Busy day in KwaZulu Natal

Early start (Again!) today as we prepared to travel deep into rural KZN. we travelled along the only tar roads in the region for about 60km to the area of Manguzi to visit our parter Tholulwazi Uzivikele (TU for short!) Loosely translated this means 'empower yourself with knowledge'. Zulu is easy huh?

Initially we met the programme Director - Johriaan de Beer and the programme co-ordinator Mdu Zungu.

We heard about the devastating impact HIV and AIDS is having within the local community - and how ignorance is as much a part of the problem as anything. In th Zulu culture it is normal for men to have multiple wives and for boys to have more than one girlfriend. One infected male therefore can infect many women / girls.

Unemployment is also part of the problem - it is running at around 75%. Young men who move to the big cities to find work may be away from home for long periods of time, and will often have multipe sexual partners in the cities - before bringing the infection home to their own families. The loss of life is significant, leavig orphans and vulnerable children needing care and help.

The life skills programme run by TU is aimed at older teenagers and young adults to educate them to live in a way that prevents the spread of HIV infection and gives them a hope and purpose for the future. While the programme is run by TU as a secular organisation it is also establishing links with local churches to provide followup spiritual support to the young people who complete the training.

We visited two centres where the programme is being taught. One was deep in the countryside, a long way off proper roads. It's very hard to express in words the scale of the rural isolation that these communities are a part of. There are very few cars, and people are walking long distances to get anywhere. Here is a picture of our team and VW wagon at one of the rural training centres.

Yet, in the midst of so many people fearful for their future, EngageHIV partners like TU are doing an essential and excellent work to educate, train and equip the young people for living lives of worth, free from fear and the risk of HIV infection.

Heading home tomorrow from Cape town. I look forward to seeing you all soon.

Thanks for reading, Trevor.

Hope - the antidote to Despair

Good evening friends from the Mbazwana Inn on the South African border with Mozambique. I'm on my anti-malarials as we are in the far North of KwaZulu Natal and it's feeling distinctly tropical.

We travelled up here by car from Pietermaritzburg where this morning we had the enormous privilege of being guests of honour at a school assembly - held outside in the yard of a school in a township of this historic city.

This was a high school with 700 kids from ages 12 to 17 present. The singing was incredible, joyful, loud, tuneful, touching, worshipful, respectful and very real. Many of these children are growing up in communities stalked by the fear of HIV, yet sadly and frequently unable to prevent this disease from affecting them. (Check back later and I'll upload a video clip.)

EngageHIV's local partner CCP has been delivering gospel infused life skills training into 15 schools within this area over the past 5 years. The effect has been dramatic. HIV infection rates and teenage pregnancies have been greatly reduced.

After the assembly we visited a cemetry on a beautiful hillside bursting with graves of young people and parents who have recently died.

Line after line of simple graves each marked with a simple wooden cross, tell of a community devastated by the disease. Average life expectancy amongst these communities is around 40 years only.

The CCP leadership are assisted in their work by Rob and Debbie, ex-social workers from Ballymoney who moved to Pietermaritzburg 5 years ago to assist in this vital HIV programme amongst young people. Here's a picture of Rob:

Just recently they evaluated that they are reaching and impacting the lives of over 12,000 vulnerable children across these townships through their work.

It was uplifting also to vist a 'Child Headed Household' after the cemetry and see how CCP were helping this fragile family with 9 family members survive in an environment where prostitution is often the only way the oldest child can provide for the rest of the siblings.

Tomorrow were planning to vist more centres for orphans and vulnerable children in this Northern area of KwaZulu Natal.

Please pray that we will see God's Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven in these areas, and that many lives will be saved both physically and spiritually.

'til tomorrow. Thanks for reading, praying and being a part of this fight.

Trevor.

-- Posted from my iPhone

Durban to Pietermaritzburg

Had minimal sleep last night due to a ferocious storm on the Cape which lasted most of the night. Up at 4.00am and by 5.00am when we set off by car to the airport it was still pretty wild. The lightning show was simply breathtaking enroute.

Thankfully the storm was blowing itself out, and our flight to Durban was not affected. After a 2 hour flight we arrived to a grey and humid Durban at 8.30 am.

Our first visit was to EngageHIV's partner Indlela based in Durban North. Indlela is a Zulu word for 'The Way' and is a not for profit organisation linked to a thriving local church that provides help to the local community in 4 ways: -

1. Life Skills and HIV prevention training in local schools.
2. Door of hope - Christian counselling service.
3. Fair Havens - transition homes for abandoned babies.
4. Feeding Programme - ongoing daily nourishment for over 500 kids in crisis.

