The Homestead Annual Report 2009

THE HOMESTEAD ANNUAL REPORT 2009

“ The test of the morality of society is what it does for its children.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Our Mission To help street children reconstruct their shattered lives, and to provide prevention and early intervention services to children and families in disadvantaged communities.

The Programmes Programme

Function

Location

Street Work

Outreach and support to children living on the streets

CBD, Muizenberg, Khayelitsha

Yizani Drop In Centre

Partial care and assessment for children living on the streets

District Six

Huis Hoop Drop In Centre

Partial care and assessment for children living on the streets

Muizenberg

Homestead Intake Centre

Assessment and interim residential care

District Six

The Bridge at Elukhuselweni Centre

Residential care

Khayelitsha

Manenberg Early Intervention

Family preservation, truancy, parenting skills

Manenberg

Khayelitsha Early Intervention

Family preservation, school return, school aftercare

Khayelitsha

Ubunye Beadworks

Poverty alleviation through job creation

Cape Town

Message from the Director Our Management Committee Sandra Morreira

Everyday courage has few witnesses. But your courage is no less noble because no drum beats for you and no crowds shout your name.

Robert Louis Stevenson This report celebrates the achievements of the children, as they struggle to leave the past behind and move on to a brighter future. I hope that the pages that follow give you an idea of the small steps towards changing their lives that the boys make every day.

We are excited about the building project in Khayelitsha. The plans have been developed, and the project is now moving from a dream to a reality.

The child and youth care centre will have three houses for boys in different age groups, where they can receive individual attention and develop basic skills appropriate to their age and developmental stage. There will be a counselling centre, too. Early intervention will be in a separate building with room for group activities. We will have a hall that can be used by the children and by local community members. This is the biggest project The Homestead has ever embarked on, and we need lots of support to make it happen.

This report also celebrates the contributions of our volunteers, staff, donors and supporters. There are many people in Cape Town and around the world who support The Homestead’s efforts to change the lives of disadvantaged children and families. We could not do our work without them.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to another wonderful year at The Homestead.

Chair Deputy Treasurer Secretary Members

Vash Mungal Sammy Williams Zaitoon Abed Tammy Hirschsohn Annette Cockburn, Andrew de Bruin, Stuart Hendry, Sandile Kakaza, Tshepo Modise Harvey

Our board members have a range of complementary skills including finance, project management, fundraising, educational psychology, marketing, public relations, NGO management, and consumer experience – Andrew was ‘a Homestead boy’ as a child and is an inspiration to us all.

Staff members and representatives of the children attend board meetings to provide insight into the organisation’s requirements and challenges. The rich inter-connectivity between the board and the organisation, combined with participative management and open communication allows for effective meeting of the children’s and families needs.

The management committee shows great commitment to the organisation. The board has set up a task team to oversee the day to day management of the building of the child and youth care centre and early intervention centre in Khayelitsha. The South African Sustainable Development Initiative (SASDI) has been contracted as project manager for this very exciting project. The events committee assists with fund-raising events. The finance sub-committee helps develop the annual budgets.

The audited financial statements 2008/2009 can be viewed on our website.

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Early Intervention With Children Living On the Streets Street Work and Drop In Centres

The best way to reach children is to develop a relationship with them where they live – on the streets.

The children have a strong desire to survive and have run away from unbearable situations hoping to improve their lives. Street workers use relationship as the primary tool to help a child begin to change his thinking, express his dreams and goals, and begin to believe that he can achieve those goals.

Street workers become accepted by the community of street people when they show respect and concern for their wellbeing. They are able to develop caring relationships with children by looking out for their interests, speaking up for them when rights abuses occur, and making sure that their health needs are met. They guide new children off the streets as soon as possible.

The street worker accompanies children to court when they come into conflict with the law – not condoning their behaviour, but providing adult support and guidance for the child in a difficult and frightening situation. Often the family is not concerned enough to provide this care, or to visit the child in the holding cells or places of safety.

Children are encouraged to attend a drop in centre, where they receive two nutritious meals a day, can shower and get clean clothes, and feel safe from potential dangers for a few hours every day. Drop in centres provide children with educational and recreational opportunities. They offer a place in which the child can talk to caring adults and share his story about his family and past experiences. Sometimes it is possible to reunite a child with his family without going into any other programme, especially if he has not been on the streets for long.

