What else could you do with the price of two cups of coffee

Last year I visited South Africa for 6 weeks to work with a children's charity, The Santa Shoebox Project, who source and deliver over 100,000 christmas gifts every year to children living in poverty, that I'd been involved with for 4 years while I lived there. I paid my own air fare, borrowed a car from friends and had access to a transit van kindly donated by Ford SA which included fuel costs. I fund raised in advance and while I was there. The only other expense I had was my food and drink.

Most mornings I picked up 2 coffees on my way to collect the transit, one for me and one for my friend. I paid 44 rand.

I love a latte when I'm out, I stop at the local garage on my way to work every morning and buy one every afternoon on my way home. It costs me 28 Dirhams.

In the UK 2 lattes costs on average £5.20.

What else could you do with that money? Well if I stop drinking 2 latte's a day, within 6 months I would have enough money for a flight from Dubai to South Africa so I could support some of the many facilities I've been involved with over the years.

The cost of 2 lattes in South Africa purchases a months worth of electricity which enables a student to study after school for their matric.

6 lattes will purchase a pack of reusable sanitary pads from Dignity Dreams to enable young girls to continue their education by remaining in school.

8 lattes will purchase a christmas gift for a child living in poverty or provide a child with a birthday gift with The Viva Foundation.

With the current exchange rate, your money would go even further. In fact twice as far.

I'd like to invite you to join me and think twice about that latte you're going to buy and decide to donate the money instead to support good causes in South Africa.

                           

If you would like to donate you can do so here via paypal or using the Donate button on my blog.

My Period and Dignity Dreams

I spent most of last week in bed with the flu, I also had my period.

I blogged about Dignity Dreams last week to share with you the good work they are doing in raising awareness and funds to support young girls remaining in Education by providing as many reusable and washable sanitary wear packs as possible.

I realised if I was to advertise and fundraise for Dignity Dreams, I should at least try out their packs.

As I've been house bound anyway, I thought it a good week to review this product. I'm at home so I don't have to worry about any leakage or carry used blood stained pads around with me in my hand bag. I did go out on Friday and used 2 pads while I was out. i was conscious of the used one in my bag and didn't feel too comfortable carrying it around with me, but it's the first time I've used them so I guess I'll get used to it.

Why would I worry about that anyway?

Well it's not very hygienic for starters in my opinion, it's summer and the pads might smell a little, I'd really not walk around with blood stained clothing if they did leak, I'd feel uncomfortable and self conscious all the time I was out. I didn't leak, but I did make more visits to the toilets than I would normally do.

Why would I feel that way? Is it because it's the way society has brought me up, or due to the way I have been brought up/ Is it because having your period is still a taboo subject?

No, for me it's about being clean and feeling clean. I wouldn't go out the house in a top that I spilt my breakfast on, I'd put a clean one on before leaving the house and if I did spill food down my top while I was out, I'd sponge it off.

I never wear light clothing when I am on my period and I always wear darker clothing and carry a pad with me a few days leading up to my period, just in case.

I'm fortunate, my periods arrive between every 25-28 days, so I know when I am due on, they only last for 4-5 days at the most, but they are very heavy and I do prefer to use sanitary pads rather than tampons.

Have I had any embarrassing moments? No not really, on occasions I've worn my jumper round my waist, as I've leaked a little, and I did have a funny moment in a supermarket in South Africa which you can read about here and still makes me chuckle.

But what would I do if I didn't have sanitary pads, if the choice was food for my daughter or sanitary pads for myself and my daughter?

Well I could use toilet paper? But if I lived in a township or an informal settlement, I probably wouldn't have running water, let alone a toilet. I could use some rag or material/old clothing. But I probably wouldn't have old clothing. I could use saw dust, newspaper, an old rag, grass. But I'm likely to get an infection and I couldn't really walk round like that could I. How would I manage a day at work, or a food shop, or sit in a classroom all day and concentrate on my education? I'd stay at home for a week every month, like I've done this week, but I've been at home because I have the flu, not because of my period.

Eventually women lose their job, young girls fall behind with their education and just give up attending school. THAT IS THE REALITY. Without an education the next generation don't change, don't get better jobs, earn more money, be able to afford sanitary pads and the cycle of poverty continues.

After a week using Dignity Dream sanitary wear I felt comfortable to go out for short times wearing one of their pads. I took spares with me and several zip lock bags to put soiled ones in. I also carried several pairs of disposable gloves with me. As I flushed the toilet, I rinsed the pad under the water. I rung it out, I popped it in the zip lock bag and put it in my handbag. I carried anti bacterial soap with me to clean my hands before leaving the toilet cubicle. I then washed my hands in hot soapy water.

