shawco kiddos

I have had the privilege of getting to work with some of the most awesome kids over the past three months. Though I've quickly mentioned it a few times on the blog this has become a dear part of my experience here in Cape town and I don't think this trip would be the same without it.

I volunteer twice a week tutoring through one of the societies at UCT called SHAWCO. From what I hear it is actually the largest society in the university, catering to several hundred students from primary ages to the senior level. As tutors we have the opportunity to work with little ones all the way up to acting as educational mentors for older students with the development of life skills and finding ways to manage the realities of life (as many of these students encounter violence and gangs at an increasingly young age).

The first project I joined is called KenSmart, held for three hours each Friday afternoon. It is not like most of the other Shawco Projects because its not held in an actual township, per se. The kids come from nearby schools in the town of Kensington, which does not blatantly look like the 'typical' township communities. Nevertheless, many situations for these kids are very similar though not as easily visible, and education is truly the mechanism for many of them to be able to hope for better circumstances in their adulthood.

KenSmart offers tutoring at the more advanced level for grades 10, 11, and 12. If I am remembering correctly, we offer services for physics, mats, another science perhaps, and then accounting. As an accounting major I thought I'd be most necessary here, and it would probably demonstrate if I actually know what I'm doing haha (each day had its own struggles).

Creeping on two of my girls, they look like studious individuals but they're ridiculously hilarious.

I really did enjoy tutoring accounting because, though extremely draining after two hours, I was able to really dissect the material and I oftentimes found that explaining 'why' particular accounts operate in a certain manner really does make it so much better than simply memorizing. Many of the other Shawco Projects will easily have 40+ students coming for sessions but KenSmart is always much smaller, and we have an average of 8-10 total. There were probably 6 of us tutors who showed up on a regular basis so it was surely a hands on approach with the kids. And can I just say these kids are brilliant. Seriously I didn't learn any accounting material until my second year of university and these are high school sophomores who showed me up from time to time. So bright!

I did not initially plan to join Masizame as I made working with older students my first priority. I didn't think it would be as plausible to volunteer twice a week might be with the course load I'd be taking, and yet, this has easily been one of the best parts of this journey here in Cape Town. I get to work with some of the most precious, and rough, and witty, and tenacious six grade boys and I couldn't be more happy to see their faces every week.

Above is the boys' classroom we spent the majority of the time 

They try to act much too cool when they pose for a picture hah

The rooms being cute as always. She has worked this project with the girls class.

What a stunner. Look at that smile.

Gonna miss this laugh and that dimple. These last several months have been the greatest blessing.

lily bloom

Lily bloom--or in Afrikaans, Lillie bloem--is the name of the child home center that the Student Y partners with every semester for an outreach I've seen them refer to as "Orfun." The center is a home for children, some of them are orphans while others have been placed there as their parents may not have the time nor resource to support their kids.

On an absolutely beautiful Saturday morning a couple weekends ago we got to take the kids to a museum that mixed natural history with a planetarium. Each of us some twenty volunteers were placed with a child between the ages of eight and twelve. When we arrived at Lillie bloem to pick the kiddos we were partnered up. Well, "partnered," not because we were assigned a particular child, instead the kids each picked us! They would sort of walk through the gate and grab your hand (or jump on you in some cases) and you knew you'd met your match. The girl I partnered up with was twelve years old and was quite the feisty character. There was a boy her age that she teased throughout the day calling him "little eyes!" because his eyes would squint when he'd laugh. She'd then go on to give him a nice punch whenever he was close enough. Sounds like someone has a crush, atta girl. 

The ride to the museum was memorable, we can sat with each of our kiddos and they had us sing some of their favorite songs including Rihanna's "Diamond" and Bruno Mars' "When I Was Your Man," and, of course, a little bit of the Biebs. These little ladies knew just about every word, showing me up every time.

Friends in the comvee before arriving at Lillie bloem.

We began our day sitting outside of the museum with some activities planned: a skit of the Good Samaritan (played by yours truly haha), a quick snack of biscuits, and whipped out some old school praise songs like Father Abraham. If any of the kids were timid at the start of the day, they certainly had been broken in at this point. We then were able to enter into the museum and spend the day with our respective child. We strolled around the museum (making great effort to keep up with my little one) for about an hour then headed to a different section for a show in the planetarium. I probably enjoyed the museum a bit more than I should have, but I think all of us college-aged folk seemed to agree that there not eight planets. It was almost painful to listen to the emcee try to explain dwarf planets--and I digress. Once we finished the show we headed to a park outside where we sat atop some steps and had lunch together.

