MyJHB

Stuff from Johannesburg

Resources for Home of Hope to help build the best future | MyPR.co.za

MyPR: Resources for Home of Hope to help build the best future:

In October 2019, SA Taxi Foundation chose to partner with the Berea Home of Hope for Girls, in the ever-ensuing fight against gender-based violence (GBV). Founded in the year 2000, this self-started organization currently houses 80 girls between the ages of 2 – 18 and to date has assisted over 10 000 girls whilst producing over 200 academic graduates.

Khanyisela Motsa, affectionately known as Mam’Khanyi, is the founder of Berea Home of Hope for Girls, she runs a rehabilitation programme that is the result of a combination of targeted training and years of experience. Mam’Khanyi underwent extensive training in trauma counselling, the prevention of child trafficking and innumerable courses with reputable international organizations such as the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) and Global Fund for Children. The knowledge, acquired skills and hands on experience, is what lies behind the success of the home but more than anything the warmth and love of Mam’Khanyi has been the greatest foundation of its success.

As the national debate about opening schools rages, Mam’Khanyi announced a campaign to acquire 60 laptops, tablets, as well as fibre connections to assist with e-learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. As schools across the country face uncertainty of remaining open with COVID-19 infections spiking, not all children have access to the technology for home-schooled e-learning and she hopes with this campaign whilst South Africa propels itself through the 4th Industrial Revolution and with the necessity of the next generation being fully digitally conversant, the girls stand a chance at a bright future.

While Mam’Khanyi admits the campaign to go online is ambitious in these tough times, she is optimistic and determined to keep up the girls’ good grades and the momentum they have achieved, without putting their health at risk. She continued to say “On the first day of our Home Schooling for Hope campaign we received laptops from the SA Taxi Foundation, this was no surprise as through our partnership they have previously carried out much needed maintenance at the home, provided school shoes for all the school going girls at the beginning of the year, aided with groceries during this tough time and provided warm blankets amongst other essential needs. Though we need more, as a start to this campaign we now have five brand new Lenovo IdeaPad laptops with a newly installed Windows 10 license, so that the girls can jump right into their school work. Being provided with the resources to quickly transition to online learning during this pandemic is definitely a game-changer.”

Two decades ago, when the widowed Mam’Khanyi and her five children moved from Northern Natal to Johannesburg, she initially thought the little girls at her street corner were beggars and was horrified by the reality. In fact, she was warned of the dangers of trying to help them. Eventually she earned their trust, rescued them from brothels and drug dens and opened the first home in Berea. The Hillbrow home followed not long after. Besides the full-time residents many others are helped through an outreach that provides food and homework programmes. So far nearly 200 girls have received a tertiary education and there are even university graduates to inspire their younger ‘sisters’ within a tradition that has many older ‘sisters’ returning to teach and encourage.

Maroba Maduma, director of the SA Taxi Foundation, says it subscribes to the concept that education is key to an independent future. This is why the foundation launched an initiative called Adopt a School which focuses on foundation phase education for underprivileged children in South Africa aiding in infrastructure, curriculum and social development. Schools across all nine provinces are receiving financial and operational support and he says, “We are encouraged and inspired by Mam’Khanyi’s determination and achievements, as more efforts continue on our side, we appeal to corporates and other foundations to consider the huge difference more laptops, tablets and fibre connections will make to the home.”

CLICK HERE to submit your press release to MyPR.co.za.

– MyPR

CLICK HERE to submit your news to www.MyPR.co.za.

Click here to submit your Johannesburg, Gauteng News – free.

Have you tried: Whale and Dolphin Watching in Algoa Bay?

Did you know this about Johannesburg? Johannesburg is more than 130 years old: The city was founded on the 4th of October 1886. It’s one of the youngest world cities though.

Category: Tag: , , , , , , ,

Top Star Drive-In: Destroyed by What Created it

However, the very thing that created the Top Star eventually destroyed it. Because the early miners had used crude methods, the Ferreira Dump—and dozens of others like it—still contained significant traces of gold. As the price of gold rose and new chemical extraction technologies (like the carbon-in-pulp process) made it profitable to “mine the waste,” the ground beneath the Top Star became more valuable than the cinema itself. In 2006, despite fierce opposition from heritage groups who argued that the dump and the drive-in were culturally significant landmarks, the projectors were turned off for the last time.

The reclamation of the dump was a staggering industrial feat. Starting in 2008, mining giant DRDGold used high-pressure water cannons to “monitor” the dump, turning 5 million tons of solid earth back into a liquid slurry. This slurry was then piped 40 kilometers across the province to a processing plant in Brakpan. By 2011, the “mountain” had completely vanished. The 50-meter-high plateau that had dominated the southern skyline for a century was reduced to a flat, dusty crater.

The disappearance of the Top Star is a poignant symbol of Johannesburg’s “extractive” nature. It is a city that consumes itself to stay alive; even its historical landmarks are subject to the fluctuating price of minerals on the London and New York stock exchanges. Today, if you drive along the M2, there is an empty space in the sky where the Top Star used to be. While the reclamation removed a source of toxic dust and “acid mine drainage,” it also erased a piece of the city’s collective memory. The land where the gold-flecked mountain once stood is now being rehabilitated for light industrial use, proving that in eGoli, even the horizon is for sale if there’s enough gold hidden inside it.