Dear Family and friends,
I apologize for not updating my blog sooner. As you can imagine, moving to a new continent has been everything but an easy experience and has left me with very little free time. However, I am finally beginning to get settled here and just moved into my new house in Cape Town with 6 other amazing interns! I am living in Sea Point, just 2 blocks from the ocean and less than a mile from the new Green Point Stadium they are building for the World Cup! It is an incredible location to say the least and is also very safe. There is an iron gate in front of the door to get into our building, the streets are lighted, and our landlord happens to be the head of one of the chapters of Hell’s Angels!
I was selected to work in Cape Town for the next year as a Programs intern. I am really lucky to have been granted this position because it was the exact job and location I requested. As a Programs intern, I will be involved with several different aspects of the successful delivery of the GRS curriculum. I will mainly be working in the field but will also have responsibilities in the office as well. My duties include, but are by no means limited to:
• Program Design
• Program Management/Execution
• Staff Management/Support
• Event Planning/Management (includes planning and logistics of training of coaches, voluntary counseling and testing tournaments, and street leagues)
• Implementing Partner Recruitment
• Monitoring and Evaluating
• Curriculum Development
• Training
• Skillz Magazine (GRS’ magazine that is published quarterly in the Sunday Times and distributed to 2,300 schools throughout South Africa. Skillz features the world’s and South Africa’s top soccer stars and draws on soccer to teach life lessons and encourages young people to make a positive difference in their communities)
While in the field, I will mainly be working in Khayelitsha. Khayelitsha is South Africa’s second biggest township. Townships were formed in South Africa during the Apartheid Era on the periphery of cities. Blacks were evicted from properties that were designated as “white only” and forced to move into townships. There are estimates that 400,000-1 million people live in Khayelitsha, although there has not been a census since 2005. If I had to guess, there have to be at least 1 million people living there. I can drive through the township for 15 minutes and see nothing but tiny shacks crammed together for miles and miles off in every direction. It is truly a sad but unbelievable sight. On average, the shacks are about as small as one or two rooms put together. There is garbage everywhere and on my last visit I saw a little girl rummaging through a trashcan looking for something to eat.
Amidst the waste and poverty, everywhere I turn I see someone playing with a soccer ball. It may not be like the professional Nike balls we practice with at home, but the kids seem to play with any sort of round object they can get their hands on. Not to mention, they will play in anything and anywhere. At the soccer tournament I worked last week, I saw kids playing in flip-flops, shoes with holes, and sometimes no shoes at all. They play on small, trash-strewn, fields on the outskirts of the township next to the highway. The fields in the townships have holes in them and sometimes consist of just gravel.
As part of their plan for the 2010 World Cup, FIFA has decided to build 20 “Football for Hope Centers” throughout Africa. Its aim is to achieve positive social change through football by building these centers for public health, education, and football. The centers will consist of a building to provide public health services, office space, common space for community gatherings, and a turf field. Each center will have a “Center Host.” The centers will provide these Center Hosts with a base from which to provide their programs and increase awareness about HIV/AIDS, increase literacy, improve gender equality, and promote overall social development in other targeted ways.
FIFA chose to build the very first Football for Hope Center in Khayelitsha and selected GRS to be the host! I am so excited not only to be apart of this amazing football project, but also that the kids and community will have a safe and clean place to play soccer in addition to a supportive network where they can learn about HIV/AIDS. During the World Cup, FIFA is providing the centers with giant screens to broadcast the 64 matches. Sony has also supplied GRS with 15,000 tickets to take kids to games and, as part of my responsibility as an intern I will be forced to attend some of the games as a chaperone to the kids! ☺ With the hype of the World Cup and the Football for Hope Centers, 2010 is going to be an extremely exciting year for GRS!
The two weeks I have spent in Cape Town so far have been unbelievable. I cannot believe how much I have learned in such a short amount of time and am so excited to have a whole year left to explore and absorb the beautiful culture of South Africa. I have spent the majority of the past two weeks training for my internship and attending lectures where I learned more about GRS, our relationship with other non-profits, our goals, HIV/AIDS, World Cup plans, and the list goes on and on. Additionally, I have found time to do some pretty amazing things with my fellow interns. I climbed Table Mountain and, without much consideration, decided to run the last 1/3 of it with 3 other friends. My body was sore for about 4-5 days afterwards but to see the view of the city on top of the clouds was definitely worth it. I have also played in several pick-up games, walked the beaches of Muzenburg (gorgeous!), seen Kirstenbosch (2nd largest botantical gardens in the world) and explored the downtown area (somehow always ending up on Long Street).
Thank you again for support and I cannot wait to tell you about all my upcoming adventures! On the list of things to do: wine tasting, surfing lessons, and cage diving with the great white sharks!
Much love,
Annie
I apologize for not updating my blog sooner. As you can imagine, moving to a new continent has been everything but an easy experience and has left me with very little free time. However, I am finally beginning to get settled here and just moved into my new house in Cape Town with 6 other amazing interns! I am living in Sea Point, just 2 blocks from the ocean and less than a mile from the new Green Point Stadium they are building for the World Cup! It is an incredible location to say the least and is also very safe. There is an iron gate in front of the door to get into our building, the streets are lighted, and our landlord happens to be the head of one of the chapters of Hell’s Angels!