In the past, children gravitated to the central city where the vibrant night life, restaurants and clubs attracted them due to the excitement and relative ease of begging for food and money from tourists and locals.

The situation has changed over the last few years.

Affluent suburbs have set up improvement districts, where security is provided to keep undesirable people away from the area. This is done with varying degrees

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of sensitivity. The end result is that street children have moved away from these areas, and are scattered in small groups all over the place – often sleeping in poorer communities, but moving into affluent areas to beg.

In this situation, the traditional street work approach no longer works as well as it did. To build a relationship, the street worker needs to see the child on a very regular basis. The Homestead has done some research into the whereabouts of children during the past year, focused on areas of origin such as Kraaifontein, Manenberg, du Noon and Capricorn. Since our street workers are not able to be present in the communities regularly enough to develop relationships or to run drop in centres, it would be best to train other organisations that already offer services in those communities. However, most organisations are wary of working with this target group of children, as specialised skills are needed. This is what we would like to provide.

Huis Hoop Drop In Centre in Muizenberg is one example of how difficult this is. Having provided street work and run the centre ourselves for over a year, we were not able to find any organisation willing to receive training and take over the work. In early 2009, we decided that we cannot spare the services of a very experienced street worker full-time to this small group of children. Negotiations with the Muizenberg

Improvement District are progressing well and it is hoped that they will soon employ a street worker to take over, under the mentorship of The Homestead, once a week.

Yizani Drop In Centre has faced different challenges, and we are currently rethinking how to run this centre in order to meet the needs of the group of hard-toreach children left in Cape Town’s CBD, most of whom have serious drug addictions. It is our firm belief that we cannot ignore these children, who are killing themselves slowly on our city’s streets.

We are going back to providing activities on the streets as we did years ago, because the children are not motivated enough to attend a drop in centre – their only focus is on making money to buy drugs.

The Homestead is working in collaboration with many other role-players, through the Western Cape Street Children’s Forum’s Hardened Street Children’s Working Group. The ready availability of drugs such as heroin, cocaine and methamphetamines presents all of us with a very different challenge to the glue-sniffing of the past. There are no appropriate rehabilitation facilities in place for these children, and we need to develop a multi-agency approach where different organisations take part in providing different aspects of a programme that can reach these children.

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Family Reintegration and Residential Care The Homestead Intake Centre

Under the new Children’s Act, there will no longer be such a thing as a shelter. All children’s homes and shelters will be registered as child and youth care centres (CYCCs). The intake “shelter” will become our first phase CYCC for intake and assessment.

Why do we need an intake centre?

• Rules and structure are a new experience for children who have been living on the streets – something they generally did not have at home, and certainly not on the streets. Learning to adhere to structure takes time and huge effort, and they often resist being told what to do in the beginning.

• If they don’t like the rules, they simply leave and go back to the street. There are no lock-up facilities for children unless they have committed a crime. Living on the street is a sad indictment on our society, not a crime committed by the child.

• When you mix together boys who have settled down off the street and new boys who are testing the boundaries, the new boys often take settled boys out back to the street with them, setting back the whole process of reintegration.

• At this stage, children need a bridging school or an on-site school before they can return to the formal education system. They have often been out of school for long periods, and have trouble adjusting and concentrating in a classroom learning situation.

• A centre for interim care gives the social worker and child care workers time to assess the possibility of reuniting the child with his family.

This process often takes place in stages, allowing the family and child to work on repairing damaged relationships.

• Long-term residential care may be avoided. Last year we were able to return about a quarter of the boys to their homes from interim care.

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As part of our new approach to family reunification, two parenting skills training workshops were held with groups of the boys’ parents, along with family fun outings. These were a great success.

Community involvement is a great benefit to the boys at this stage.

The pull of the streets is strong, and we need all the help we can get to keep them constructively occupied. Children benefit enormously from opportunities to participate in ordinary social activities, to learn new skills and to begin to value themselves.

We are very grateful to those volunteers who spend time doing various activities with the children.

This year our local helpers included Kelli Hayes – boxing; Chelle Lovatt – reading, arts and crafts; Jonathan Maritz – body boarding; Ajax Cape Town Academy – soccer training; Jan van Riebeeck High School – rugby; Dr Shadi Ganz – art therapy, group and individual counselling; Russell of the Moravian Church – mentoring the older boys and taking them to Friday evening movies; Hillsong Church and Vineyard Church – encouraging boys to attend services regularly; All Stars – taking Jacky to play soccer in Johannesburg; KPMG – soup lunch and Christmas party; Table Bay Hotel – Christmas event, meeting the rugby teams; Deutsche Schule KIDS – cultural day and sports day; CPUT Event Organising course – Edu-Train outing; Nike – taking boys to the Manchester United match as mascots; Herzlia School – games afternoons; Rox Bradnick and friends – lunch and games.

