Recent Happenings

Mother/Daughter Art Day

In South Africa, August is Women’s Month.  In celebration of the women that work at my organization as caregivers (caring for sick patients in their home), I held a mother/daughter art day. When I say I had a mother/daughter event, I mean it in the most unconventional sense. In South Africa, it is extremely common for random women family members to take in children for whatever reason. Maybe the mom is sick, working in a city, or just irresponsible.  Often times, an aunt or gogo (grandmother) ends up raising kids that aren’t hers without a second thought.  Since my event was for caregivers, I also told them they could bring the girls that they care for as patients.

 The day was centered on fun- doing arts and craft projects that they had never seen before. We made tie dye scarfs, pin wheels, bean mosaics, and decorated cupcakes.  When we were making bean mosaics one of the caregivers commented, “But this is dinner!” We explained that today it was just about fun.  All of the caregivers asked how they can make icing and I have a feeling we are going to start seeing iced cupcakes popping up all over the village. The women and their “daughters” all had a great time and got a day of stress-less fun that they more than deserved.

 

Computer Lessons

Last year, I asked my host mom, who is principal of the primary school in my village, if she would like shoes for her learners if I could get them donated. She replied, “Yes, but what I’d really like is some computers.” The search began.  A couple of months ago, I got computers donated and my (real) family helped pitch in with a printer, projector, and overhead projectors. Obviously, most people’s responses to overhead projectors are something like, “wow, those are so old. They are pretty much null.” My principal had a somewhat different response, “Look how beautiful. We are really going to be a technologically savvy school now.”

After many challenges to get the computer lab up and working, I have finally started computer classes. I am teaching the teachers how to use them so that they can teach their students.  Some of the teachers are catching on quickly whereas some are a little slower (it is amazing what we take for granted, having grown up using computers).  Teaching the teachers is comparable to teaching our grandparents the newest technology: a little bit slow, a little bit frustrating, but overall rewarding. One of my main problems is explaining how to use a mouse-especially when you need to go from insert to table, to insert table while keeping every new extension open (yikes!). The teachers are excited to be learning and go crazy with each new program and each new skill. Hopefully soon we will have learners that can type like pros!