Suprise!

Right. This is a bit of a long story. And an unusual one. Also, I'm zonked so this may not read very well.

Anyway...

Last week my manager came and asked me if I wanted to go on an outing with the older girls on Wednesday (yesterday). I said I would, but I was working-kids/work come first so if there's an outing and you're working 9/10 times you can't go. That was all I was told. An outing. On Friday, my manager came and spoke to me, Evlien and Sarah in our room to say that it had been an elimination process and anyone that had ummed and ahhed had been voted out so to speak. However she wanted us to go so unless we had said no straight away we were all going. We were told to be in her office at 2.30 on Wednesday and to be wearing takkies (trainers) jeans, a red, pink or white top and a warm jacket. We weren't allowed to have bags with us and to only take the bare minimum. We still knew nothing.

Because I knew I wasn't going to be working Wedesday afternoon, I let my Child Care Worker-Amanda-know so that she could prepare for not having me there. On Monday it was a childs birthday and I took another one to Clicks (see two posts previous) so I popped into the house to say hello. Amanda told me she'd seen a note in the Cokus (morning meeting for the CCW's) book about us filming/shooting an advert with the girls. I was pretty excited, it sounded like fun!

On Tuesday I went for an AWSOME picnic under a windmill with Anne (you pronounce the 'e' as an 'eh' sound for any non-germans!) because Sarah and Evlien had gone on a road trip to wild spirit. After our awesome picnic we went to the annex to do that amazingly sociable thing teenagers do which is sitting in 1 room with a laptop each and showing each other funny or strange videos. Some other volunteers came in who I knew were taking part in the outing, so we crept outside to discuss what we knew. We weren't allowed to talk to any volunteers that we knew weren't going though. Some bright spark had realised that Justin Beiber was performing (with his circus) at Cape Town Stadium and had got it into their head (and others) that we were going to see him. I thought this a fairly rediculous notion. There are something like +24 kids in House 1 and 2 as well as 7/8 volunteers and however many staff members. There was no way the Home could afford it.

In the end Sarah and Evlien couldn't come because they couldn't get back from their road trip in time.

The rest of us met in the office at 2.30. We were given some leaflets on HIV to read and Gender Based Violence. The assistant mentioned something about Desmond Tutu giving a speech. We were all given up to 3 children that we would be responsible for. We went to the activity hall to meet up with the girls and there was a radio station there. 94.5 Kfm said they were using us to film and record an advert for them. They would have us on a bus as if we were on a school trip and the radio would be on and we would have to pretend to be having a mini party on said bus. There were goody bags on the seats but we weren't allowed to look in them until they said. We all got on the bus and found seats, and were told to shut up so they could quickly do a sound check. The video is what they filmed. Watch the video then read on :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgyFseDCBHw



So we were actually going to a Beiber concert. Now I'll admit, I don't like Justin Beiber I think he's an egotistical fool and if I'd know we were going to a concert of his, I probably would have said no. But it was too late, we were on the bus, I was trapped! But in the end I really enjoyed it. The girls were so excited and happy it was an honour to share that with them. We were very close to the stage, they'd spared no expense on the tickets, we were in the first block, if you tried to go further forward you would have been on stage. He was late coming on-or at least he took his time: it said it started at 7.30, the support acts were over by about 7.30 and he didn't come on until 8.40ish. Some of the younger ones (some of the under 14's had been allowed to come) were falling asleep on the pile of coats we had and the adults were beginnig to discuss how late we would wait until we had to take them home as some of them had school the next day. All of a sudden all the lights on the stage went from off, to bright white and they all flashed up. Kids that had been asleep were awake and upright in miliseconds. I've never seen anbody become so alert so quickly! From 8.30 until it ended at 10.30, I had to girls alternating who was sitting on my back or shoulders so they could see. One girl is 12 and the other 13. Now they're both shorter than average but they did weigh enough! And they were so excited I nearly fell over several times because they were bouncing around so much! Another bonus was watching the social workers and my manager who I'd only seen in a professional setting before, dancing and jumping around like 10 year old girls, almost as excited as their charges! It was very funny!

So all in all, I had a very nice night, even if I would have chosen a different performer!

Much thanks to 94.5Kfm for organising it, and to the Home for letting some volunteers go and be a part of that with the girls. They've never been to something like that before and will (almost certainly) never get to be that close again if they manage to get tickets to something like that. It was a real treat!

Donation Button.

OK, I have added a donation button to the side of my blog to make it easier for people to donate if they can't come to an event in person. There is a 'purpose' box when you type in the amount you would like to donate so if you would like me to use the money for a specific thing just write it in. Projects I'm hoping to do with the kids include things like drumming but it cost up to R400 so at the moment I can only plan for a one off session with them.

