The past two weeks have flown by! Everyone is swamped at work as the December 4-6 weekend approaches. The December weekend is a huge event for FIFA because the World Cup Draw takes place on December 4 in Cape Town. It is also a huge weekend for Grassroot Soccer since we were selected as the Football For Hope (FFH) Centre Host in Khayelitsha. FFH is the main element of a strategic alliance between FIFA and streetfootballworld and it is a movement that uses the power of the game for positive social change. The FFH Movement is a part of FIFA's "20 Centres for 2010" official World Cup campaign.

Most of my time over the next three weeks will be dedicated to preparing for the big weekend. As the final touches come together for the Centre, GRS has started to focus on the logistics for the weekend. I'm spending a lot of time putting together an agenda for several visitors that are coming for the weekend. I've learned that planning events in Cape Town is much more difficult than planning an event in the States!!

Table Mountain

We started our hike in Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens.

We hiked up Skeleton's Gorge, a route that has lots of ladders, big rocks, shady trees, and waterfalls.

At the top of Skeleton's Gorge, we reached a sandy reservoir where we set the 10 second timer on the camera and jumped up and down trying to capture a picture of all five of us jumping.
From left to right: Me, Corey, Amy, Phil, and Allen.

View from the top of Table Mountain.

View of Cape Town.

Resting on the top of Table Mountain before hiking down. We originally planned on taking the cable car down the mountain, but it was closed because of the wind.

Hiking down Platteklip, the face of Table Mountain. Although it was tough on everyone's knees, the hike down the mountain was beautiful because we were surrounded by clouds.

I'm going to backtrack a bit and write about a couple events that I have not yet touched upon.

October 9: Heritage Day at GRS Cape Town! South Africans celebrate Heritage Day on September 24 by celebrating the many cultures that are present throughout the country. GRS decided to host its own Heritage Day lunch to share our own traditions and cultural dishes. I decided to be adventurous at lunch and have a taste of everything. This included sheep eyeball, smiley (known as the "tastiest" part of a sheep, smiley is the cheek), tongue (I could feel the tastebuds), intestines (so salty), and hoofs (really chewy). I also ate lots of chocolate buckeyes (made by Elise, a fellow Ohioan), German cake, and Greek goodies (my contribution).





October 10-12: Rocking the Daisies Music Festival with the interns located in Kimberley, Richmond, and Lesotho! We spent the weekend camping and watching amazing music on a wine estate in Darling, about 75 kilometers outside Cape Town. My favorite bands were Freshly Ground, Gang of Instrumentals, Lonesome Dave Ferguson, and Goldfish.

October 13: Finally visited my host family in Grassy Park! I had dinner with Nazeema, Soraya, Juleigha, Tasneem, and Mischka and caught up on everything that happened since I left in April 2008. It was great to see the Valleys and I'm going to do my best to stop by more often.

October 18: I spent seven hours hiking up, around, and down Table Mountain with Allen, Corey, Phil, and Amy. It was my first time hiking the mountain and it was absolutely beautiful. I'll write another post with pictures and more details just now.

This past weekend was much more relaxed. I spent Saturday morning at the Old Biscuit Mill Market catching up with Alyssa, my program director from Projects Abroad and I spent the afternoon surfing with Corey, Amy, and Allen. We got a full night of sleep in preparation for a soccer tournament that we played in on Sunday.

Aside from music festivals, hiking, surfing, and eating, I've been spending lots of time in the office. My workload is picking up and I'm getting involved in several long-term projects, mostly involving the weekend of December 4-6. The World Cup draw takes place on December 4th and the Football For Hope Centre in Khayelitsha is opening on December 5th. Both of these events will have huge media coverage and Grassroot Soccer will have the spotlight for a small part of the weekend. Several GRS Board Members and important GRS friends will be in town for the events and I am helping to prepare for the big weekend.

Table Mountain pictures to come...