The building we are in is small, with very limited play and counselling space, because it was originally built as a night shelter. Thanks to V&A Waterfront for their work in progress, painting and brightening up the centre. We plan to add another storey (once planning permission is received) to create a big play area and a private counselling space for the social worker. More on our progress next year!

In Memoriam We are extremely sad to report the death of Eddy van Wyk on 18th February 2009. Eddy slipped on the road whilst walking to Learn To Live School and was unavoidably knocked down by a car. He was declared dead upon arrival at Groote Schuur Hospital. This was very traumatic for everyone who knew and loved him. Eddy originated from Namibia, and returning his body to his mother was a long and difficult process. Since the boys and staff were unable to attend the funeral, they had a moving ceremony placing flowers on the street where he was injured. The family and Namibian government thanked The Homestead for looking after Eddy in his last months.

Rest in peace, Eddy, we will not forget you.

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The Bridge at Elukhuselweni Centre

Our second stage child and youth care centre provides residential care for 65 boys, and some short-term place of safety beds.

Some children have no option but residential care, or need specialised care that cannot be provided in the community. Last year, 40 per cent of the boys from the intake centre were placed in our statutory care. Many of the children we work with are not able to return to their families for obvious reasons (they left home because of those difficult situations). At The Bridge, 15 per cent of the boys’ parents have died or their whereabouts are unknown.

Last year we appointed four child care workers as supervisors of teams with specific focus areas. Two of these are related to intensifying our efforts at family reintegration.

The Family Tracing Team succeeded in tracing the extended family members of several boys who had had no contact with relatives for years. In December we paid for eight boys to travel to villages in the Eastern Cape to visit their relatives. Finding a family to which you belong is an amazing experience for a child in this situation.

The Family Reintegration Team doubled the number of home visits to families near Cape Town; placed three mothers in our beadwork project; got 24 boys to go home regularly for weekends and 32 to go for the December school holidays – great achievements.

They also spent two days voluntarily renovating the dwelling of one family – cleaning, painting, fixing and providing beds and bed linen. The letter on this page shows how much this meant to the boy and his family.

The Activities Team started a vegetable garden and developed more structured afternoon, evening and weekend activities to keep the boys busy. The Life Skills and Sports Team does regular group sessions teaching the boys basic skills such as using a telephone directory, as well as tackling emotions and adolescent concerns. The boys are involved in art, soccer, ballroom dancing, basketball, kickboxing and interactive Sunday evenings with Burning Bush Ministries. Much of this is made possible by the dedicated Art of Living volunteers, who help us every Saturday; Amandla ku Lutsha soccer league; and Rayana Ameerodien, Thai kick boxing coach. Ncedo Gomba won on points at the International Muay Thai Tournaments in Thailand in May 2009.

We are delighted to report that the social worker has placed four of the youngest boys in foster care

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through a wonderful organisation, Home From Home.

Now they have a chance to experience family life and avoid institutionalisation. Two older boys are soon going into foster care, too!

With the help of Leo Reid, our angel-from-heaven volunteer education coordinator, and the sponsorship fund, we placed boys in a range of schools most appropriate to their needs in 2009. They now attend Learn To Live, BEST Centre, School of Hope, ten formal schools across Cape Town and one special school. This has made a tremendous difference to their motivation, pride and scholastic performance.

The Borman’s contribution to nutritious weekly fruit and vegetables for every boy has helped too – brain food! Afternoons are busy with homework and projects, and getting the school reports is a red letter day for everyone.

Mamelani Projects continues to partner with us, through Project Lungisela, in preparing the older boys

for leaving care, and supporting those who have left in the past five years. Clinton Osbourn runs weekly groups with the boys over 16, and a combined weekly group with these boys and the over-18s who are out in the community. This is enormously helpful in teaching the one group what to expect, and giving the other group emotional and practical support.

SASDI helped with maintenance again this year, bringing two teams of students from abroad to do blitz painting and repair jobs that have brightened up the interior of the building.

We long for the day we will be in our new building.