All donations will be used towards my trip back, so it maybe that I use it to help pay for my flights or medical aide, or I could use it taking the kids on an outing. But I might also use it for a holiday or to buy nice food :)

Thanks,
Damson.

Googels.

For the last week I've been running a toothbrushing competition in the house. Basically, whoever brushed their teeth the best or made the most improvement over the week, I promised to take to Clicks (SA's version of Boots) and they could pick a new toothbrush. In the mornings they had to pracise brushing their teeth on their own, then in the evening I would take my toothbrush into the house and all the kids would line up in a row in the corridor (Boys and girls have seperate bathrooms and they aren't allowed in each others so the corridor is neutral territory!) and copy me brushing my teeth. The winner was a kid called Googels because his eyes are so adoarbly massive. When he was younger, they used to call him Uil (owl). So today, as promised, I picked him up from the house and took him down to clicks.

He was so excited! When we were leaving he was shouting to all his friends and saying "see you later, I'm going to Clicks!" and he was chatting all the way and waving to people. The kids hardly ever leave the home if they don't have family or a volunteer to take them out so the only time Googels leaves the home other than for school is on the out weekends or in the holidays.

He picked a nice new blue toothbrush and got a tube of toothpaste, then we went to pick and pay (think Tesco or Asda but South African) because it's one of the other boys 11th birthday today and I didn't have time to make him anything, so we got him a dot-to-dot colouring book and some coloured pencils-although it's just occured to me the kid can't count...I'll have to use it as a learn to count book instead!

New Domain!

Ok, a day late, we are now on the new domain of damsonincapetown.blogspot.com :)

My Artwork:

I'm sat in the house waiting for the kids to go to sleep so I can go and now we've got new and improved internet that we can now use inside (sometimes it even works when it's raining!) I decided to edit the picture of the sunset we saw to what it should have looked like if it hadn't been so flipping cloudy! Here it is:

Praise and Worship.

Yesterday was one of the longest but best days of my year here I think. I started at 6 and when I got to the house, everyone was already up and getting dressed-although I missed waking them up, a task I quite enjoy! I went to room 3 to check both boys were doing something productive and not just standing in their PJ's beatboxing, only to find their was only one boy in there! I asked the child where his room-mate was and he happily told me the boy had gone home for the weekend. Now some of the children do go to a foster family or their volunteers on the weekends, but it's the same children every weekend and if it's a special event, we usually know by Thursday on the weekend plan and we pack their bag that night. It turns out it was a very last minute arrangement!

The rest of the day went pretty much as planned except for it was a Monday, so everything was a bit stressful. In the evening, we had 2 homework aunties coming as well as the church auntie AND it was the night of Praise and Worship: this is when all the children have to go to the activity hall and sing religious songs for an hour or so with all the church aunties and uncles. Because we had all these extra activities we had to run everything a little early so although we did allow the kinders outside but only in the small area outside the house. The house used to be the C.H.I.L.L.I unit so it is completely fenced off from the other houses and has it's own-slightly run down-playing area. We kept them in this area so we could call them into shower quickly and easily. There is a frame that used to hold swings and one of the children wanted to climb up it to sit on top. He jumped onto my back so I was giving him a piggy back, then clambered up to sit on my shoulders. Once there, he stood up so he could hoist himself up and sit atop the beam. Of course when the other kinders saw him up there, they all wanted to join in! I ended up being the climbing frame for 5 children, helping them up, then standing beneath them so they could drop down and land on something soft and squishy! After maybe 20 minutes of this, I suggested a new game. I explained we had to stand very still. Then we had to kneel down, then lie down. Then sleep! For some bizzare reason the 4 boys didn't want to play this game, instead they decided jumping on me was much more fun. I spent the next 10 minutes rolling around on the grass playing with them and trying to escape! I had so much fun :)

Today when I went to speak to the kid's social worker, I saw the head social worker and she said she'd been watching us play for most of the time and was amazed I could lift and support so many of them so often...my shoulders ached so much this morning though!

Family Day.

Yesterday was family day at the Home so all the kids families could come and see them and we had a load of activities planned. The kids had organised some dances and a modelling show and then, as always, we did some boeresports.

In the evening, about 8 of us went to Signal Hill to watch the sunset. The veiw was breathtaking!

It was really cloudy! In some places you could see the cloud falling over the road. But when the cloud cleared for a few seconds, it was amazing. The whole of Cape Town was blanketed in cloud!