our thembalitsha foundation web site

March News

As ThembaCare Grabouw have probably mentioned in their news, we have had a dramatic month here in Grabouw. There has been a large amount of unrest in the community which culminated in violent protests a couple of weeks ago. We are thankful that our project is not immediately in the township so we weren’t caught up in anything directly, however it impacted our staffing for over 24 hours because it was not safe for our House Moms to move back and forth. Thankfully we are currently blessed with lots of very capable volunteers who stepped in to fill the gaps and they did an fantastic job of keeping the children stimulated and the routines running.

Children’s Unit

Peek-A-Boo Easter Bunny

With the Easter Holidays now in full swing, the House Moms are being kept on their toes. Nine children to entertain all day, seven days a week can be quite full on! To add to this we have been looking after two extra little boys in the day as well. The boys are staying with ThembaCare (because we don’t have any spare beds) whilst they wait to go into hospital for TB treatment. Thankfully we have the distraction of a new trampoline. The frame was a second hand donation a while back but the pad arrived perished and sun damaged and no good for hardcore bouncers. Tim’s parents brought out a new one with them from the UK using some money that was donated and now trampolining is a new major past time. We have also got Jess, Grace, Heather and Katia on hand to do some Easter crafts with the kids to keep them entertained.

Sports Outreach and Community Work
Two weeks ago we had one of our Soccer Saturday events at the Country Club. We had a fantastic turn out with over 150 children attending from the seven different areas we work in. All credit to the volunteers and Dutch Students who arranged it. It all ran very smoothly and the kids had a fantastic time. The German building students came along to lend a hand and be ‘managers’ for each of the teams and then later on the Dutch and German students went head to head in a match of their own. We are very grateful to the Elgin Round Table who came through again with food and refreshments for all the children. We stood back and realized that at one stage with had volunteers from England, USA, Canada, Holland, Norway, Germany and New Zealand helping out…Village of Hope really is going global!

It really was also great to see investment that we have been making in the sports mentors paying off. They conducted themselves really maturely and were an asset to our day. We are exploring how we can invest more in our mentors off the pitch too by seeing whether we can offer a scholarship to one of them to help to develop them and give them hope for a better future.

Other News
Volunteers:
The whole team was very sad to say goodbye to Niall this month. He had five weeks serving at ThembaCare Grabouw and with us and had become a true father figure in the volunteer unit. We are confident it’s not the last we will see of him but we are already missing him. Lance and Travis, our Canadian duo also said goodbye – things are certainly very quite around here without them!

On the flip side we were able to say ‘hello’ to Katia and Heather. Both of them are serving with us for three months and have already got stuck in! Katia is a Nurse from New Zealand and is assisting in the children’s unit and we have been enlisting Heather with lots of admin and petty cash. Not always the most glamorous of jobs but the help is always very much appreciated. We have even loaned her skills out to the Day Hospital who have needed help with their mountains of filing.

The New Building:
….Is complete! (well very nearly!) Yes, the Germans have now left, leaving us with another lovely straw house. This one is a two-story affair but is very similar to the house they built last year. The whole team worked extremely hard to get it completed as far as possible working late into the night and early in the mornings. We are so blessed to have another building which we hope will help us cater for more volunteers in the future and eventually lead to us being able to expand the services we can offer in the children’s unit. But for now it’s the same process as last year: we need to wait for the straw to dry out before we can plaster it and then begin to use it and with the rains on their way it could take a while.


Events
With Easter just around the corner, why not give a chicken this year rather than an egg?! We have a great alternative gift for you just visit eBay to get yours! http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=290691216752

It’s that time of year again when we are recruiting runners to for our 10k run. We have six places available and the run takes place on Sunday 8th July. This really is a fantastic race – you get to run past major London landmarks like Big Ben and St Paul’s cathedral. It costs £30 to enter and you need to be willing to commit to raising at least £500 for us. So, whether you are new to running and looking for a challenge, or an old hand looking to beat your personal best, this is a great opportunity to get into training and to run for a great cause. Contact us at office@thembalitshauk.org.uk for more information.


