The Amy Biehl Foundation and Nyanga

The Amy Biehl foundation is set up for a girl who was living in South Africa in the early 1990's. She was a college student at Stanford University majoring in African studies. She came to South Africa to help fight the injustice and segregation. She was here up until the first free elections, but then she was driving home from a township and was killed by a mob that thought she was there to fight against freedom, instead of fighting for freedom.
   Her mom and dad originally came to South Africa in hopes of making peace with the death of their daughter, but they also ended up making peace with the man who killed her. Now, they have started the Amy Biehl foundation to help townships and the surrounding areas to help people with after school programs. They help educate the kids about HIV, drugs and violence, but they also provide fun activities for the kids after school to keep them out of the streets.
    Their goal is to provide opportunities to become well rounded and prepare youth to be leaders, entrepreneurs, and stable in their future. They help them support their family in their future. They also help the surrounding areas by picking up trash, planting trees and planting gardens. They want to channel the kids energy into positive things such as sports, swimming, soccer, and arts.
    This is such a great foundation, but just like any other organization, they are limited by funding. It costs about 6M rand, which is about $600,000 to run the foundation for the year, including paying the 20 full time staff, providing one nutritious meal for the kids before they go home at night, and going on outings during their holiday breaks. They hold events to showcase what the kids have been doing during the after school sessions.
   Their motto is "You can be, If you want to be." But they also say that it takes dedication.
If you would like to donate, which would be great, or read more about Amy and their work you can check it out right here.

    Then we went to a little township called Nyanga and helped at the school there. Their school is all make shift buildings. They have 40 kids in a class and over 308 kids grades 1-7 in the school. Their are broken windows and obviously not enough funding. The desks are old and they don't have enough supplies, but the kids are so happy and they make it work. Their biggest problem is when it gets cold in the winter, they don't have heaters or electricity.
    We spent the afternoon working with some of the classes and talking to some of the students. A couple of us even taught a classroom how to do the electric slide. It was a fun day!

 Then we ate super together at a cafe and had some fun. We are now finishing up and calling it a night!

Over supper our words for the day were: 

Amy: Understanding

Mirvet: Knowledge

Kelsie: Resourceful

Deb: Rhythm

Dr. Curry: Spirituality

Mine: Happy'

Another great day finished up. Tomorrow we actually have lecture and then a trip to the achirves for some research! Exciting stuff!

I am so glad I came on this trip because I have already learned a lot, just in the few short days about how people live and the differences in culture. I also learned that Peanut Butter is really just an American thing. So is turkey sandwich meat! Who knew! 

There is your fun fact for the day and I can't wait to get home and share all of my memories and pictures with everyone.