SASDI has consulted everyone extensively about our requirements. Building plans are ready – we are just waiting for the funds to come in (which they are doing slowly), and for provincial government to finalise the paperwork. Excitement is mounting as we realise that our dream of a more appropriate setting for quality residential care is getting closer.

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Prevention and Early Intervention Overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity, but a collective act of justice Nelson Mandela 2008

The new Children’s Act recognises the importance of broadening and deepening the focus on early intervention programmes in order to avoid the need for children to be placed in residential care.

The Homestead has been involved in early intervention work for several years, starting in Manenberg in 1999 and in Khayelitsha in 2006. This work is even more important now that children are living on the streets of poorer communities, where it is difficult to reach them.

We are thrilled to report that our early intervention work in Khayelitsha is at last receiving funding support from the Department of Social Development.

It is of critical importance that all of us reach out to children and families living in desperate circumstances who are struggling to survive in these difficult economic times. Often the help and support that they need is for small things that many of us take for granted. Our appeals for household goods, linens and clothes are a good way of redistributing possessions from those who have much to those who have little.

Above: Family preservation work involves regular home visits to families to help with psychosocial issues.

Right: These children attend the programme at Eluxolweni primary school every afternoon. Here a volunteer from the community assists with the activity programme.

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Manenberg Early Intervention Project The impact we make is limited by the fact that we employ only one child care worker (CCW) in Manenberg. The project identifies children who are truanting or having difficulties at school and provides assistance to help keep those children in schools. Initially, this was done in partnership with Downeville Primary School but the school did not have the time to submit lists of children on a regular basis. We have diversified our efforts to other schools over time, and also identify children who are truanting by observation in the community.

In this way, 80 children were reached and each had individual counselling sessions to establish what is happening in their lives. Home visits were done to meet the families, assess the home circumstances and to refer them to relevant sources of help. The CCW motivates families to access the help that they need.

One group of parents received parenting skills training, and one group of very young mothers received supportive home visits to give parenting advice. Several women were referred to our job creation project.

Recently, we have been trying to establish a relationship with a group of 21 children who are said to be sleeping in Gatesville (close to Manenberg) and begging in more affluent areas during the day. We are working with the South Africa Police Service (SAPS) and are willing to set up a drop in centre for these children at our rented premises in Manenberg if this is needed.

Khayelitsha Early Intervention Project The afternoon care programme continues at Eluxolweni Primary School. An average of 22 children attend the programme on school day afternoons.

The children are identified by the school as severely disadvantaged, and home visits are carried out before their participation is agreed. We provide children with school uniform items that the relatives cannot afford twice a year. Many of the children would probably drop out of school without this, simply because they do not have uniforms and shoes.

The daily programme stimulates social skills (communication and listening), socially accepted behaviour (manners, generosity, caring) and cultural understanding (heritage and family) through games, sports, reading and planned activities. The children receive sandwiches to supplement the school feeding scheme.

Family preservation includes basic counselling and

referral. We believe in spreading knowledge so that parents understand how best to carry out their responsibilities. Two groups of parents attended parenting skills training during the period.

We are excited about the street work that we are doing in Khayelitsha. It is targeted at children who are mostly still sleeping at home or at the homes of friends, but have dropped out of school and are begging and working on the streets of this disadvantaged community. Given time, they may end up gravitating to full-time street life.

The outreach worker had regular contact with an average of 15 children in this situation every month.

An average of five new children was found every month. Services included the return of 12 children to school (assistance with school placement and uniforms); obtaining identity documents and social grants; referrals for drug counselling; establishment of a soccer team to combat substance abuse; referral of vulnerable children to Social Development for investigation; and place of safety placements in residential care when necessary (four children). We facilitated the attendance of children at the SAPS skills development programme.

The project was delighted to receive support from Standard Bank staff and a local businessman in Khayelitsha this year.

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Ubunye Beadworks The Homestead believes in working holistically, so that if poverty is a major factor leading children to street life, we provide work and an income to mothers through the beadwork project.

The project started out working with mothers from at-risk families in Manenberg, but over the years has become an important resource for mothers or sisters of children who are begging in Khayelitsha, or are in our residential care. With high rates of unemployment, it is almost impossible for a poorly educated woman with no prior work experience to lift herself out of poverty and provide a decent diet and education for her children.

