For those of you who were wondering what our children and youth were up to during this past school holiday, we have decided to let you in on their excitement! The theme for the week was “The Rural Voice” and it aimed to teach our children and youth what it means to be a real servant leader by using their gifts to make a difference in their own community. This programme ran for 4 days and was attended by 163 farm children and youth from farms in the Riebeeksrivier Valley and surrounding areas.
The Tiener Aksie (12 – 13 years) and Youth in Construction (14 – 20 years) youth groups went to visit Greenpoint Stadium where some of the soccer world cup matches will be played in 2010. This was the most amazing experience for them and we thank the West Coast District Municipality for making this wonderful trip possible for our rural farm children. After this incredible experience they went to our 
new Southern Cross POP Youth Centre in Esterhof, Riebeek Kasteel where they planted grass in the court yard and at the entrance of the building with some 100 very curious children from Riebeek Kasteel watching them from a small distance. I am sure that they can’t wait to join in on a youth programme and hopefully we will be able to give them a school holdiday programme in December / January.
The highlight of the rest of the week was seeing these children and youth working together to make wooden benches for their parents to sit on, painting white T-shirts (with messages like Stop drinking, stop hurting, stop abusing, etc. on it), making small things e.g. cars with wire, beading and embroidery.
Here are some pictures to show you our children and youth at work during the September school holidays.
Here are some pictures of our children and youth going out to the farms to put smiles on the faces of the rest of their community.
The days of having boring and uninteresting school holidays are officially over for the children and youth who are part of our Path out of Poverty Programme. They had lots of fun, learned valuable new skills and most of all were able to give of themselves to the larger community and touched the hearts of their parents. Thank you Sophie, Jaco and Edlyne for implementing such an amazing programme! We are very proud of you.
Thanks for reading this blog and for all your incredible support. We would love to hear from you too so please do send us your comments.
Till next time!!
Love, Ingrid
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Ruth Williams, a teacher from Bishop Gore School in Wales, competed in the 10K Swansea Bay run which is the fastest 10K race in the UK and it is also recognised as a UK Official 10K course.
Ruth running in GREEN the last km!
This year’s race took place on Sunday, 27 September 2009 and had 3 500 entries that consisted of elite, serious and fun runners. The route was from the famous Swansea rugby ground St Helen’s along the main road down to Mumbles, left onto the sea front and back to St Helen’s along the promenade.
This was Ruth’s 8th time to run it but for the past three years she has done it to support our work in our Path out of Poverty (POP) Programme. She was very happy to be the 1 312th person to cross over the finish line with an official time of 53 minutes and 28 seconds which was under her planned 55 minutes! This was her fastest time ever and the picture shown was taken in the last few kilometer! I just love the fact that she wore GREEN! Now, in her own words “when the race got tough I visualised the beautiful surroundings of Goedgedacht farm, thought of the wonderful young people I have met and worked with there and remembered that the inspiring work that happens there – and that got me through!!’
We are very blessed to have such wonderful friends and amazing supporters like Ruth who are prepared to give so much of themselves to help our rural children and youth out of the poverty cycles that have thus far prevented them from being happy, healthy and confident human beings. Thank you so much Ruth!! We appreciate every mile that you ran for us. You are an inspiration to us all!
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