Harambee Sustainability Project

07/21/2014

Masakhe Cooperative's Garden in Philippi is flourishing! Sharing Our Ubuntu Legacy

07/15/2014

First sale from Masake garden cooperatives garden!

SUCCESS! Masake's first sale from their garden. Great that their new customer is a neighbour & fellow partner from the SOUL Training Programme. Harambee Sustainability Project

05/27/2014

Thank you to our OUTSTANDING 2014 team for all of your hard work and dedication! 23 entrepreneurs trained in business, 2 cooperatives mobilized, and another food garden built!

Thank you to everyone at The B.I.G: BackPackers In Green Point for another AWESOME year!! !

05/24/2014

Construction of the Philippi Garden is complete! Thanks team for all of your hard work this week! Sharing Our Ubuntu Legacy

05/22/2014

A few more shots from our 2014 group's climb up Lion's Head

05/22/2014

From our blog: Town Hall Recap: Pulling Together

Our group is about halfway done with construction work for this week as we make final pushes to set up the people of Phillipi for sound business ventures and plans to maintain the communal garden that will be completed Friday afternoon. Construction work include tasks such as carrying large beds of wood across fields that are to hold future garden beds, pile-driving rocks with whimsical pix-axes, and coming up with quick solutions to expedite the collective process; tasks that are definitely not for the typical college student. Needless to say, one can easily lose one’s sense of purpose in a sea of back-breaking frustrations.

Luckily, I was able to break away from the group today and attend a town hall meeting in Phillipi to put things into perspective. The people of this township who showed up to the event were extremely warm and welcoming. The men and women who would usually greet us with customary handshakes, characteristic of the region, greeted us with open arms, literally, with their cordial hugs.

Plates of snacks with chips, trail mix, and candy were set out, coupled with a lot of dancing and singing at this lively event. They even prepared a generous hot meal for lunch with locally prepared dishes of meat, rice, carrot, and cabbage. When I think about how costly the feast must be to put on, I begin to understand the significance of this remarkable gesture. Combined with the emotional testimonies I was so fortunate to have witnessed, I further realize how dedicated the community is in creating a better environment for Phillipi and how appreciative they are for the help we have to extend. Let’s pull together!

—Montana DelColle

05/21/2014

Today, HSP and Sharing Our Ubuntu Legacy's Philippi project was publicly endorsed by 2 of the community's chiefs as well as their bishop. We are so honored to work with this community of inspiring people and grateful to be welcomed with such open arms. To another 5 years of Ubuntu!

05/21/2014

From our blog: A Trip to Bellville

Most people who spend 26 hours traveling end up in some remote resort village, sitting on a beach tanning their jet lag away, waiting for some “native” guy to bring them a cocktail. Although we have seen some beaches, and taken in some amazing views, our second day in Cape Town was spent in a tiny dingy yellow room in one of the townships that are famous for their squatter camps, trying to communicate with people who speak only a few words of English. Although extremely frustrating at times, the few words of Xhosa I have since learned are all the more rewarding.

As a group we have been working with people from two of these townships to develop their business ideas into business plans and taking the opportunity to learn as much about a culture as possible. While our new friend Roro has specifically said, “our day to day is just the same as yours,” I and two other girls from our group went on a day trip that tested that statement.

At the end of last week we took a kambi (aka “black taxi”) with a woman named Patricia out to a shopping area to price her fabric. The van-sized taxi took forever and we were packed in with about twelve others who probably spoke even less English than Patricia. Once we hopped off and started to walk down the packed sidewalk we realized what sore thumbs we were. I could not see a single other white person and everybody was staring at us, hollering at us, or trying to sell us something. At first it was incredibly overwhelming and pretty off-putting but as we got used to it and moved a little beyond the most hectic areas it was cool to watch everyone bustling about, doing what they do day to day, And it turned out Roro was pretty correct- people came to the market after work to grab things they needed for housework, teenagers went to an arcade to play video games, people peddled products from infomercials, and Adidas and Nike were everywhere. It was a little louder and smelled a little different than the city markets I was used to, but it was most definitely normal. I even wanted to go check out the hardware store that we were pricing in but there wasn’t really enough space for all of us- that could be counted as one big difference between the Xhosa communities and us, possibly out of necessity there is much less value put on space in general. Whether its personal space or the size of cars or room between houses, there is a lot less of it and people don’t seem to mind- I’m even getting used to conversations with people from less than a foot away and that is seriously saying something.

Anyways, we managed to get out of the market that day with our prices and generally unscathed besides a few shouts of “whities!” in our direction. We were a bit of an intruder that day but I am so glad I got to go. It’s rare that visitors get a good taste of the non-tourist zones of countries and I got a really good one.

Enkosi, we’ll see you soon!

— Claire Beauchamp

05/21/2014

From our blog:

Raised beds are constructed and in the ground!! Thanks to our team for their backbreaking persistence!! We literally pickaxed solid rock (and old piping) to get these in!!

05/18/2014

From our blog: A Recap of Week 1

It’s hard to believe we are already halfway through our time here in South Africa. Looking back at all of the work we’ve done, the people we’ve met, and the places we’ve seen, it often feels as though we have been here for months! What exactly did this week entail you might ask. Let’s start from the beginning.

With the entire group finally together in Cape Town, we spent our first day getting to know the team, prepping for our first week on the ground, and, unbeknownst to most of the team, completing our initiation - climbing Lion’s Head. A few shots from our climb are shown below:

We took some time at the top of Lion’s Head to do some team building and hear more from the HSP and SOUL leadership teams about the communities we would be working within. Our leadership team, pictured below at the top of Lion’s Head, is comprised of Gabi Oken, Mae Diapera, and Roro Dyonta of HSP, and Tracy Stallard of SOUL.

With a riveting climb under our belts, we hit the road the following day to begin Business 101 training with our budding entrepreneurs in Langa. Over the next 3 days, we worked with men and women both old and young, working independently and in cooperatives, to develop business plans and start-up sustainable ventures.

Through the training, we developed a name and brand for a elderly women’s cooperative selling sewn goods and beading. The cooperative chose the name “Umlibo”, which is Xhosa for “to grow”. It was a truly amazing experience to see the personalities of each woman shine through the products they made, and through their increasingly eager participation as the week progressed. The picture below shows two of our students modelling ornate beadwork made by Cynthia, one of the cooperative’s entrepreneurs.

Although we had plenty of work on our hands, we still found plenty of time to play…with the adorable 4-5 year olds at the creche next door!

05/18/2014

Philippi garden construction plan for the week :) let's go HSP!

05/17/2014

Our Tulane 2014 group! What a great bunch!!!!

http://ift.tt/1jpRh5W