Arrival of new wheelchairs

Friday 22nd October, finally we see the result of months of hard work and effort of fundraising as we arrive at Happys to meet thula, our wheelchair supplier. God had also helped organise the day for us too, when we arrived the entire school were together in an organised assembly sort of way (a very rare thing) and there was a company there (im not really sure what they were promoting) with an entire PA system which gave us a platform for presenting the wheelchairs and turned it into a ceremony. It couldnt have worked out any better! thankyou God!

The state of some of the wheelchairs were just not worth thinking about, ripped seats, ripped back rests which meant thy had no back support, broken wheels, no foot plates so they had no where to rest their feet, they really were disgusting! But there was nothing more joyful to see them lifting themselves out of these wheelchairs and into a brand new one whilst the urban beats were pumping out the speakers and the other students were cheering at the joy of their friends.

Nozipho also recieved her electric wheelchair and almost lost her hearing at the same time through the amount of screaming and clapping. Thula lifted her out her chair and into her new one and showed her how to work her new chair. Understandably she was incredibly nervous at using it for the first time as she was centre of attention in front of the entire school including the teachers "Hamba, hamba" they were all screaming at her (which means go). For the first time since she was 15 (shes now 29) she was able to move for herself, to get to where she wanted to on her own, what an incredible thing! She also has leg rests, before people would accidently knock her legs and she couldn't do anything about it.

It was such a beautiful day and i feel very blessed to have been a part of it and witnessing their joy as they received their new chairs. I know that they are very thankful! 15 chairs were delivered in total and there is still more money coming in to buy a couple more!

Tomorrow Thula is coming back to start and fix the 18 chairs that can be fixed...

Pen pals

Anna organized for the hall green kids to each write a letter for the kids at happys. Here are a few extracts from the replies:

- i love being friend of jesus

- i like the junk food as a child

- i live at Eshowe farm a place it is difficult to me, i hate farm

- We have a sun, but sometimes we have a rain

- i like to speak the jokes

- i like playing soccer ball and sex (Ayanda, age 12)

- i love you so much my friend, thats the end of my letter to you

Photography class

Last week i held a photography class at the happys school. I taught them about documentary photography, what it is and how they can achieve it and gave them the task of documenting their daily life. Private photos, photos that others are unable to access, photos that tell the truth. I gave them all a disposable camera and i had them developed yesterday, below are some of the shocking, intimate and beautiful photos. some of them really grasped the concept. I hope to combine them into a book format which will then go on sale to raise money for the projects here in south africa. I would also love to find an exhibition space for them too somewhere here in south africa. we'll see...

Donations for happys

Thanks to the generous members of Westville who had a clear out of clothes and toys we were able to donate these to the happy's children. A fair few of them were in need of some clothes! We managed it into a jumble sale sort of affair letting a handful of children in at a time. It was quite funny, they ALL wanted a teddy bear. even the boys. One of the older girls i took in who was maybe about 16 wasn't bothered about the clothes, she had seen 2 of the boys with a squeaky dice sort of thing ( a bit like a dogs toy) and she wanted one of those, straight in and straight out and happy with a squeaky dice. It was so good to be able to see the children's ecstatic faces as they were let inside the room and were allowed to pick something for free.

We are told to be like children. We should be so thankful for all our blessings, ALL of them, because some people have nothing that they are so happy when they receive a second hand teddy bear for free!

The queue under shelter as it started raining

An appeal for donations

This is my friend and sister Nozipho. She showed me a picture of her when she was 9, before she was disabled. She has rhumatoid artharitus. Shes at the front on the right.

Im trying to fundraise to get her an electric wheelchair because at the moment she has to be pushed everywhere. An electric wheelchair would give her so much more freedom. She is 28 years old.

If you would like to donate please email me at naomi_midgley@hotmail.co.uk

Classroom signs

Finally finished the wooden signs for the wooden shed classrooms and put them up the other day. Unfortunately i made it out of wood that pretty much disintigrates in the rain so i couldnt put them on the outside of the classroom so i had to put them on the doors instead which stay open so it worked out ok. they just have to shut them when it rains! Londiwe was a babe and held the signs up for me while i put them up. Shes the girl in the second picture.

got my new gloves on

For those of you who dont know phila, the is the most comical, outgoing, demanding, joyful person you will ever meet. She is pure joy to be around. In her lively demanding character she demanded some gloves to stop the skin getting hard on the tops of her hand. She doesnt have the full use of her hand so she wheels her wheelchair with the top of her hand, this result of this is in the photo below. Someone very kindly donated some money for some good long-lasting leather gloves. She was so happy...