Ubunye Beadworks makes this change possible for 31 women. Some of the more experienced women work at home, bringing in the finished products for payment, whilst 23 women come to the workshop in town. We have also included older boys from the Children’s Home who need work experience, especially those who have had to return to relatives at age 18. Three boys had work exposure for periods of three to six months in the last year.

For all the participants, learning bead-working skills is secondary to learning about the world of work. The project offers life skills and mutual support. Of course, the primary motivation is earning money for every

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piece of work produced.

Marketing is always a challenge in job creation projects such as this. We are eternally grateful to Lindy Hirschsohn and her children, Nicky and Gaby Coetzee, for voluntarily marketing our products in the USA. Their orders keep the women busy, and help to support all their children. Through Lindy’s efforts, our wine bags and totes are sold at SAm’s Wine and Spirits in Chicago. Lindy and her network of angels (several friends of hers assist with sales at fairs and other venues) are successfully promoting our wine charms, along with many other products. Gaby is about to have her bat mitzvah and all of the decorations for the event have been purchased from Ubunye.

Armilla Jewellers continues to provide contract work for the project, which the women love doing. Their products are very creative. Miglio Jewellers in the UK makes a special Homestead necklace and bracelet, and donates the proceeds to The Homestead for the care of the children. We were thrilled to have a visit from Miglio’s team of top sales people in March, who went back enthused about making more sales to help the boys!

Locally, we supply products to various retail outlets, sometimes on a consignment basis. Ubunye’s range includes Christmas decorations, wedding mementoes,

many items of jewellery, a large range of bags in a variety of colours, yarmulkes, ankle bracelets, conference bags and folders, and many others. The products can be viewed on our website, but we are happy to develop other samples according to your specifications. Logos can be beaded to suit the customer.

Ubunye has a small shop at 150 Strand Street in central Cape Town, where you can see the women at work. We are eager for advice on how to develop the shop, and would welcome any volunteers with retail shop-fitting and decorating experience.

In her usual inimitable style, Annie van Wyk always goes the extra mile to help the women improve their circumstances. Many of them live in overcrowded conditions, and so a revolving loan fund was set up a few years ago to enable them to buy wooden wendy houses to live in. Last year another three houses were erected. The next step was to ask the Cape Town community if they had any spare linen, beds, cutlery and crockery for those who have none of these things.

We were overwhelmed by the fantastic response – thank you all!

Although finding jobs in the formal sector is very difficult, two of the women were placed in employment last year – in a laundry and a hairdressing salon. This is what we want to help participants to achieve.

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Management Committee July 2009 Director

• Sandra Morreira

Accounts Manager • Kuda Muputa

Unit Manager Homestead Intake Centre

Operations & Job Creation Manager • Annie van Wyk

Accounts Clerk • Nura Patel

• Charmaine Germishuys

Ubunye Marketing Assistant

• Gladys Ginyana

Ubunye Job Creation Assistant

• Leo Reid (volunteer)

• Miemie Snoek

Driver

Child Care Workers

• Godfrey Adams

• Eunice Mkangisa

Education & Activity Coordinator

Senior Child Care Worker

• Yume Baukers

Cleaner

• Sonja Basson

Early Intervention Programmes Director • Denise Booysen

Admin Assistant

• Nura Patel

Unit Manager The Bridge

• Mongezi Nuweni • Katie Williams • Armstrong Stemele • David Geduld • Leonard Ruiters • Patricia Mhlontlo

Cleaner

• Irene Madikane

Community Liaison Coordinator

• Jakes Jacobs

Family & Community Worker

• Mandla Klanisi

Khayelitsha Outreach Workers

Child Care Workers

• Zolile Mdala • Sivuyile Kholela • Nombulelo Ganyaza • Ayanda Mntwapi • Vuyiswa Landu • Xolisa Soga • Nolitha Dyalivane • Nomzamo Dubula • Vusumzi Nombewu

• Nomthandazo Bulawa • Givenart Mcotshana

Manenberg Outreach Worker

• Ingrid Losper

Weekend Cook • Eunice Mkangisa

Child Care Assistants

• Zameka Mazaleni • Ntombomzi Madola • Nomazizi Gilman

Cook

• Xolelwa Mejane

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Assistant Cook

• Thobeka Kwethana

Cleaner

• Vuyokazi Machane

Laundry

• Dolly Mboniswa

Our Staff We are each of us angels with only one wing, and we can only fly embracing each other.

Luciano de Crescenzo

In most NGOs there are not enough staff and everyone does the work of two or even three people.

