Paul Williamson | The Simunye Project

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Posted on March 5, 2011 - by Paul Williamson

Vegetable Garden Fence for New Life Daycare

When we had previously visited Silence at New Life Daycare, she had told us that she had trouble with goats eating her vegetables. Her fence was not high enough and the freely roaming goats would happily jump over and devour the food that was meant for the children. We set out to weed, remove all grass and build a goat-proof-fence for a 200 square metre area in a little over 1 day.

We began by digging holes, cementing posts into the holes, and weeding the area.

The kitchen built in April 2010 still standing strong and proud. Cemented posts with intermediate star pickets in progress…

What an amazing difference in just one day!

No more free lunch for these goats!

Posted on February 15, 2011 - by Paul Williamson

Tshepang Christmas Activities

The kids at Tshepang got creative and made their very own christmas decorations which we hung up inside and on the christmas-tree we provided. There was so much going on at once! Everyone had a fantastic day! Every family also received a food hamper containing rice, sugar, cooking oil, canned beef, matches, tinned fruit, canned fish and various other necessities to help make Christmas a little easier.

Posted on February 15, 2011 - by Paul Williamson

Chickens for Tshepang

We set up an area for chickens at Tshepang and provided 20 chickens. We built a hen house and a covered area with roosting bars. A great team effort and beautiful red hen-house! We have since heard the hens have been laying eggs – a great addition to the nutrition of the kids at Tshepang! Many thanks go to the students at Syndal South Primary School for raising money so we could provide Tshepang with an extra chicken!

Posted on October 20, 2010 - by Paul Williamson

Thank-you Amazing Racers!

We realise we’re a tad late with this thank-you message, but better late than never, no? Plus we’ve been really busy planning for our upcoming trip – more to come!

The Amazing Simunye Race was one of our most ambitious fundraisers yet, and we’re bursting with pride to report that it was a huge success. Nearly 200 people met us at Federation Square to launch the race, and thankfully the same number met us again at the final checkpoint around two-hours later (phew!). We had teams of all ages, including young families, university students, baby boomers and generally anybody who excelled in amazing-racing. Those who raced encountered challenges both physical and mental, which left most racers significantly confused or exhausted long into the evening.

Thank-you to all who came, raced, and told their friends about the amazing time they had. We’re so glad you enjoyed yourselves, as we’ve worked incredibly hard to make donating to a charity fun and rewarding. Your participation will make a real difference, and we’re so grateful.

Fancy running your own race? We’ll almost certainly be Amazing-Racing again, but if you’d like to run your own race (perhaps as a corporate team-building exercise or as your Christmas party) then get in touch, we’d love to help.

Click through to see the timing and final placings!

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Posted on April 28, 2010 - by Paul Williamson

Low Ropes Course at Tshepang

We have cleared a new area at Tshepang to develop a low-ropes course for the children. We had to start by clearing the area of weeds, rocks and garbage. We soon discovered there was a broken kitchen drain nearby causing an awful stench, so we fixed that making this previously unusable area a great place for the children to play (see post: Trench Digging and Plumbing).

So far we have constructed a Wobbly Log and Spider Web, with plans to add additional modules on future visits. Minutes after the children laid eyes on the newly built structures, they excitedly ran up and began playing on them with a little instruction on working as a team.

Wobbly Log

Spider Web

Posted on April 28, 2010 - by Paul Williamson

Trench digging and plumbing at Tshepang

When we found the area to start our low-ropes course, we couldn’t help but notice there was a foul stench in the air. This was traced back to blocked-up grease-trap where the kitchen waste-water ended up (with repulsive doll floating in the top). Joel said “We just need is PVC pipe, we can do this”. So the following morning we got some PVC piping, joins and sealant and Mr Newman became the head apprentice plumber, leading a team of trenchers and plumbers.

Facing such obstacles as digging through rocks, tree roots and joining pipes at strange angles, the team came together and achieved an amazing result. The smell was completely gone by completion, opening up a wonderful new area to the children to play in.

Posted on April 25, 2010 - by Paul Williamson

Shoes to 240 children at Tshepang

We sorted the shoes by size then welcomed the Tshepang children in to choose a pair of new shoes! What an exciting day!

Shoe Fitting at Tshepang

Thanks to the following people for organising and donating shoes:

Jedwab Family
Syndal South Primary School Families
Huntingtower Junior School Families

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Posted on April 18, 2010 - by Paul Williamson

A Kitchen for New Life Daycare

Silence has been in contact with Susan who runs the Tshepang programme in Johannesburg. Susan helped Silence to obtain funding from Old Mutual Bank to enable her to purchase supplies and labour to build toilet blocks to the required ratio (1 toilet per 15 kids) in order to obtain minimal ongoing government funding. All the building supplies have arrived, she is now searching for a good builder to start construction.

We spent one and a half days at New Life day care this time and constructed a new outdoor kitchen for Silence. Her old kitchen has been a concern for some years – we had done some minor patch-up jobs on it on the last 2 trips, replacing logs which had been eaten completely away by termites, and patching up the roof which provided barely any protection. (more…)