The opening

Hello there again!

Lots of things has happend latey! And the best thing is that the creche has opened!

On the 7th of May the offical opening was. However before that we went to buy furniture for the creche in Port Elizabeth, 8 colord tables and 32 colord chairs, as well as 3000 rand for educational toys and educational Posters.

On the wednesday before the opening Yvon went out to make a painting on the back wall. (see the pics for the results).

The Saturday itself was a big success. We invited the local farmers, loca people, teachers, the church. Besides that the general managers from the Netherlands and Qatar were there aswell to open the creche.

We started at 10.30 with a offical Welcome from MK Raco, and a Prayer of his uncle. Then Mr. Taai (the community development manager) handed the creche to the community. We also had some thanks to Qatar and some advisory words from the Netherlands. After that there was place for some traditional dances, some food and drinks. When the most 'white' people had left the local people started to dance and sing in gradituede and some tears where dropped by all of us.

Although the opening was a succes. We are not finished yet. More donors have been found and we are planning on building toilets. Besides that will the money be used to pay two volenteers for the coming 7 months.

The 2 volenteers have been found in the community. It are two young ladies who stepped forward and offered there help. They will get some help, as well as sponsorhsip to get an offical pre-school teacher educations.

The last thing for now on the agenda is to give an offical presentation for the local government in order to ask for their help.

The photo's will be updated soon (when internet decides to be faster)

Updatetje

Week 2

Good morning everybody.

As you might have noticed we got a little slow with putting on information about Shaw Park. This is due to a lot of reasons, but especially our thesisis. However The work in Shaw Park is progressing, as you can see on the new pictures.

Not as quick due to a lot of rain (we really needed, so we just forget about the negeative side) and a national holiday this Monday.

However Eddie and his workers are busy, and yesertday afternoon when we had a little time we went to Shaw Park to make pictures and look how far the buidling is.

It was really nice to see that they ceiling was in. The space looked suddenly a lot smaller. But more like a classroom allready. Besides that was the wall suddenly with, really with outside. Which was also nice to see.

What news do we have more? Well a lot op people donated money! Thank you for that. But we still need more. Besides that do we hear a lot of positive stories about stationary packages and gifts, which is definatly positive. We are going to see what the easiest way is to get all that here.

And then ofcourse there is some news from Africa. We went to the local radio station, and probably we are going to be on one of the programs. Besides that, we might have the possibility to have a piece in the local newspaper!

We just wanna close this with a thank you to all donateurs and people who are still busy, and especially to the Qatar Students!

Thank you All!

Eline & Yvon

Quick explanation about Qatar students

Hello there,

Some people are wondering what we mean with Qatar students. Just a small explanation here.

We are part of Stenden University, which has school in the Netherlands (Leeuwarden), South Africa, (Port Alfred), Bali, and in Qatar (Doha). If you are a student in any of this schools you can attend the Grand Tour and go to school in any of these countries, ass long as they have your education. Some of the campuses offer also possibilities for traveling to different countries, and Qatar is one of these campuses. The students involved in this trip volenteerd and signed up for some volenteer work. They are visiting south africa for 2 weeks, whereby they help out in Shaw Park for 4 days. They also raised money for our project.

16 and 17 March

Hello there again,

Yesterday was a cold day and it was even raining when we left Port Alfred. With an eye on the clouds we figured the Qatar Students would not be able to do much. So we called them and told them to do something fun.

This left Us and MK with a lot of work for the whole day. Since it was not that warm, it was easier to work the whole day from 8 to 5 (Yes, yes be proud at us!). And what did we do? I think you must have guessed already. Sanding and scrapping. There was one wall left to do totally and an other wall half.

We practically did everything only for the top part. Which is kind of difficult, and while we were already expecting muscle pain, we hoped that Eddie could arrange something.

While we were sanding the whole day the construction workers were busy with the Roof (That takes lots of time) and filling all the cracks in the building.

To keep up the good work we decided to start singen at the end of the day, which kept us going. While we were busy, sanding, scrapping and singen, one of the boys from Shaw Park commented that Apartheid was really finished now, two white girls working really hard.

Since transport is a problem sometimes we got a lift from Eddie back to Port Alfred, in the back of the Bakkie. Nice in the wind, with our already sandy hairs. (check pictures)

Today was a quite day. Yvon had to work on her disseration, so I left alone with the Qatar students. They wanted to buy candy and balls for the students, and raised some money on our way there. With the 900R (90 euro!) they raised they bought lots and lots of candy to give to the children in the school.

We arrived only at ten and found out that the building had some water inside do to they thunderstorm of Yesterday evening. Lucky it didn't do any damges. There were no proffesional painters yet, so we had to do some more scrapping and sanding. While the guys were busy setting up (steiger??) to work on some of the girls cleaned.