It is therefore essential that we work together as an efficient team, and value the contributions of every team member. Given the range of projects we implement, 40 people (some of them part-time) achieve a huge amount.

Comings and Goings ...

Sadly, Gerald Jacobs left us in January 2009. Gerald had been with The Homestead for seven years and was a fantastic mentor to the boys. He felt the need to move on to something different, but is still involved with the boys on a voluntary basis. Mandla Klanisi is our new family and community worker, covering traditional street work and research into new trends at community level.

We were sad to lose our counselling psychologist, Zelda Durrell, in 2009.

Fortunately, Dr Shadi Ganz, a clinical psychologist, appeared like an angel to offer us her services on a voluntary basis – we are over the moon to have her expertise.

Management and Administration The Homestead is fortunate to have three very experienced and dedicated social workers managing the residential care and early intervention programmes, especially since social work has been declared a scarce skills category in South Africa. We are grateful for their commitment and staying power. Annie van Wyk manages Ubunye Beadworks, and takes responsibility for all the logistics of running the organisation with enormous commitment and passion. She and Godfrey, our driver, plan his busy schedule every morning so that all the centres have what they need to function effectively.

Kuda Muputa has brought our accounts department to a new level of professionalism during his first year with us. Nura Patel assists with the clerical work in accounts, and marketing for Ubunye Beadworks.

Our managers attended training in self esteem and assertiveness skills, and team building in 2008.

Damelin provided the training free to members of

Clockwise from top left: Nombulelo Ganyaza; Dolly Mboniswa; Ingrid Losper; Mongezi Nuweni and boys; Charmaine Germishuys and friend; Mandla Klanisi, Denise Booysen and Jakes Jacobs; Yume Baukers; Sivuyile Kholela; Miemie Snoek and Andile; and Sonja Basson and boys.

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the Western Cape Street Children’s Forum – much appreciated by NGOs which can seldom afford such training.

Residential Child Care Teams The child and youth care workers are important influences in the day-to-day lives of the children. They constitute half of our total staff complement. CCWs work shifts so that there are always adult carers on duty to look after the children. Depending on how many children are in care, the current care worker to child ratio at night is 1:11 or 1:18 at the intake centre, and 1:18 or 1:21 at The Bridge. We are a long way from the recommended ratio of 1:8 recommended in the new Children’s Act. We have designed the new child and youth care centre in Khayelitsha as three houses with capacity for 20 to 25 children per house to bring the ratio to 1:10 or 1:12. This will improve the quality of care we can offer the children.

The director of The Homestead was privileged to attend NACCW’s leadership training with Jack Phelan last year, where she gained a deeper understanding of the supervision needs of CCWs. Because there is a shortage of senior CCWs to provide professional supervision in Cape Town, we engaged a consultant to develop some of the CCWs as supervisors of a team.

We also provided extra training in developmental assessment so that the CCWs are able to develop individual development plans for the children. In addition, we continue with NACCW training in child and youth care to professionalise our care staff.

Domestic Teams At a staff awards ceremony last year, the cook at The Bridge said that she had never realised before that her work was important. Yet none of what we do would be possible without the vital contribution of our support staff cleaning, cooking, serving food, washing, ironing, tidying and making our centres places in which we can all take pride.

Ubunye Beadworks Team Our offices are full of beads, designs in progress, and products ready for despatch. Annie and Yume constantly search for new product ideas so that the women can earn enough money to make the project worth their while. Yume has come up through the ranks from participant to supervisor, and does a wonderful job. Quality control is important to the team, and everything is carefully checked before it goes out.

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Volunteers Volunteers enrich our work and bring new ideas and skills. The Homestead is fortunate to have many wonderful people who help the children and the projects in various diverse ways. Many of them have been mentioned in previous pages. Here two volunteers tell their stories – and hopefully inspire others to join them.

A Danish Perspective on Six Months Practical Work Martin Hoffman

I have never experienced many difficulties in my life.

So my journey to South Africa, and working with the boys at The Bridge has been an eye opener and an incredible experience.

These loveable boys have been through all kinds of misery in their young lives. But despite all their struggles, they take the opportunities presented to them by the organisation. So it makes me glad to be around these guys, see the smiles on their faces, because they really deserve another chance in life.

