Dear friends, Another year gone and here we are, still in the grip of this awful pandemic. Let’s hope that 2022 will bring back some sort of normality.
For the friends of Esperado, despite the confusion and uncertainness, we have been able to continue helping the youngsters in the Orlando township, in South Africa. Orlando is a place of extreme poverty and hardship that we in our society would find difficult to accept. Many of the residents live in shacks and mostly work in agriculture or have no employment.
The komati-Care-Pre school, was set up in the township, to take children from 3 to 6 years of age off the streets and rubbish tips where some were found searching for food. The school gives some 60 children, play in safe surroundings, a little learning, but most importantly two healthy meals a day. The school exists purely on donations and we are pleased to have been able to help them improve the school and the lives of the children.
After the failure of our container classroom (see previous post, April 2021) we were still faced with the problem of unregistered children unable to access free schooling. It was at this point that Marietjie who manages and organizes our project, suggested that we enroll some of the children in a local private English school. We could only afford to school eight children. This would equate to the cost of the teacher and running costs of the container classroom. (At present the cost is 1,400 Rand per month per child. At the current exchange rate that is £70.00 per pupil.)
We are delighted with the progress the children have made, in just over a year. They are now able to speak, read and write in English. They are also learning arithmetic and other subjects. They have tremendous enthusiasm and pride in their achievements. One of our pupil’s, a girl with the lovely name of Imaculada, came to us at the age of eleven, she had never been to school before and didn’t speak any English. She can now read, write and speak English and is one of our star pupils. Imaculada is now being sponsored by a Jersey family and one other child is being sponsored by a Belgian charity.
The children are picked up each day by Jan, Marietjie’s husband, in his vehicle and taken to school he then picks them up in the afternoon and takes them back to the township of Orlando. For Christmas it was decided to give them a reward. Jan was able to borrow a game viewing vehicle and the pupil’s had a day trip into the world famous Kruger National Park. Then we funded for them and their teacher to have a meal at a local burger restaurant. Later they were taken to a local shop and given a hundred Rand each to spend. We also funded Marietjie to give each of their families a big tub full of essential items of food and essential items.
The pupils class teacher, just before terms end at Christmas, went into the township and visited each of the children’s families. She came back to Marietjie in tears. As a black South African she hadn’t known that people lived in such poverty.
We have to give tremendous and heartfelt thanks to Marietjie and Jan for all the hard work they do for us and the children..
The children and their teacher went to a local restaurant.
Shopping.
Off to Kruger National Park.