A brighter corridor

So basically, the corridors at Happy's are sooo dull!! The school used to be a hospital, but thats no excuse. It looks more like a prison. I noticed that above each classroom it had a tiny piece of paper "Grade 5", "Grade 8" that no one could read anyway it was so faded and tiny (and in times new roman). I decided it deffinately needed some colour and some fun font which the kids just love. Dani and i have done the 4 indoor ones. 3 of the classrooms are outdoors and are wooden sheds, so iv made some wooden signs which im going to screw onto the doors. They just need painting...

Here's the first 2

working in the sun :-)

This guy is a dude...

Grade 11, we did the one next to it too but i dont seem to have a picture of the two for some reason...

Once a week we go to the hospital to chat to the patients, sing and pray as a result of one of our brothers being in the hospital. The guy in the bed next to him, Siphiwe, is now baptised as a result. Although our brother marcus has now passed away this has opened up more new friendships in the hospital. Last week on our weekly visit we bumped into Promise, a girl from the Happys school. It was fantastic to see her although not in those circumstances. But out of all the wards in the hospital we only visit 1 womens one. and she was in there! God's hand at work! I was aware she had cancer but had no idea she would be spending the entire 5 week holidays in the hospital recieving radiotherapy.

Her family dont want to see her, she is in care of social services when not at school (the children board at the school). So being in hospital is quite lonely for her not to mention upsetting with all she has to go through with cancer! When she has a day off from the clinic i take some of the girls from school to go see her. This sunday shes aloud out, shes coming to church and having a fun day with her friends from school!

Nozipho's baptism!

Last Sunday was so full of joy! Probably one of the most emotional baptisms iv every been to! We arrived at happys at 8:30am to pick Nozipho up and her friends for the baptism. Nozipho was sat at a desk alone writing her testimonial she would give at the baptism. This immediately brought tears to my eyes. Here was a lady, my friend who is totally dependant on others, unable to do anything by herself and she wants to give her life to the Lord.

I forgot to pray that morning for Gods help in making things run smoothly. There was meant to be a bus driver to drive the schools minibus to the baptism, he wasn’t there. We were on a tight schedule and had 3 lots of other people to pick up too! The only staff member that was around happened to know someone who lived next to the school that had his number! She got if for us and we managed to get hold of the bus driver…he said he would be 30 minutes. We didn’t have 30 minutes! We told him we were at the school waiting and then he said he would be 5 minutes. 10 minutes later he did turn up. Him not turning up could have been a disaster! That was God saying HE IS in control of everything! It doesn’t matter how much you plan and you think everything is under control, in the end; it’s down to God.

12 students on the mini bus and 3 other pick ups later (we have a pick up truck which fits many people in the back, practically everyone has one here in SA and each one is normally packed with 20 people in it. No one knows whether its legal or not but the traffic police don’t seem to care) we finally made it back to the hall with 10 minutes to spare. Quite the accomplishment here in SA.
The baptisms, which were incorporated into the Sunday service, were just so beautiful! Brenda, sine and nozipho all gave a testimonial about how the introduction to the truth changed their lives, very emotional! The baptisms were done outside which was just lush too then we all shared a meal together.

Marine world day trip!

Monday we took a group of the happys kids to the marine world. They had a great time!

Its funny, iv been going to the school for 4 months now and there are some students which aren’t really bothered about you being there. Which is fair enough. There are a few which sit in groups on their beds braiding each other’s hair and don’t really want a conversation when I try and start one and they don’t get involved with the activities we organize. There is one girl who is extremely independent and very loud and abrupt. Months ago she wasn’t bothered about talking to me. But slowly as she could see I was sticking around she began to slowly become interested, she would peer over my shoulder if I were showing someone some pictures, or stick her head in the classroom if I was talking to her friends. Then last month she partook in one of the craft activities. The kids at the school LOVE photos. Like you wouldn’t believe, they beg you to take photos of them and print it out. On a couple of occasions iv printed one out of her and given it to her. She nods and walks away. She doesn’t smile much. But the marine world opened up a whole new level. It was as if they finally saw that we cared and that they cant ignore us any longer because we are sticking around for them! The ones that sat on their bed braiding hair not wanting a conversation suddenly were coming up saying hi. Thulinsiwe, the very independent girl would not leave me alone all day! She was right behind me the whole day. Whenever there was an opportunity to rest she would always rest her elbow on my shoulder (she is unable to straighten her arm, I guess it must get quite tiring for her). But it was just so good to have gained more friends from the school that day. It was as if all barriers had been dropped! They were so full of thanks for taking them out for the day.