Especially Patrick, one of the boys in my group, has left a deep impression in me. We bond in a special way, and he’s almost like a brother to me. We do his homework together, play soccer in the yard, listen to music, and go to the movies. I also feel fortunate that I had the chance to meet Patrick’s mother, in her home, which was a great experience.

When I depart for Denmark, I feel like I’m leaving a part of myself behind, but with all my gains and experiences from this adventure, I’m coming home a different person. I’ve become stronger mentally, and in my profession, and with more knowledge of life, and a lot of good friends richer.

I wish both boys and staff all the best, and I want to thank them for everything so far. You’ve made this one of the best times of my life, and for that I’m truly grateful.

You can’t save the whole world, but even the smallest of changes makes a difference.

Top to bottom: Clinton Osbourn; Martin Hoffman with two of the boys he made friends with during his stint at The Homestead; and Kelli Hayes giving pointers on boxing techniques.

Eleven Years of Volunteering Clinton Osbourn

I came to the Homestead in 1998 purely by chance.

Little did I know what a profound impact it would have on my life. In the beginning I was just hanging out a lot, helping the care workers over the weekend and taking the boys on outings. The beginning was about finding my way and getting to understand the boys. I stayed for so long because of the incredible positive response I received from the boys just because I was friendly and treated them with respect and kindness.

I have seen an incredible change over the past few years. And as the organisation has changed so have the boys. The settled, calm, happy, school going boys that live at the Bridge nowadays are worlds apart from the out of control boys that lived in Patrick’s House when I arrived. Moving the Home out of the city and into the community was the first step in the right direction, but it is the passion and commitment of Sonja Basson that has led to a positive change. The staff are now committed and involved and the boys are so much more settled and living lives of relative normality.

Over the years, my path has lead me to the place where I now stand, working on Project Lungisela – a partnership between the Homestead and Mamelani Projects. It was started by Carly Tanur, whom I recruited to work as a volunteer on an art project with the boys years ago. She recognised the need for the older boys to have continued support once they leave, and started giving them life skills workshops and checking up on them once they had left. She could not continue doing it alone and asked me to step in.

Today, with the help of Michelle Potter and Gerald Jacobs, I regularly meet with the boys who are preparing to leave as well as those who have left.

We give them the kind of support they would receive from their families if they were better resourced and more stable. We assist them with getting skills, finding suitable accommodation and finding employment.

I met most of the boys that I am now working with many years back, some of them in 1998. Since then they have become like younger brothers to me. Eleven years ago I would never have dreamed that I would be doing what I do today, I had other plans. Thankfully I am not that good at sticking to plans.

The Homestead has become a very large part of my life and it’s a great pleasure to be working within an organisation that has really progressed over the years. With plans to improve the lives of these boys even more in the future, I look forward to a long and productive relationship with The Homestead.

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Acknowledgements The Homestead thanks everyone who has supported our work. Although we cannot list the hundreds of people who give in small ways, we value every donation.

To Our Major Donors Action for Street Kids Troy Blacklaws Body Shop Foundation Johans Borman Fine Art Gallery City of Cape Town Community Chest of Western Cape Dame Hillary Cropper Charitable Foundation Department of Social Development Deutsch-Sudafrikanischer Forderverein DSF Glencore Estate late MH Kinnish

Lillian H Florsheim Foundation Spencer McNally Miglio Muizenberg Improvement District Primrose Hill Cricket Club M Schroder Sponsorship Fund Street Smart Stichting Liberty Telkom Charity Cup TwinFilm Productions

To Our Regular Donors in Kind I&J, Lions Club Cape Town, Marpro Trawling, Pick ‘n Pay Butchery Gardens, The Nutman, Tydoris Café, Woolworths Kloof Street and Sea Point, Wellness Warehouse, Winch Motors and many others – thank you for your consistent support.

Friends of The Homestead Who Contribute Monthly S Alderman N Bradshaw MC Carlisle E Coetsee DA Coombe ET Craven RE Cronwright CT Sewing Centre Décor Housewares MJ De Wet SM Gibson H Halladey CJ Hitchings James family

FP Korte R Kling Krige Tree Services W Kotze P Krige BR Marsden M and A Mason KM McCormick GJ McPhun I Melzer S Morreira J Mort J I Muller MC Nasby

C Naude GN Nader J Nel J Nott M Niewoudt G O’Leary CW Pretorius RE Pretorius B Rabinowitz RJ Rabkin P Richter U Rodewald C Rossouw RW Design

CS Schimanek EA Schulz P Sim C Smit Southern Spirit Properties C Style JD Van Dyk L Van Vuuren VJ Van Zyl JK Walker TP Walker M Weatherhead

Events Committee Chair Members Staff

Tshepo Modise Harvey Tammy Hirschsohn, Margaret Sarembock, Anneline Bacon, Vicky Hide, Winnie Bowman, Aida Uys, Barbara Khan Annie van Wyk

Our special thanks to this wonderful group of women who plan and organise fund-raising events on a voluntary basis.

