Sport's Day!

I’m here covering nightshift in CHILLI again… turns out I’m now the go-to person for when they need someone extra. On the one hand this is good because I’d really like to work in here if a volunteer position ever opens up. On the other hand, when I do nightshift here they’ve decided I need to start at 7pm not 9pm… hello 12-hour shift.

It’s not too big a problem though. I know pretty much all of the kids names in here now and I’m starting to get a feel of their routine which is nice. When I get in at 7 they’re already in their PJs and usually watching TV and chilling. Today, one of the boys was painting (I think it was a sign for his door) and he asked one of the older boys to write his name out graffiti-style so he could then do the painting. I was like ‘wow, that’s really cool’ and left them to it… I don’t think there’s much worse than a super-clingy volunteer who wants to be involved in EVERTHING but that’s just personal opinion I guess. Aaanyway, 5 minutes later they boy who was doing the writing turns to me and asks how I spell ‘Amy’ then gets a bit of paper and does my name too. It’s pretty cool as well… all graffiti-like with shading and stuff. But yeah, my point is, obviously they’re not going to have massive amounts of respect for me seeing as we’ve just met but I think I’m doing OK. Thank God.

A couple of days ago there was a Sport’s Day in Stellenbosch (the place with the good clubs) for children’s homes in the Western Cape. What with the memories of school Sport’s Days still fresh in my mind you can imagine I wasn’t all that excited at the prospect especially since attendance was compulsory for all volunteers and it was my weekend off.

Can I ask a favour? If I ever write on here saying something is going to be crap just text/email/facebook me and tell me I’m wrong. I always am here… these kids never stop surprising me. Their spirit is incredible, most of the kids in the home gathered outside the night before the Sport’s Day to dance, chant and sing songs. The closest thing I can compare it to is one of those ‘pep rallies’ you see on American TV. Then, the next day, they cheered for everyone from our home that ran in the races no matter how well they were doing. The singing and dancing continued too, not just from our home though. Some of the others had even brought drums and things and there was music playing over the loud-speaker- the favourite song here at the moment is the Party Rock Anthem. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard it in the last fortnight… Seriously though, these kids can shuffle! I want to come back with some of this African rhythm. God knows, my dancing needs it.

Another surprising thing is how emotional we’re finding we get when we hear the national anthem. No-one can quite say why but every time we hear the kids singing it we start to well up. The first time we experienced this was when we were sitting on the bus about to leave the children we met in Soweto in Jo-burg. The bus driver called out to them ‘Sing to us!’ and all of a sudden these little voices are belting out ‘Nkosi sikelel’ iAfrica’. It was literally the most beautiful thing I have ever heard. Perhaps because the song is so full of hope and unity- each verse is sung in a different South African language- but almost every one of us on that bus burst into tears. We had to hold it together when they started singing it at Sport’s Day but seeing a thousand children from all of these Children’s homes united like that with so much pride for their country was seriously touching. It makes me kind of sad that Flower of Scotland is about hating the English and we only bother to sing it when we’re getting pissed…

Not everything here is all lovely though… the kids can be pretty challenging at times, the hours are long and every now and again something will pop up and remind you of what these kids have been through. For example, when we were at the sports day one little girl came up to me and says ‘Aunty, look!’ and shows me a pretty sore-looking cut on her leg. After checking that she was OK and stuff I said ‘You’re being so brave! Do you need a cuddle?’ She totally jumped back like a cuddle was a scary thing… absolutely broke my heart. Sometimes it’s all too easy to forget the abuse most of these kids have experienced. I know I write a lot about nights out and stuff but I think if we couldn’t blow off some steam occasionally the emotional aspects of the work would get to be too much.

I’ll leave you with a nice story though. One night in CHILLI we were watching a scary movie before bed. I had arrived last and was sat in the corner (terrified of course). There’s this boy in CHILLI who’s in his early teens, he can be a total horror but occasionally has these incredibly kind moments. So he gets up and comes over to me and says ‘Aunty, get up please’. I’m a bit confused at this point as to what’s going on but I do as I’m told. This kid starts shoving my arm-chair over the floor until it’s right next to his then he grabs my bag and puts it next to the chair, waits for me to sit down then says:

 ‘OK Aunty, now you’re not so lonely.’

Oh, Just in case you were wondering, we won Sport’s Day by quite a large margin. By this point we were all so excited and into it that the volunteers were cheering and dancing as much as the kids… feeling insane amounts of pride and excitement. I wish I could go back and do it again.

I don’t think I’ve ever said that about sport before.