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News
February 29, 2004 posting
This is a very exciting time here, and the past month has been very hectic. Many things are happening, seemingly all at the same time, in contrast to the period from December 15 to January 15, where all government workers seemed to be away. We have also reassessed our judgment about our customs agent. Government people kept telling us that they hadn't received documentation from him or it was wrong. We believed those stories, until we began to hear from him how he had sent the information twice and it had been lost. In any case, for the past month he has been a jewel and things have started to happen with the container.
We have collected two loads of donated goods from customs, leaving only the used clothing for the time being. The Department of Social Development wrote a letter to SA Customs in January recommending release of the clothing. People in Pretoria and Durban are still processing that information, and we believe we will eventually get the clothing. In fact, we brought home quite a bit of clothing mixed in the boxes of other stuff, with no complaint from customs.
Crafts for the June 2004 sale are now in Durban awaiting shipment to Vancouver on March 10th.
We have prepared a program plan for the coming year, which has to be acted on by the Board and funded by donations, but which we hope will all go ahead. The plan includes the following projects:
Construction of a community centre, to include a learning centre, a manufacturing centre, a clinic, an office for the Chiefs (to be shared jointly to promote unity) and one for Edzimkulu, a volleyball court and a demonstration garden for teaching purposes. We will use solar power to enable the community to use the centre at night and to run manufacturing machinery and computers. All the construction will be done by Ndawana craftsmen/women, and Ndawana women will cater lunch meals with food donated by Edzimkulu. Edzimkulu will pay for construction materials, except that each Ndawana family will be asked to donate either a building block or the equivalent amount of cash (about C$1.00). Meetings with segments of the community have been held, with a great deal of enthusiasm on the part of community members. The builders will elect a supervisor from among their number, the selection to be approved at a meeting of the whole community. This community meeting will take place within the next two weeks.
An AIDS and Lifeskills education program.
A music and art program, designed to bring the community together in song and celebration, with a CD to be sold in Canada, including at the Edmonton Folk Festival. Tim Senger, who is a musician and has produced music in Canada, is heading up this project.
A language and literacy program, to include literacy in Zulu and ESL training, along with a women?s writing program, business training, and the provision of books in Zulu. Debbie Cantin and Colleen Vallee will provide the ESL training.
Micro enterprises, including sewing, beading, furniture rejuvenation, permaculture gardening, a muti garden (traditional herbals), and chicken farming.
Advocacy to provide medical aid and education, electric power, phones, and water upgrades.
Community building with conflict resolution and communication skills, respite care for caregivers, and helping with documentation of births and deaths to enable orphaned children to be able to receive government grants.
Right now there is a huge amount of work to be done to make all this happen, but we have good volunteers coming and the six of us here now (including Bevin Worton and Corina Mar) will be joined today by Larry and Margaret Rathnavalu, so we will have lots of people power to get things done. Thanks again to all of you who have responded to our updates and stories. It will be very good to see many of you when we are in Edmonton from May 15th to July 6th to meet with people there.
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