They held a wonderful impromptu fund-raiser at The Best Ugly restaurant on 2nd June 2009, where Chris Braide, a composer and singer from the UK, shared his talents with us. Thanks to all who helped make this a success. The committee is currently planning a jazz lunch at the Table Bay Hotel in the first quarter of 2010.

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Special Thanks to…

All Build Hardware All the Trusts Art For Life Art of Living A Baptista Monika and Klaus Bathel Leslie Beak Colin and Sue Bell The Birkholm family Blueware Maureen Bolton in lieu of birthday gifts Mario Brunner Cape Town Clothing and Suburban Guild CADIZ Swim Series Marlis Caesar and patients City Vineyard Church Claremont Main Road Mosque De Nederlandse Club Te Kaapstad Deutsche St Martini Kirche Denise Dogon in lieu of birthday gifts Carel du Plessis M Errington Eskom Foundation Everyone who gave to the Xmas appeals Tracey Farren Freudenberg Nonwovens Fuse Net Solutions Dr Shadi Ganz Geraldine Goldblatt in lieu of birthday gifts Ian and Elizabeth Graham Helene Greulich Claudia Grossl Paul and Lorna Hansen in lieu of wedding anniversary gifts Harrodian School HCI Foundation Hotel le Vendome J Humphries International Women’s Club of Cape town Peter Kerrigan

Kids 2 Kids Klub Interact Deutsche Schule Nikki Neuman Kress in lieu of birthday gifts Arleny Lahumeten and friends Joseph Lange Grumfeld Andrew and Miranda Lang Bill and Sue Langley Edward Lewis for raising funds for the new building Sandy Loedolff Grant Maben Meninghedsrade Gavin Miller Sophie Opitz and friends Jan Pickard D Roodyn Rotary Club of Kirstenbosch Milly Rusterholz Edmar Ruud Dr Zalie Said SASDI Claudia Scheltema Ulrike Scherer Dr RL Segall Janet Sender – JUMP David Sher Singapore International School Standard Bank, Khayelitsha St. Andrew’s Church Irmgard Stellmaszek Table Bay Hotel Peter Thomson Krista Tuomi Tzu Chi Foundation Taiwan Umhlanga Resources USABCO Limited Jan van den Bongaard and friends Eddie Villiers Sasha White and family The Whitfield family

For providing free medical services Dr Leon Geffen and Dr Caroline Ward

Credits Photography: front cover – © Kristian Buus; inside front cover – © Paul Kline; p3 – © Kristian Buus; p4 – top left and bottom right © Kristian Buus; p6 – © Kristian Buus; p7 top – Kristian Buus; p8 – © Kate Barnes; p9 – © Kristian Buus; p11 – © Kristian Buus; back page – © Paul Kline; all other photos © The Homestead.

Printed with the kind generosity of Multiprint Litho: 011-392 6366.

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WE INVITE YOU TO VISIT US To see our programmes for yourself, and to meet with some of the hundreds of children and families who have the opportunity to change their lives through the generosity of people like you.

YES, I WANT TO HELP THE HOMESTEAD TO KEEP GOING AND GROWING Name Postal address E-mail address

Telephone

I would like to make a donation of R I would like to contribute every month. I authorise The Homestead to debit my account every month for the amount of R Name of Account Bank Branch Name and Code Account Number Signature

PLEASE RETURN THIS COUPON (OR A COPY) TO: The Homestead, PO Box 21538, Kloof Street, 8008 Bank Account Name: The Homestead • Bank: ABSA • Account Number: 4052958568 • Branch Code: 632005 NPO Number: 003-217 • e-mail: info@homestead.org.za • Website: www.homestead.org.za

HEAD OFFICE 150 Strand Street, Cape Town, 8001 PO Box 21538, Kloof Street, 8008 Tel. 021 419 9763/4 Fax: 021 419 2600 E-mail info@homestead.org.za Website: www.homestead.org.za

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