Green Mountains in South Africa

The very title of this blog is in reference to my love to my home state of Vermont aka the Green Mountain State. Its one of the things I miss the most about Vermont and I can not wait to do a sunrise hike up Camels Hump once I'm back home. I recently got the chance to explore some other Green Mountains in South Africa, the Drakensbergs. The Draks are a mountain range that divides SA from Lesotho and is a mecca for any hiking enthusiast. For the majority of the trip my jaw was on the floor, the scenery is outrageous and a totally different type of Green Mountains than Vermont. So without further ado here are a plethora of photos to show how amazing the Draks are.

Sunset at Amphitheater Backpackers

This is we're really lost look

Cloudy day of hiking

Our next album cover

Just chillin on the edge of a cliff

Dragons definitely live around here

The group doing a cliched taking it all in photo

Ali climbing some ladders

Matt messing up the ladies photo

SO MUCH GREEN

Cave camping

An elderly couple passed us with larger packs on their backs and made me feel like such a wimp

Oh....and we got to play with lion cubs :)

Transition Time: Move from Kimberley to Cape Town

I’ve now been living in Cape Town for a full two weeks and it’s has yet to feel like real life. Cape Town is magical. It has everything from beautiful mountains to hike, gorgeous beaches, botanical gardens, and soooo many amazing restaurants (not to mention awesome cheap wine). My wallet is already taking a serious hit. There is so much to do here especially in comparison to Kimberley. I’m now also living with 6 roommates who are all interns at headquarters with me. They are an awesome group and I’m incredibly psyched to be living with them. But all of these awesome things are still clouded by why I had to move, the closing of the Kimberley site.

We really had the best last week in Kim that you could ask for. We were incredibly busy with running a SKILLZ Street Holiday camp and also having an HIV Counseling and Testing soccer tournament the day before we moved. Each event was successful and we were able to get to say bye to all of the coaches. While we had to leave and move to Cape Town, the Kim staff is still hard at work. There are a few grant applications which we have been shortlisted on and we’re hoping to be funded. They had to move to a smaller office and suspend all programs, but if new funding comes in they can be up and running by the next month. I wish I was there to help them during this unstable period, and I still get a giant pant of guilt whenever I’m enjoying my time in Cape Town knowing they are trapped in Limbo.

It’s been a weird transition from Programs Intern to a Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Intern at HQ. I am used to working on site and now I’m in an office setting looking at Excel spreadsheets and running reports on all of the numbers. I never thought I was meant for a desk job and this is confirming that suspicion. There are some cool parts of this new gig including me being the intern assigned to help with a randomized control trial (RCT) study being done with Grassroot Soccer participants. The study has been running for the past two years and is meant to see if participants who have gone through our programs are less likely to demonstrate “risky behaviors” than high school students who have been in our programs. Each year a survey has been given to these kids asking questions about different life style choices like their number of sexual partners, if they drink or use drugs etc. This is the last year that the survey is being given before the data is all looked at. The tricky part of this study is tracking down the same kids every year. When they first sign the consent form for the study the kids provide a contact number as well as their address, so if the team can’t find them in school they can meet up elsewhere to take the survey. When kids can’t be found in the school the team ‘traces’ them with that info.

I went with the team to shadow them while tracing kids in Khayelitsha. Khayelitsha is the biggest township in Western Cape and has zero signs. Trying to find participant’s houses was near impossible. During a full day we only found 1 kid. This is not a common occurrence, and the team is usually way more successful so you could see the frustration on the team that day. All of their hard work is so important in gathering information for determining whether our programs are having any effect which is rarely done with organizations similar to GRS.  

I’ll soon be providing a post on my trip to the Drakensbergs, a beautiful mountain range between South Africa and Lesotho. It’ll mostly be pictures because I really don’t think I can describe in words how incredible the adventure was.  

Taking a break on our drive from Kim to Cape Town

Playing soccer on the roof of Kloof (the other intern house). They have the most incredible view

Jeremy Loops concert at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens

Top of Lions Head

Fog rolling over the top of Table Mountain aka the tablecloth

Got up nice and early for a hike up Table Mountain

India Venster trail up Table Mountain has some interesting rock climbing parts

My cheese has so been moved

A lot of things have been happening in Kimberley since the New Year. BIG things. Firstly being the imminent closing of the Kimberley Grassroot Soccer site. We were informed in mid-January that our site would be closed by the end of March if no funding were found. This was a very different message than the one we were initially told in December before the break, which was there was enough money for us until June. With less than 2 months to go Kimberley went into hyper drive to find money. Hence, the lack of any blog updates. Sadly no money has been found yet. We’ve applied for so many grants as well as had meetings with companies and government officials in the Northern Cape and we’ve gotten zilch, nada, goose eggs.

This recent experience has shown me the dark side of non-profit organizations and a part that happens all too often. What happens when there’s no money? Even though the people at your site are doing an amazing job and reaching thousands of kids every year someone is going to take the hit, and unfortunately for Kimberley and Port Elizabeth we happened to be on the chopping block. I understand why we’re the sites being closed but to simply (and crudely) put it, it sucks balls. Even though the Kimberley site has been open since 2008, we have never been able to find local businesses to fund us, and that what’s leading to our closing, along with many donors putting money to larger sites in South Africa.

What does this mean for me personally? Well it looks like I will be moving to Cape Town on March 29 to work at GRS headquarters for the duration of my stay in South Africa. I considered going home early but quickly decided that I had committed a year to GRS and I was going to uphold that promise. Even though I’ve gone through feelings of betrayal and anger at Kimberley being closed, I know these feelings are misplaced and I still want to do all that I can for an organization like GRS especially when help is most needed.

So my plans for the next month is to live it up in Kimberley and tick off as much as our bucket list as possible. Nick and I have already gotten a good start since last week. Last week was my birthday and we finally did The Half Special, which is 1kg of beef, lots of pita bread, and 6 Heinekens. As you can see from the pic we finished every bite. During the weekend we also competed in the Hootgat Run. I completed my first 10km race and Nick crushed his first marathon with a time of 3 hours 15 minutes…I hate that kid. On Friday we are also expecting the arrival of some of our wonderful Intern friends and are planning an epic Kim weekend for them.

I still feel incredibly sick when I think about my new family losing their jobs but I hope they are taking advantage of a new door opening for them. I’m also trying to look at the situation as such, but let me tell you, it takes a lot of freakin effort. But anyway, here’s to trying to make lemonade.

Half Special before

Half Special After

Kids keeping Nick hydrated during the Marathon

Medals for everyone!