Home from Home

I realize now looking back at my posts from the past few months that I have written very little about what I am actually doing here. Roughly 30-40 hours of my week is spent working – a significant difference from my previous internship in Stellenbosch, and something that gives far more structure to my life here in Cape Town than I had last year once I decided to stay – and yet I’ve hardly mentioned it. I suppose this is the perfect time to talk about my work though, since I’ve comfortably settled into it and can describe it much better than I would have been able to when I was first starting.

My days here are split between two organizations, the local Home from Home, and the American Tremendous Hearts. Home from Home was started a few years ago by two women who wanted to offer an alternative for children from troubled home besides the orphanages that were being to be disbanded here in South Africa. They settled on this idea of cluster foster care, which are small houses of no more than six children, this gives each child much more specialized and personal care, and the homes resemble a typical family much more than a crowded orphanage would. The organization has grown quite quickly, due in part to one of the founder’s fabulous connections (Elton John is a personal friend), and now Home from Home has 27 houses across the Western Cape and is being used as a cluster foster care model for the South African government. The office, which we just moved into in August, has four social workers, the two founders, a receptionist, an office assistant, and a few volunteers who are in and out throughout the week, including myself and my boss, Marilyn, who has been a long-term development volunteer with Home from Home since she first came to South Africa around 2008, which is how I’ve been connected to them.

My job, apart from helping sorting the mess of a storage room when they originally moved to this new office, is solely Christmas Party Planner. Every year in December they have a huge Christmas party for their 160 children, foster mothers, staff, and associates and donors – in total it’s about 300 people. Previously they have not had a consistent person in the office assistant position, so this year was largely a knowledge transfer from Marilyn, who has planned the party in recent years, and the new office assistant, Gen. The three of us comprise the Christmas party team for 2013.

My responsibility has predominately been to arrange activities and games for the party, which has meant sending nearly 100 emails to different party planning, sports, and other such organizations in and around Cape Town. I managed to find a group to lead soccer, got a DJ for free, a lady who is bringing sand art and a puppet show, and a few other activities as well as donated cupcakes and beverages for the party. Now that that party is so close (ten days!) I am working on organizing the presents. Each child has made a gift wish, and we pass those on to sponsors who then buy and wrap that present to be given by Father Christmas on the day of the party. Currently we have half of the 160 presents here, in marked black plastic bags by house, but due to the large volume of gifts, we have to spend quite a bit of time checking and rechecking so that we don’t miss anyone leading to them being present-less on the day of the party, which would be absolutely heartbreaking.

The party is next week Wednesday, and it will be quite the day – with magic shows, dance parties, and bouncing castles (moon bounces for all you Americans), as well as a braai (BBQ), and gift giving from Father Christmas and his elves. Though the party is only three hours long, my day will start at 7 and probably won’t end until 4 or 5, but it will be the culmination of so much effort, and is sure to be such a fun day, and the best way to spend my last week of work.

So that is half of what I have been doing in South Africa, I’ll write again in the next week or so to explain the work I’ve been doing with Tremendous Hearts.

To read more about Home from Home go to their website.