From our international volunteer Aranka Van Dalen (the Netherlands):
On Friday, the 18th of July, was Mandela Day. In commemoration of the late president who Nelson Mandela has spent 67 years making the world a better place. So we asked the community for 67 minutes of their time doing something to make the community a better place and we are very happy to say that a lot of people gave themselves. We started with a central introduction: Michael Mjonono told us about the dream he had last night, his dream was about Nelson Mandela. After that we sang the national anthem and Mymoena Scholtz told us what was going to happen today. We had differe
nt programs.
The children were getting face painted and they colored in pictures of Nelson Mandela. We give the children’s programme 67 minutes longer than normally. We also had a clean – up campaign in the community. They cleaned the street, and made a line with tire in order to show this place is Rainbows’ friendly. Some of the people from the community even give us more than 67 minutes, which was even better!
Some residents were peeling the vegetables and so help in the community kitchen. The kitchen made ample food, to cater for everyone who wanted to have some soup could get some. We fed 300 people for the day, because Mandela Day is a day of giving and we ensured that many people benefited on the day.
In the afternoon (3 pm) we launched the Save a Life project were we welcomed international delegates and showed them what we do at the organization. Where Rainbows with the hope that hope one of them will give their support in order for us to continue our much needed services, to our beneficiaries. We finished with a performance of the dance crew that the delegates really liked. In short it was an extremely successful day!
In the spirit of Ubuntu and the Legacy of our president the core values our organization was built on.