“Let me tell you about myself” was the Theme at this week’s at Cape Studies Apple Brigade.

Our foreign students joyfully told the children all about their countries: languages, culture, food, music, flag, … 

At the end we created our own world map consisting of all these countries Sweden, Japan, Brazil, Gabon, Mozambique, Germany, the Netherlands, Mauritius and Czech Republic.

It was truly inspirational!

I enjoyed very much my stay in Cape Town. The school is situated near the beach, city and mountains. The Cape Studies’ Team were very  kind, helpfull and professional which made my English learning experience a memory of a lifetime. Cape Town will be in my heart forever!

Roberto

Apple Brigade at Kalkfontein

Last Tuesday we visited our Apple Brigade Kids in “their” Township in Kalkfontein.

What’s a Township? During Apartheid the non-white people were sent to townships because it wasn’t allowed to live in town. Today a lot of black and coloured people still live in townships.

The houses in the townships are small and uniformly built. They are not isolated and the walls mostly aren’t wooden or stone.

The areas are outside town in a sandy not really nice area. It’s sandy, dry and dirty and often a family has to share a little house called shacks. The houses are simple but inside its clean and organized (the house, I saw).

I guess every European wouldn’t like to live in a place like this but I wouldn’t say that a life in the townships is bad. The community is still one and the people help each other.

I guess it would be much worse to grow up in a city centre than in a Township. The do have traffic but they also have a lot of space to play and to be just kids. Of course the school education could be better and I guess the most difficult thing is to motivate the children to study hard and to make them believe in a “better” future.

17.03.2008

Sybille

We visited the Kids in Kalkfontein - the other side of Cape Town.  The community gave us a warm welcome and it was an unforgettable experience for everyone.

Kalkfontein was established in the late 80s by migrant labourers from rural Towns and surrounding farms in the Eastern & Western Cape and it is a POST Apartheid Township.

I was one in a million of Japanese.

Speaking of myself, I’m studying Education for children at University. In the near future, I’m going to get a teacher’s license in Japan but I don’t want to be a teacher at this moment. Eventhough there is plenty of information, high-tech industries and a stable economy in Japan, it is sometimes difficult to see a real situation. Whenever I thought about my future, I asked myself what I could do in my life and what do I love the most. I really wanted to know and I decided to come to Cape Town to study English and travel around Africa.

Cape Studies is quite a nice place to start my travel because the staff has helped me to get a Visa and a flight ticket and students are allowed to take a break freely.

So I took a 2-month break and started to travel up West Africa. Altogether my travel was successful (because I am alive now). Of course, everything wasn’t always safe. My baggage and trousers were cut with a knife. Sometimes my passport was taken by soldiers, and then they tried to get some bribe. However, I felt West Africa overall was safer than South Africa. Actually I was more afraid of a mosquito than a burglar. I had to be careful about Malaria every evening.

Eventually I went to Ghana, Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal, Guinea and Cote d’Ivoire. There were a lot of fabulous landscapes, traditional cultural-music, food, clothes, different lifestyles; and wonderful people. I’ll never forget taking a shower under the flaming sun and ate FUFU with my right hand. During my travel, I received a lot of things from local people. They gave me food, a bed, their addresses and their unconditional, bottomless kindness. They weren’t even rich. The most important thing was that I received many smiles of children. Their smiles cheered me up every time and I realized what I would love to do. One day I would like to teach children all over the world and see their priceless smiles.

I found my feet a little bit through this travel. Thankfully there is a project where students can meet underprivileged children from a township at Cape Studies. It’s called “Cape Studies-Apple Brigade”. I want to enjoy being with children for the rest of my school days. Of course, I must improve my English more than now and learn about our life.

Finally , Thank You very much to all my friends and to the Cape Studies’ Staff.
11, March, 2008
Sun