Skillz DVD Launch

October 2, 2009 marked the launch of Grassroot Soccer’s first ever Skillz DVD. The DVD was filmed in Khayelitsha, but is delivered to all GRS coaches after they are trained in the GRS curriculum. The DVD featured 21 boys and girls from Khayelitsha and over 150 people attended the premiere party, including all 21 boys and girls featured in the DVD, their family members, the 93 recent Skillz graduates from Impendulo, Skillz coaches, Grassroot Soccer staff, Substance Film crew, local media, and a special appearance by professional soccer star Thabo Mngomeni. Every child who participated in the video got to walk down a red carpet, receive a goody bag, and get their picture taken with Thabo.

Walking down the red carpet at the DVD Launch Party

Weekend in Kimberley!!

Several other interns and I spent last weekend in Kimberley, a huge diamond mining city. We made the ten hour trek Friday morning and had a fun night on the town with Lindsay, Hooter, and Kristin - the GRS interns stationed in Kimberley - serving as our tour guides. After sleeping for a couple of hours, I woke up to go fly fishing with Hooter, Lindsay, Allen, Taylor, and Corey. It was my first time fly fishing and I was pleasantly surprised by how fun, peaceful, and hard it was. After fishing for a couple of hours (and catching nothing), we left to attend a South Africa versus Madagascar Soccer Game. Although it was a friendly match, it was the first time the South African National team had ever played in Kimberley. The stadium holds about 20,000 fans and was completely packed for the occasion. We spent a little too much time tailgating with the locals so the only seats we could find were standing right behind the Madagascar goal. Minutes after we entered the stadium, Bafana Bafana (term meaning "The Boys, The Boys" in reference to the South African team) had a penalty kick. Unfortunately the Madagascar keeper made a great save and the score remained 0-0 until the second half when South Africa took the lead. The rest of the game was great and the atmosphere was unlike anything I had ever experienced before.

After watching South Africa coast to a 1-0 victory over Madagascar, the ten of us spent the night at Lilydale Lodge. We spent the night braaiing, drinking, and hanging out. I introduced everyone to my favorite desert - toasted marshmallows hollowed out with a splash of Amarula (similar to Baileys). After a short night of sleep, we woke up and walked down to the river for a second round of fly fishing. We had much more success on our second day of fishing - all together, we ended up catching 5 fish (I hooked one, but wasn't able to bring it in). We eventually said goodbye to Hoot, Linds, and Kristin around 2:00 and made it back to Cape Town a little after midnight.  All in all, it was a terrific weekend.

Skillz Snap

Since it has been a couple of weeks since I last posted (sorry), I'm going to backtrack to Saturday, September 10 when I spent the day in Khayelitsha working on the Skillz Snap project with Jeff DeCelles, one of my GRS coworkers. Skillz Snap is a pilot project intended to engage Skillz graduates (kids that have gone through the Grassroot Soccer curriculum) in peer outreach activities beyond completion of the Skillz intervention. I was paired with a graduate and a couple of GRS coaches and together we spent two hours interviewing community members on HIV-related themes. 

I spoke with one woman, Grace, for 20 minutes about her sister's 2003 death from AIDS. Grace's stories were really inspiring, but also really difficult to take in because she was so brutally honest and open about tragic events.  Grace spoke about losing her niece to AIDS because her sister did not take the necessary medicine to prevent mother-to-child-transmission. The Skillz Snap pilot went really well so it will be fun to see how it pans out in the future.

Kids in Khayelitsha

Coaches and GRS Interns

Braai in Khayelitsha!

On the last day of intern training on August 13, all of the interns and the rest of the GRS staff went to Khayelitsha for a braai and soccer tournament. Khayelitsha is the second largest township in South Africa and was formed during Apartheid when blacks were evicted from their properties and forced to relocate on the periphery of towns and cities. Estimates place Khayelitsha's population size at 400,000-1 million people, but there has not been a census since 2005. The township is filled with thousands of tiny shacks that are made of corrugated iron. Although conditions in the township have improved since the end of Apartheid, Khayelitsha continues to struggle with unemployment and poor living conditions. Since many of the Cape Town GRS programs are based in Khayelitsha, I will be spending a good portion of my time in the township. In fact, on Friday I'm going to spend a couple of hours tutoring kids in one of the elementary schools in Khayelitsha and on Saturday I am helping to plant a vegetable garden in the township!


Khayelitsha


Khayelitsha