Italian day!

Had the best day ever last saturday!!! We had Italian day at happys. This involved Drawing mustaches on all the kids and baking pizzas and colouring in the italian flag. It was a very organised MESS!!!!

The crew avec moustaches

This kid was having a ball. He mushed up about 4 dough balls with cheese and tomato sauce and drool and mashed it all together for about an hour.

My fave

It took forever to get them all through the oven, there was flour everywhere, the poloni was bright pink and some of the children ate the pizza raw. yum yum. a good day all round!!!!

New wheelchairs!!!

Annie also did some wheelchair assessments while she was here. The kids desperately need new wheelchairs, they are way too small or way too big or way broken. Newbury ecclesia have donated some money for new chairs and the money raised from the happys website is also going to new chairs.

but we still don't have enough money...we need 32 new chairs and 7 have to be specially assessed.

There is now a sister at the school. Nozipho...She got baptised on sunday and needs an electric wheelchair. She has rhumatoid artharitis and is unable to move her arms or legs. She is fully dependant on her friends at the school for getting around and feeding her, changing her etc. She is very bright and hopes to go to uni next year, she is worried about where she will live as she needs a carer. An electric wheelchair would give her so much freedom that she used to have before she got rhumatoid artharitis. So we plan to fundraise for this...watch this space! dontations welcome...

Sister Nozipho

Heres some pictures of the things we have done over the past few months:

Tiled the girls and boys shower rooms, they were SO gross and mouldy before!

We had a spa day for the girls on valentines day. We washed and massaged feet, painted nails, did some henna and gave out a bible verse bookmark

Ntokozo with her bookmark and freshly painted nails

Katie washing hands and julie massaging feet

Every tuesday and friday we have a bible class, this is it!

We had a concert for them last month, it was awesome!

Iv put together a saturday rota of fun things to do, to brighten up the weekends, they get so bored as there is nothing for them to do!

We had a craft day a few weeks ago, here they are all holding up pom poms they made

Nokwethemba making a bracelet, she is a very talented young lady!

Telensiwe doesnt have the use of her hands, she does everything with her feet. Iv seen her wash and wring out her clothes with them, its incredible! Here she is making what turned out to be the best pom pom. she was very careful with it!

Got my new shoes on

sawaborna!!!

My naomi is Naomi Midgley and i am very blessed to be here in south africa for 9 months. My favourite place to spend time is Happys, The joy you get from being there is just amazing, its so uplifting and the kids are incredible! Iv built up a great relationship with them and try and get there at least twice a week to do various activities with them. So im

going to use this blog to keep anyone interested in the things we do at the school. All the volunteers out here are so grateful for the fundraising that you guys have done!

Esther absons mum annie is over here for 2 weeks (she's a physio) and has managed to bring over 24 pairs of special boots to help the kids walk. The trouble was every kid wanted a new pair of shoes! Apart from one girl that annie fitted, who wouldnt stop complaining and then as soon as our backs were turned she took them off. ha! There were some especially amazing pink pairs which the kids loved and we had to convince the teachers to let them wear them to school.

Annie with 2 suitcases full of special shoes!!!

Nonjabulo

Nomfundo

This guy got my favourite pair of boots!!!!

qunobi

On the same day anna, jess and allanah also brightened up the dull cell like corridoors with an awesome murel for the library:

This has inspired me to do murels ALL over the school. quite literally. im very excited by the idea.

Iv also had the vision to take some of the kids swimming, which would be amazing for them and very therapeutic. A couple of weeks after id been thinking about it esther mentioned her mum was coming over and did hydrotherapy. hallelujah! God really does send the right people at the right time! Esther and i prepared by hunting out some outdoor swimming pools and making sure they had disabled access, good changing room facilities and a hoist for getting them into the pool. But it turns out there are many issues with taking physically disabled people swimming, and its a good job esthers mum was here to point them out...Each child had to be assessed and a decision had to be made weather they could go in the pool or not. It also turns out that all the pools we found were too cold. they had to be around 30 ideally, otherwise it would be counter productive, their muscles would tense up and it can make their joints painful and also with not much movement in the pool we would all get very cold quickly! We hunted and hunted for pools indoors but they just don't exist in durban! We found 2. a public pool which has been bought by fifa for the world cup use so thats not open to the public and the other onewas in a gym up 2 flights of stairs, hardly suitable when all the students are in wheelchairs! The search is still on but it looks like our best bet is to wait till the football is over so we can use the public pool and when annie is back in september! :-(