I was selected to work in Cape Town for the next year as a Programs intern. I am really lucky to have been granted this position because it was the exact job and location I requested. As a Programs intern, I will be involved with several different aspects of the successful delivery of the GRS curriculum. I will mainly be working in the field but will also have responsibilities in the office as well. My duties include, but are by no means limited to:
• Program Design
• Program Management/Execution
• Staff Management/Support
• Event Planning/Management (includes planning and logistics of training of coaches, voluntary counseling and testing tournaments, and street leagues)
• Implementing Partner Recruitment
• Monitoring and Evaluating
• Curriculum Development
• Training
• Skillz Magazine (GRS’ magazine that is published quarterly in the Sunday Times and distributed to 2,300 schools throughout South Africa. Skillz features the world’s and South Africa’s top soccer stars and draws on soccer to teach life lessons and encourages young people to make a positive difference in their communities)
While in the field, I will mainly be working in Khayelitsha. Khayelitsha is South Africa’s second biggest township. Townships were formed in South Africa during the Apartheid Era on the periphery of cities. Blacks were evicted from properties that were designated as “white only” and forced to move into townships. There are estimates that 400,000-1 million people live in Khayelitsha, although there has not been a census since 2005. If I had to guess, there have to be at least 1 million people living there. I can drive through the township for 15 minutes and see nothing but tiny shacks crammed together for miles and miles off in every direction. It is truly a sad but unbelievable sight. On average, the shacks are about as small as one or two rooms put together. There is garbage everywhere and on my last visit I saw a little girl rummaging through a trashcan looking for something to eat.
Amidst the waste and poverty, everywhere I turn I see someone playing with a soccer ball. It may not be like the professional Nike balls we practice with at home, but the kids seem to play with any sort of round object they can get their hands on. Not to mention, they will play in anything and anywhere. At the soccer tournament I worked last week, I saw kids playing in flip-flops, shoes with holes, and sometimes no shoes at all. They play on small, trash-strewn, fields on the outskirts of the township next to the highway. The fields in the townships have holes in them and sometimes consist of just gravel.
As part of their plan for the 2010 World Cup, FIFA has decided to build 20 “Football for Hope Centers” throughout Africa. Its aim is to achieve positive social change through football by building these centers for public health, education, and football. The centers will consist of a building to provide public health services, office space, common space for community gatherings, and a turf field. Each center will have a “Center Host.” The centers will provide these Center Hosts with a base from which to provide their programs and increase awareness about HIV/AIDS, increase literacy, improve gender equality, and promote overall social development in other targeted ways.
FIFA chose to build the very first Football for Hope Center in Khayelitsha and selected GRS to be the host! I am so excited not only to be apart of this amazing football project, but also that the kids and community will have a safe and clean place to play soccer in addition to a supportive network where they can learn about HIV/AIDS. During the World Cup, FIFA is providing the centers with giant screens to broadcast the 64 matches. Sony has also supplied GRS with 15,000 tickets to take kids to games and, as part of my responsibility as an intern I will be forced to attend some of the games as a chaperone to the kids! ☺ With the hype of the World Cup and the Football for Hope Centers, 2010 is going to be an extremely exciting year for GRS!
The two weeks I have spent in Cape Town so far have been unbelievable. I cannot believe how much I have learned in such a short amount of time and am so excited to have a whole year left to explore and absorb the beautiful culture of South Africa. I have spent the majority of the past two weeks training for my internship and attending lectures where I learned more about GRS, our relationship with other non-profits, our goals, HIV/AIDS, World Cup plans, and the list goes on and on. Additionally, I have found time to do some pretty amazing things with my fellow interns. I climbed Table Mountain and, without much consideration, decided to run the last 1/3 of it with 3 other friends. My body was sore for about 4-5 days afterwards but to see the view of the city on top of the clouds was definitely worth it. I have also played in several pick-up games, walked the beaches of Muzenburg (gorgeous!), seen Kirstenbosch (2nd largest botantical gardens in the world) and explored the downtown area (somehow always ending up on Long Street).
Thank you again for support and I cannot wait to tell you about all my upcoming adventures! On the list of things to do: wine tasting, surfing lessons, and cage diving with the great white sharks!
Much love,
Annie
Muizenberg.
Kids running after me because they wanted to see my digital camera.
A lake 760m above sea level atop Table Mountain.
A soccer field in Khayelitsha.
At GRS' Soccer Tournament in Khayelitsha.
3 comments:
Thank you for the update - sounds incredible! Keep up the good work. Love you, Sis!
That is awesome!! Looks so cool! :) I am super jealous! and I miss u
xoxo
I am extremely inspired with your writing talents as well as with the layout on your blog. Is this a paid topic or did you customize it your self? Anyway stay up the nice high quality writing, it is uncommon to see a nice blog like this one nowadays..
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