When I got home I rubbed sunlight soap on the pads and hung them in the sun to dry, the sunlight and soap help to kill the bacteria, I then washed them by hand and hung them out to dry again. At the end of the week, even though I'd washed the pads by hand I put them through the washing machine, before storing them in the bathroom ready for next month.

I had the advantage of disposable gloves, hand sanitiser and a washing machine to use, which most women and young girls in South Africa don't have access to. I also hung the pads outside after the gardener had been in the mornings, but I didn't worry about hubby or my teenage son seeing them.

Periods are a way of life for nearly every woman on the planet, I've blogged about it, I don't keep sanitary pads out of sight in the bathroom, and I do keep a small supply in the guest toilet and bathroom as not everyone is keen to discuss their periods.

On a weekend away with hubby a few months after we got together I sent him out to purchase sanitary pads for me, he never made it to the local shop, as he asked the man on reception in the hotel for some instead.

If you would like to support this initiative please make a donation. PAYPAL Each pack costs R150 or £7.50, or you can make a donation of any amount towards a pack. Please mark your donation DD as I'm also fundraising for other projects.

If you'd like to review the product yourself I have some packs available that I'd be happy to post out to you, if you're based in the UK.

Charity Cup Cakes - Making a difference to lives in South Africa

How can a cup cake make a difference to a child's life in Africa?

Very easily. 

If you visit a child in a township or informal settlement in South Africa you'd be surprised that not only do the majority of children not know they have a surname, they can't tell you how old they are either?

Very few have ever had a birthday celebrated, let alone a cake or a party and gifts.

The Viva Foundation in The Alaskan Informal Settlement in Mamelodi are changing this by sponsoring every child who attends there Early Learning Centres to have a birthday, to feel special and to feel valued.

Here is one of many cakes I baked for a child's birthday.

This little girl was so excited to have a cake she dived into head first.

Over a two year period I baked over 3000 cupcakes, I handed them out over christmas, easter, at family days, to orphanages, random people on the streets. I've baked cup cakes for several families as a donation towards a child's funeral as requested. I turned up at nearly every facility I visited with cup cakes.

I received many donations from family for ingredients, or friends baked for me to help me out with larger events.

I designed individual cakes, made red velvet and chocolate cakes. I had help from the kids and hubby with loading the car and delivering.

So can I tempt you with a cup cake? or maybe a small donation for when I return to South Africa in October for 5 weeks to help out with collecting and distributing 10,000 christmas gifts to disadvantaged children in Pretoria. To work with Dignity Dreams to fundraise for sanitary pads to enable young girls to remain in education.

If you would like to donate please click here.

Volunteer holiday in South Africa - Santa Shoebox - TimeTraveller

For this weeks TimeTraveller, I'm travelling forward in time.

This isn't a holiday I've done yet, it's my next but one trip this year in October.

I wanted to share my Santa Shoebox volunteer journey with you when I lived in South Africa between January 2011 and December 2014.

Left to right and always in my heart

Laura, Janet with Chaz, Louise, Brittany (front) Sharon, Cheryl, Dorette, Me, Lisanne. Leon and Elizabeth.

One of the biggest problem an expat faces is socialising, it's hard enough moving, settling kids into school and unpacking all the boxes, add to that the fact you are now living in South Africa and face security and safety issues also, it's hard going.

I spent the first year looking for places to volunteer where I could use my teaching and child welfare knowledge and helped set up a foster home by designing the paperwork and training the staff. It was short lived as the home was an hours drive from Pretoria to Lone Hill and I wasn't comfortable driving past Diepsloot Township.

For many years as a family we joined in with making shoe boxes for children in Africa, I'd even helped out at the local library with the collection the previous year. So tweeting to ask 'do people make up xmas shoeboxes in Africa for children less fortunate' and I've no idea who it was that replied but they sent me a link to an organisation that did just that.

I made 5 boxes and dropped them off at a local school on the Thursday morning, by Sunday evening, I'd made firm friends with Dorette and we quite literally there and then took over the whole project.

I also met the lovely Janet, whose family have become very important to us and Brittany who was our life saver and cat and dog sitter on more than one occasion.

The Santa Shoe box project is a 10 month project every year, it is countrywide and collects and distributes over 100,000 Christmas gifts, every year, with volunteers working on sponsorship, donations, advertising. they drive out to remote areas to locate needy facilities, identify vulnerable children, collect name lists, up load on the website.

In October the drop off days begin and every single box that is donated is logged in the system, checked to ensure it contains all the required items and to remove contraband such as religious items and items of war and liquids are zip locked to ensure no one's box contents get damaged.

The boxes are collected and taken to a warehouse until they are delivered to the facilities for Celebration Days. In some cases we have the boxes for certain facilities dropped at our houses as we know they have no storage or there is a risk of them being stolen.