The constuction workers are putting on the Roof Sheets today, and put on the first coat of painting.

At 11.30 the kids have a break and everybody stopped to hand them candy. Afterwards the children did some singing and dancing for us, which was as emotional as always. Lucky for me I was not the only one crying :)

Tomorrow Yvon is leaving to help out for a while and then it is weekend again. Monday is an offical holiday here in South Africa, however eddie thought he might be able to get the painters to put on the sencond and third coats. I will upload the pictures later, when I have my cable. As well as some pictures and movies the catarian students made (A LOT)

BTW keep up all the good work with raising money and Materials every little bit helps

Sanding

Tuesday evening already, and we are tired.

Today we left on time and when we arrived all the windows were whole again :D.We started Sanding and scrabbin immediatly. Half a hour later the Qatar students joined us. While we were sanding the contruction workers and some of the Students were working on the roof.

After we took of the sheet of the roof yesterday and the ceiling, we could see the wood in the ceiling (the skeleton) is also rotten. This means we needed more wood and more time. However they did a good job today.

Sanding is not always a nice job, besides getting the dust all over you (Take a look at the pictures) it also is tiring and some times even boring. Some of the Qatar students were a little demotived and started playing with the kids, which was also fun to see.

Some others were really hard working and looked like dust mans afterward. At 12 we figured we sanded almost everything, Only the top on the outside must still be done. However we only had 3 ladders. We decided to leave things for the day and go back to Stenden, to wash everything of.

Now it is 5 hours later and still when we sneeze or scratch our ears we find blue dust everywhere.

More good news is that there are a lot of people raising money for us. Some people also had the idea to gather materials like pens, books ect. This is ofcourse also really helpfull :) Since we need also things to put inside and to work on with the children.

Tomorrow we hope the sanding will be finished, and we will make a start with filling up the creacks and maybe, maybe we can start painting.

Eline & Yvon

First Day

Thanks to all people who already donated some money!

Today was our First Day to work on the creche. For both of us it was also the first day to meet the Qatar students. Ofcourse we left to late at school, however we were still the first ones to arrive. Quickly after us the constructor (eddie) arrived and we could start working. We started to break the plaster on the wall, next to the plant, so we can take it out. We were slamming with hammers against a wall on Monday morning. Nice exercise.

At 9.30 the students arrived and they started removing the ceiling. They were pretty enthousiast so things when quickly. Breaking down is always more fun, we guess.

While the boys were busy working on the ceiling, the construction workers were removing the roof sheet (the metalic things on the roof).

Hower this is Africa, and after we broke down the ceiling we had to wait for the delivery of the materials by an African company. They were supposed to be there at 9 am, however they arrived at noon.... With the Qatar students leaving at 1 we could not do that much anymore. We started sanding the walls in the last hour. Lots and lots of dust everywhere.

Tomorrow we will start again with sanding the walls and hopefully we can start painting!

Thank you all for the support for the project, we really want to make this happen and it would not be posible without you!

Yvon and Eline

Letter to all parties interested

Dear all,

School, although we are not always in fond of going to school, we all know how important schooling is. Schooling is the basis for the rest of your life and for most people it also is the basis for their career. However as most of us also know, do not all children have the privilege of going to school, especially the young ones.

At the moment we, Yvon van Eerdt and Eline Vring, are working with the Shaw Park school. This school it located in one off the rural areas around Port Alfred. However this school starts from grade 1 on (7 years old).

The younger children either stay home alone with the female siblings, or they are sent to grade 1, when they are to young.

This lack of and Pre-school, or a Grade R, as it is called in South Africa, is causing this problem. Besides this do a lot of the children miss the basic education, like how to thy shoe lashes, how to hold a pen etc. Only 5 students out of 40 made it last year to grade 12 (the last class in Africa).

Luckily we have located the perfect building for this pre school! However the building is not in a good condition (See pictures). Together with some students we are repairing the old church into a safe pre school.

However a lot of things need to be done, and the money raised is not enough.

We would like to ask you if you can help us with raising the R10.000 (1000 Euro) needed for this.

What do you get in return for this?

• 64 children and all future children will have a basic education.

• Better educational possibilities.

• Better education and opportunities for females.

• And the result on a weblog: shawpark.reismee.nl.

You can help us and the children to donate on this account:

401884643, In name of Eline Vring, Hazerswoude Rijndijk (Dutch account).

We would also like to ask you to sent this letter to as much family and friends as possible.

Baie Dankie, Enkosi kakulu, Thank you very much, Dank u Wel!

Yvon van Eerdt, Eline Vring, and all the small children