We then visited a local school in the Amaoti township community of over 900 kids; in some cases with over 80 in a class. Many of the classrooms were being painted up by Soul Survivor gap year volunteers from the UK, and we were introduced the teachers and children who had benefited from the Life Skills and HIV prevention training.

This programme has now been running for 4 years. One of the significant outcomes is that they've seen the number of teenage pregnancies in the school drop from between 20-30 per year previously, to almost none this year.

We returned to Indlela's offices for lunch, then headed 70km north to Pietermaritzburg.

We spent the evening as guests of Rob and Debbie who help out at CCP - an HIV AIDS outreach on the edge of Pietermaritzburg. We're seeing their work amongst school children tomorrow.

No pictures today through lack of wi fi. Must do better tomorrow!

-- Posted from my iPhone

Quiet Sunday in Llandudno

Today I had time to relax before our trip to KwaZulu-Natal early tomorrow. The sun shone all day but the wind has been relentlessly gale force setting off alarms all over the neighbourhood.

Attended Camps Bay United Church in the morning with my hosts the Davissons for the 9.30am service. This was their 2nd service of the day, the first was at 8.00am - can you believe it?!

The church was very welcoming and contemporary in style, and Pastor Steve spoke about the amazing opportunities for ministry associated with the significant events happening around Cape Town in the next 12 months, not least the World Cup.

I was disgruntled to discover that I'd missed Tree63 who had been playing at a beach outreach 'Spring Tide', attended by 6000+ young people and organised by the church the night before. Tree63 are a great Christian band last seen in Belfast at the Franklin Graham event.

Llandudno beach




Then it was a swim before lunch with the Davissons, then spent the afternoon reading the amazing story of the making of the Compassion Art album - a great encouragment for us all to make sure our worship is accompanied with action to help the poor and oppressed in society.

The wind is still howling around table mountain, trying to rip the shutters off my window. Up again at 4.00am for flight to Durban.

Talk again soon.

Trevor


-- Posted from my iPhone

Flying down to the Cape

After a rather unsatisfactory attempt to doze for a couple of hours in Dubai Airport it was early morning and I found myself chatting to a retired academic from Scotland who was heading down to the Cape to visit his brother.




The flight down the east coast of Africa was been relatively uneventful (except when my neighbour decided to spill her pepsi all over the place!) with plenty of opportunity to catch up on lost sleep thankfully. 10 hours down from Dubai in a Boeing 777 - makes one realise how vast a continent Africa really is. We skirted the coast of Somalia, Ethiopea, Sudan and Kenya before veering overland near Dar es Salaam towards Johannesburg and on down to Cape Town.

Cape Town International Airport is undergoing a big upgrade to cope with the influx of World Cup Football fans next year. It's very impressive. The drive from the airport towards the city however is less impressive. A large township of shanty town style shacks is almost immediately visible on the left of the motorway. It is these communities that are most affected by the HIV/AIDS crisis that has gripped sub-sarahan Africa. Unfortunately it was only recently that the South African government admitted that it had a problem with HIV. Thankfully things are now changing in that regard.

Overall there is a very relaxed feel to Cape Town. I'm staying tonight with good friends in the beautiful village of Llandudno on the outskirts. This is the view from my bedroom of Table Mountain. Impressive huh?




No putting the clocks back here apparently, so I'm now 2 hours ahead of UK time.

More tomorrow. Sleep beckons ;-)

-- Posted from my iPhone

Dubai stop

Made it to Dubai tonight. Our flight path took us over Mosel , Kirkuk, and around Baghdad - well known hotspots in the recent Iraq conflict. I couldn't help but contrast the luxury of the Emirates 380 super airbus with 600 channels of in flight entertainment, with the desperate conditions that many of the Iraqi people below must suffer.

Connecting flight to Cape Town leaves in the early hours of tomorrow morning. I fear the contrast with the East African countries we'll pass on the way down will be even greater than that of Iraq.

Dubai Airport is pretty amazing There is an unbelievable range of luxury items on offer. A shoppers paradise if you've got the money!

'til tomorrow. . .

Take care

Trevor.

-- Posted from my iPhone

Final preparations for SA trip

So it's late and I'm almost done with packing. It's always difficult to know what to leave behind on a long haul while desperately trying to travel light. Travelling on e-tickets on 8 flights in total. E-tickets always make me a little nervous especially when flying on unfamiliar airlines. Looking forward to seeing Cape Town and Table Mountain. 'Til tomorrow....


-- Posted from my iPhone

2 days and counting

Heading down to South Africa and KwaZulu-Natal on Friday to see some of the projects supported by the EngageHIV Foundation. See http://www.engagehiv.org


-- Posted from my iPhone