It was such a joy knowing that though our day was so simple it was one that meant the world to them. Again, it is a bit difficult realizing the lack of permanence in these kids' lives. I saw this most clearly when we first jumped into the van after meeting the children, and watched as my roommate's partner (who was much younger and smaller than many others) hop onto her lap and tell her that Nichelle would be her mom for the day...

I don't have many answers, but after seeing the smiles on these faces at the end of the day, I've decided that these things should not justify a decision to sit back and let these opportunities pass.

67 minutes

Mural put together made by Khayelitsha students.

 July 18th is Mr. Mandela's birthday, otherwise known as international Mandela Day. Yesterday he rippened the age of 95 as we celebrated his lifetime dedication to freedom and equality. In a speech given by Mr. Mandela on his 90th birthday back in 2008, he ushered in this informal holiday urging people all over the world to give back to their communities and use this day to serve the people around them. We are suggested to spend at least 67 minutes of our day directly serving in some way as this is the amount of years Mandela gave (both in and out of prison) fighting the battle for social justice.

Throughout the day I kept hearing the term Madiba everywhere I went. When I asked about it I found that Madiba is the clan Mandela belongs to and denotes his tribal heritage. Referring to him in such a manner is to demonstrate your highest regards of honor and respect. He is also referred to many as TaTa, meaning father. In the same way that Mother Theresa has become a symbol of motherhood for many, Mandela sets the standard for a fatherly, loving leader to many of his people.

The largest individual society at the University of Cape Town is called SHAWCO, a volunteering organization that caters to several townships around Cape Town. My group went to Khayelitsha, a township community that houses nearly 1.5 million individuals. I will be visiting this community on a weekly basis as a tutor starting up soon, so you will be hearing much more about Khayelitsha over the next several months.

Even public transportation wished him well. 

A couple of days leading up to Mandela day SHAWCO held signups for different service opportunities throughout the day. I believe there were three different township destinations to choose from leaving at different time slots. If my memory serves me correct, there were nine different groups overall to choose from and each described the types of activities that would be held, including playing chess, soccer, and netball with the kids, creating Mandela art and reading stories, painting walls, or cleaning and organizing. 

The group I signed up for turned out to be the last group of the day and my roommate and I had arrived just minutes before we were to depart. There were at least fifty students waiting outside the shuttle and soon found out that this was part of the overflow of volunteers. These students hadn't previously signed up and crowded around this last bus to go out and serve the community. Roomie and I stood there confused about how we were supposed to hop in the midst of the large swarm of people. We gave one of our local friends, Kirsten, a call and found that she was already abroad the shuttle. She told us that we needed to make our way to the front as they were only allowing people in who had already signed up and soon they'd be filling in the empty seats. Thus, in the cold drizzle we shimmied our way through the crowd and had to shout over several heads that we were on the list. Definitely quite an experience as someone aided us in screaming "make way!"

We pretty much ended up being one of the last few people before the shuttle left, having to turn away several dozens of students who did not register beforehand. As unfortunate as that was, the fact that the overflow was to this extent was incredible. I was, and am still, blown away by the eager support of students to join in volunteering for just a little while. And to think that was just one of nine shuttle groups (taking in at least sixty students), wow. 500 students came together just to serve through SHAWCO, so just think of all of the other organizations that held events as well. Witnessing such a will to connect with the community was entirely too beautiful.


We arrived in Khayelitsha soon after and were directed that the only jobs remaining were cleaning and organizing the books for the library, painting pictures with some of the kids on the library walls, or assembling a Mandela mural of sorts (as seen in the first picture) that the children had each decorated.

I chose to help with the organization of the library as we separated out a couple hundred scattered books into three categories: easy, medium, and difficult. Not gonna lie, some of the "hard" books were textbook level material so difficult that I wouldn't want to read them. We came across many books that brought smiles to us university students as we reminisced about reading series like The Magic Tree House and Junie B. Jones. It took a bit of effort to not sneak in a paragraph or two as we were supposed to be quickly skimming through the pages to discern the difficulty level.

I soon noticed how dirty my hands became after touching only a couple of the books, leaving almost a rough, grimy residue on my fingers. My first thought was that this was so unfortunate to have such worn out materials (many had missing covers, or even hard covers without the actual text inside), but I then realized that perhaps the books were well-worn in because of the fact that they were actually used by the students. Not to take away from the fact that quality materials certainly do enhance the opportunity for education, but there was a bit of comfort to know that even these well-aged books still brings so much privilege to the faces of so many students.

I am honored to have spent Mandela day participating in such a great tradition. Though I am excited to continue my service over the next several months within this community, I am all the more excited to bring this legacy into my existence back home as well. This tradition is certainly a 67 minutes well-served, but it is even greater to know that it represents a legacy of equality, forgiveness, and strength that is very much in effect today.