How You Can Help
We are never short of ideas on how you can help us out!!!!
• Give - Become a regular monthly giver - Regular givers are like gold dust to us!!! You can download a standing order form from our website – don’t forget to sign a gift aid form if you are a UK tax payer. Or nominate us as your charity of choice within your church or business.
• Fundraise – Commit to shave your head, host a quiz night, do a sporting event!!!!! – The possibilities are endless and can raise £1000s with enough enthusiasm! We also have annual walks, runs and bike rides. For more information contact us office@thembalitshauk.org.uk
• Pray – Sign up to the prayer newsletter. Prayer is just as vital to us (if not more so) than money! We can’t have enough people committing to pray persistently for us. Sign up at prayer@thembalitshauk.org.uk


Volunteering
We rely heavily on committed volunteers to do the stuff out here in South Africa. It can be a fantastic way to give (and receive!) However, we do have some criteria you have to meet in order to apply. For more information on volunteering for the Village of Hope please download the INFORMATION FOR VOLUNTEERS documents under the ‘Support Us’ page on our website (http://www.thembalitsha.org.za). Also, please do NOT book ANY flights before your application form has been accepted. Thank you!

praying for our children

just chilling in the kitchen before dinner,
her favorite time of the day

on tuesday morning maz took our little two and a half year old girl into tygerberg hospital where she will stay for a few days whilst the team get her started on her ARV (anti retro viral) medication for her HIV. normally there's no need for our children to go to hospital to start this treatment but due to the fact that she is also on TB medication and has had TB meningitis then the staff want to observe her before sending her back to stay with us at the village of hope.

she is such a dear little (well not so little) thing, she copies everything anyone says and has really developed since she has been with us. please pray for her as she stays on her own and that there wont be any complications with the different types of medication.
we are longing to see her happy smile back with us again soon.

an update on our 11 year old boy is that he has now been discharged from the red cross children's hospital into our sister project, thembacare athlone, mommy maz visited him yesterday and he is doing a little better but he is still a poorly boy!

January News

Happy New Year from all of us here at Village of Hope. As we enter 2012 we are full of excitement at what God has in store for us this year…We are also rather hot! The summer has decided to kick in and it has been in the mid-30s for the past week…phew! Anyway, we intend to grab 2012 by the horns, seizing every opportunity and continue our fight to restore hope to the communities we work with.

We want to invite you to join us in our quest and use this year to make a positive change . Why not sign up to volunteer or take on a personal challenge to raise funds for us? Two of our Thembalitsha staff might inspire you. Together with their friends they have organised two initiatives in aid of our Foundation. Frances from our sister project Bosom Buddies is completing 6 physically grueling trail runs within a month – for those of you who don’t know, these runs are actually like racing up and down a mountain! (Sponsor her here) And Amanda, our funding manager, is going to cycle from our Village of Hope project around the coast to the most southern point in Africa: Cape Agulhas.

Together we can make a huge difference. For more information on how you can get involved email us: info@thembalitsha.org.za…..Start now!

Village News
Tim and Maz returned back safely from their exciting tour or Europe – That might be a slight exaggeration but they did cover a few countries on their trip! The tour proved to be busy but very successful. It seemed a fantastic mixture of talks and presentations, worship events, radio interviews, plane flights and visits to past volunteers. They also managed to spend some quality time with their family too!

The rest of the team here were very relieved to receive them home! There were no major incidents whilst they were away, the project didn’t burn down and remained pretty much as Tim and Maz had left it! – Always an achievement!

The children opening their gifts from Operation Shoebox
(Isaac ably assisting!)

Children’s Unit
The Children in the unit had a most enjoyable Christmas time. This year, for the first time, all the children were able to spend at least Christmas day with either a House Mom or a relative. This was a really special time for the children. They all came home very happy and with huge grins on their faces. It must have been great for them to be so spoilt and have the sole attention of a normal family for a change. Our 11-year-old boy was the only one who was unable to go to a family. Unfortunately for him he had to remain at our sister project, ThembaCare Athlone, because he had just been discharged from hospital after yet more health battles. He is still there now. We have tried to bring him back to the children’s unit in between times but it just hasn’t worked – he isn’t stable enough and needs more medical support. Please continue to keep him in your prayers.

Christmas also saw a flurry of parties and celebrations for the children in the unit. This year our party, in conjunction with the day hospital and ThembaCare, was very generously funded and meant that we could have a magician: Mr Fu Lin Yu (get it?!) The kids loved it.