My role within the Pretoria area for 4 years was on First Aid, the fixing and checking corner. I sourced donations as fillers for when the boxes were short of items, located facilities, delivered the training to 200+ volunteers who worked just on the drop off days and along with the rest of the committee. Worked 7am-10pm for 10 days over 2 weeks.

Prior to drop off we'd collect and sort donations, wrap shoe boxes ready to use as spares or for the short fall as people would often fail to donate their pledged boxes. We also visited local malls, cafes and markets, advertising the project, handing out leaflets and sourcing donors for registering online.

This is the team for 2011 we collected and distributed 1,400 shoe boxes.

2012

Bigger premises, larger team and around 6,500 shoe boxes collected and distributed in Pretoria. We now had some serious donations and my garage was home to many a packing party and dumping ground. From September till mid December our lounge was full of part filled boxes as donations from companies started to appear. 

 Me, Dorette, Janet, Nicole, Lisanne

2013 

We were now running two drop off locations and dates and collected and distributed 10,000 shoe boxes.

Janet (in pink) 

New drop off venue

One of the drop off day and many volunteers.

Laura, Laura, Laura oh I miss you. 

My car loaded up with boxes for celebration days.

This is at the end of drop off days, the following two days are spent packing additional boxes for the donors who failed to drop off and using up all the donations, we always have additional facilities we can donate to, even if it's just a pile of stationery or 2nd hand clothing.

We then have to tidy, clean and store remaining items ready for distribution.

Dorette (back left) and Brittany (right) they practically lived in my garage

2014

 Brittany

Oh Cheryl how I miss you

You'd be amazed at the speed in which we can clean up.

 That's it for Brittany

 Leon almost gave up

This is how Dorette and I met 4 years earlier and we're still fairly nifty with a broom

Everyone of the team manages at least one facility and support that facility throughout the entire year, helping to build and equip schools, collecting and donating blankets in the winter, food parcels, birthday parties, helping fill forms for Government grants, carrying out repairs, just being at the other end of the phone when someone dies or a child is missing. I get regular whatsapp messages from Mavis who I met 2 years ago who runs one of the facilities we support at Christmas.

These people have become my family and although I'm now 4000 kms away in Dubai, it doesn't stop me from being part of it all. We Whats App, face book and surprisingly Laura and I have managed to get post to one another.

I can't visit the facilities, help with sorting through the donations or get up at 5am in the morning to advertise the project at local markets and malls. But I will be back in October and November to help with drop off days and attend Celebration days also.

I cannot post pictures here of the children who receive the boxes as I've added a link to The Santa Shoebox Project and due to child welfare, as a volunteer with them I'm not allowed to post photo's. 

Pledging for Santa Shoebox goes live on September 1st every year, you can pick a child's first name, age and sex and make up a personal box for them, you'll be given dates and times of drop offs and you can register as a volunteer or sponsor if you want to help some more.

You can even pledge a box from overseas, but I don't recommend you post one as the South African postal service, from experience is poorly operated and there's no guarantee your parcel would indeed make it to the child.

Over the next few weeks I'll be sharing with you some of the other facilities I've been involved with over the years, where I do have permission to upload photo's on my blog and the internet.

Kungwini Children's Home for vulnerable teens.

Paul Jungnickel home for adults with disabilities and their Nickel Xmas Market.

The Viva Foundation who are simply marvellous and run Early Learning centres, support for victims of rape, run art projects, a safe house and much more stuff.

Njabulo an Early Learning Centre who, when I found them had 60 kids sleeping on mud floors with no money coming in and Betty feeding them out of her own pocket every day while the parents were at work.

I'm also looking forward to showing how some of you as bloggers can help spread the word and support Dignity Dreams run by Sandra Millar who I met through Santa Shoebox. She is campaigning actively  to ensure no woman, teen or young girl misses out on work, life, their health or education in South Africa by providing them with Reusable Sanitary Pads.

You may have read some of my posts already, or seen the pictures on Instagram and Twitter.

I am fully funding my personal travel to South Africa, my flights and food and accommodation has been offered from all of friends over there. I also spend considerable amounts of my own money as many others do when we're 10 boxes short for one facility, because someone who has pledged has failed to show up, because we can't go to a Celebration Day without a box for every child and there are always extra kids who turn up on the day, for whom we need to give 'Boot Magic' to. 

I do however need car hire and to cover some of my travel costs, as one of the facilities I was involved with is a 2 hour drive, West of Kruger National Park. I sourced educational items and toys for them last year, while the Viva Foundation built them a school and funded over 100 children's education. These people walk 4km every day to fetch water and I'll be telling you about that some more in a later post.

I'm also looking for financial donations for the following items:

toiletries

dignity dream washable sanitary pads

educational supplies

clothing

food

You can make a donation via paypal by visiting Angel of Hope and clicking here.

Leave me your twitter or blogging name and I will personally send you the receipt and a photo from the facility where your donation was spent.