The new year brought in a new child who has come to stay whilst his home environment gets sorted. He is yet another little one suffering with HIV and TB but is a happy little soul and has made himself at home here very quickly.

Those kids who are old enough to attend school are back. Our 6 year old boy has started ‘big’ school and now has to wear uniform – he looks very cute and is very proud of his new attire but is a little overwhelmed by his new environment. Also, our 3 year old girl started preschool for the first time. She is loving it and is especially insistent on carrying her own rucksack despite the fact that it’s almost as big as she is!

Our Dutch and Australian volunteers with
some of the kids from our sports clubs

Sports Outreach and Community Work
We were able to take the children from our sports clubs out for their annual trips to the beach again which is always good fun. It’s such a special experience for these children who, although they only live 20 mins drive from the sea, hardly ever get to visit the beach and for some it was their first time. We were also able to take them to a local restaurant to have burgers for lunch. The expressions on their faces really were priceless when they saw their lunches arriving. It really makes you realise how blessed we are to consider eating out as a normal activity.

These beach days were the final flourish of action from our fantastic interns from HAN University in Holland. Stephan and Weike really have helped to develop and refine our sports outreach, taking it to the next level, and we were very sad to see them go last week. They were so dedicated to us in their time here and really embraced the project as a whole. They go leaving a legacy and a high standard to retain – so no pressure for the next two students who arrive in February then?!


Other News

Volunteers:
Where would we be without volunteers? This year we have so many bookings (right through to July already!) and we are so thankful because if it wasn’t for these fantastic specimens  we would really struggle to keep our heads above water. This month we were sad to say goodbye to Heather, whose solid, level-headedness  and hard work was so valuable over her three months of service – especially with Tim and Maz being away. We also said goodbye to Stjjn who was with us for a month including Christmas and new year. He was a building student from Holland and helped to construct a new water tower on site so that we can install a new filtration system to purify the borehole water. We will miss trying to pronounce his name and his big hair!
Thankfully we’ve also been able to welcome some new volunteers. Jess Trigg from Yorkshire is with us for six months and is already getting stuck in with the Children’s Unit. She is revising all the activities and bringing in some fresh ideas. She is already looking a lot less pasty that when she first arrived thanks to the heat wave we’ve been having recently!
We are also very excited to welcome Tim Berger back. Tim has served here numerous times by bringing over and leading mission teams from America. This time he has arrived to serve us for 2 years and we can already see that he is going to be a great asset to the team – even though he’s another American so with him and Mel here us Brits are rapidly losing ground!

New Year, New Building:
Yes, you did read correctly! –Guess what? We have another group of students from Stuttgart, Germany, arriving to build another building on Village of Hope. The advance party of three has already arrived and another twenty-five will be joining them mid-February. The university are keen to build a long-tern relationship with us and will be putting a plan in place to return annually to add more structures. Once again they have raised the funds to do this themselves which is staggering. Our thoughts at the moment are that, hopefully, we will be able to build enough accommodation so that we can move the volunteers out of their current place and free up that space to develop the work of the children’s unit to include counseling rooms and a staff room for the House Moms as well as meeting rooms….but this will all take quite a while. We will be posting regular updates on the blog as to the progress of this next building. It looks like now we really are going to have a village of the land!


HOW YOU CAN HELP

We are never short of ideas on how you can help us out!!!!

• Become a regular monthly giver - Regular givers are like gold dust to us!!! You can download a standing order form from our website – don’t forget to sign a gift aid form if you are a UK tax payer

• Fundraise – Commit to shave your head, host a quiz night, do a sporting event!!!!! – The possibilities are endless and can raise £1000s with enough enthusiasm! We also have annual walks, runs and bike rides. For more information contact us office@thembalitshauk.org.uk

• Pray – Sign up to the prayer newsletter. Prayer is just as vital to us (if not more so) than money! We can’t have enough people committing to pray persistently for us. Sign up at prayer@thembalitshauk.org.uk


VOLUNTEERING

We rely heavily on committed volunteers to do the stuff out here in South Africa. It can be a fantastic way to give (and receive!) However, we do have some criteria you have to meet in order to apply. For more information on Volunteering for the Village of Hope please download the INFORMATION FOR VOLUNTEERS documents from the Support Us page on our website (www.thembalitsha.org.za). Also, please do NOT book ANY flights before your application form has been accepted. Thank you

info@thembalitsha.org.za