Your Turn To Help!

OK, Friends...now it's your turn.

You have been hearing us for months talk about our project, our trips to South Africa and El Salvador. You have seen the pictures, read the blog, maybe attended a fundraiser or two. Now, we need a few minutes of your time.

Since you are already sitting in front of a computer, this should be a relatively easy way to help, but could turn into a huge boost for our campaign to build new school buildings in Coffee Bay.

We have applied for funding from a charity program sponsored by American Express. So has a hundred other groups. Over the next few weeks, there is an online nomination process. If we are nominated into the top 25, we will then be able to make a presentation to become one of the 5 projects to get funding.

Here is what we need from you:

Nominate us yourself by following these quick steps:

1- Go to www.membersproject.com/project/view/N34DIQ
2-click on "nominate this project" located under the school photo
3-a box will appear click on "sign up as guest member" in blue at bottom of pop up box
4-fill out Name, email address, create password and fill in security code then click on "sign in"
5- You are signed in and ready to vote go to www.membersproject.com/project/view/N34DIQ
6-click on "Nominate this project" YOUR VOTE IS CAST
Project Name is "Schools for an education system in crisis"
www.focalpointaid.org

You do not have to be a member to nominate us, but you will have to sign-in as a guest. The process will only take a few minutes but will help us us in a large way.

Thank you very much!

The People You Meet

You often meet many people on the road while traveling off the beaten path. Perquin is certainly off the beaten path. It is a wonderful crossroads of people and culture. After visiting other places that see very few foreigners and have no NGO presence, we were very surprised to see the high number of aid workers from all over the world here to help out this region.

The Peace Corps for example has had a very long history in this area and still has over 100 volunteers throughout El Salvador. In the short week that we were here, we ran into 5 different Peace Corps workers stationed in the surrounding villages. Lindsey (or leela as she is called by the children who can't pronounce her name yet) is working right here in Perquin. She has been here for about a month of her 2 year commitment and already seems well situated in the community. She helped us immensely while we were here and could not have taught the classes without her.

We met Marie, a newly graduated political scientist from Sweden here to study the role of woman in El Salvadoran politics. Sara (seen above), a teacher from New Mexico has volunteered throughout Central America. Our Paths crossed while she was making her way from Nicaragua to Guatemala. She sat in to observe classes at Amun Shea and helped us teach the photography workshop.

There were 2 grad students here from Harvard and Columbia conducting research for microfinance programs, a woman from San Francisco here to implement arts programs, and a man from England who is the only man on earth who has seen and evidenced the white breasted hawk, which he spotted in the mountains of Morazan (this last one is not a charity worker, but it is a fascinating story).

El Salvador is in a very precarious place right now. Their classification as a "developing nation in need" is changing very soon, and their largest source of foreign aid, the Millenium Project, is about to cut off their funding for El Salvador. There will soon be little money for things like infrastructure, education and medical care. With so many people out of work, the only source of income for some families is sent from a father or sister sending back their salary from abroad. These remitants make up a staggering 20% of the GNP. If foreign aid is suddenly cut off, it will become even more difficult for people to survive.

Help from charities like FocalPointAid or programs like many we have seen this week from outside organizations may be that little extra push that people here need.
The people of Perquin are strong, proud and hard-working. If we can do something as simple as help build them a school building for their children, we are happy to help.

As for all the wonderful people we have met: Keep up all the good work, we will see you soon.

Last Day of School

After a week of teaching dance and photography it is time to say goodbye. Heather's students were very disappointed to hear she had to go back to Nuevo York. Children from all classes lined up to hug her goodbye with many trying to convince their new teacher to stay.

We ended the week, on Saturday, with a performance to honor the family. In El Salvador, unlike the USA, Mothers and Fathers are honored on the same day, Familia Dias. The children of Amun Shea performed many traditional songs and dances for their families. One song in particular had a great deal of importance to the children. It was explained to us that the lyrics sang by the children were asking "when their father will come home". Refrain after refrain asked where is our father, when will he come home. This was incredible moving and relevant with the current influx of immigrants to America.

Hearing the songs and meeting with the parents or guardians of these children make the mission of Amun Shea even ore important. This school was built with the hope that children of this region reach for a life beyond their current means. The unfortunately trend for youth here is the to become laborers that have to travel outside of El Salvador to find work. It has broken up families and crippled an economy. The wish at Amun Shea is to create leaders and inspirational figures of their community.

During today's family day, Amun Shea incorporated two of Heather's dances into the celebration. The children performed these new dances with exuberance and even added a great deal of their own personal touches. Families applauded throughout the numbers and greatly appreciated what had been introduced to their children.

Children are Gifted

As we mentioned here yesterday, many of the students that were invited to our Photography workshop were remarkably gifted at an art form they have had little to no experience at. They each had a very unique sense of beauty in their surroundings and showed a level of creativity well beyond their education. We were extremely impressed with the level of excitement and the quality of work that these students brought to their projects.

The picture above is just one example of their photos. It was shot by Jeovana, a second grader.

Lending a Helping Hand

We are very proud of our relationship with the Amun Shea school here in Perquin. Although new and experimental in many ways, it is already operating at a high level and holds true to all the ideals of learning and child development that make education paramount in building a strong community. When members of FocalPointAid first visited El Salvador and Amun Shea in February, we knew that we wanted to help this school in any way that we could. That is why on this trip, meant for research and observation, we wanted to roll up our sleeves and lend a hand.

Each day this week, we have visited Amun Shea,spoken with the teachers, seen the students, photographed the school in progress and even taught some classes. That's right...we taught some classes. We have helped the school run classes in photography and dance. At first, these might seem like "non-essential" subjects to teach in such a place as Perquin, but on the contrary, teaching students anything that can excite imagination and create a culture of new ideas is exactly what can help young people grow into positive community leaders.

Joe created a program to teach the students in 2nd and 3rd grade how to take photographs. We brought with us a handful of digital cameras, a photo printer (all to be donated to the school upon our departure) and a laptop computer. On the first day, the students were shown about a dozen prints of our photos, some taken at Amun Shea during the last visit. They learned basic photography skills like lighting, focus, composition and subject matter. At the end of each day, a few students were given the cameras and a homework assignment to take pictures of whatever they found interesting. The next day, Joe uploaded their artwork to the computer and picked a dozen pictures to compliment and critique. We expected this excersize to be fun, but did not expect the results to be as interesting as they came out. Each student showed individuality and personality in their experiments that you may not find even in a college photography course. I guess when you give children who grow up in this kind of environment a chance to express themselves, they do just that. It was amazing to see. We hope to be able to expand on this trial run on our next visit.

At the same time, Heather has run a very ambitious dance program, teaching 4 classes a day to children from K-3rd grades. As with most art-forms these children learn, this was a whole new experience for them. They were shown video of ballet and exposed to dance music of many genres. Over the last few days, the children went from reticent and giggly to talented, budding dancers able to recite and demonstrate the 5 positions of ballet and together perform a dance piece fully equipped with tutus and ribbons. Every time Heather demonstrated a new kick or turn or split, all their eyes lit up with wonder and a few seconds later were anxiously trying to duplicate what they saw. Whether or not this great group of students will produce the next Nuriev is unclear and inconsequential. What they have learned is that their is a whole world outside of what they have seen that is full of excitement and wonder. Isn't that what education is supposed to strive for?

Both the dance and photography classes were just a taste of what education can offer these students. We are happy to be invited to be a part of a school willing to allow teachers to visit and interrupt their day-to-day curriculum. We are proud to support such a place. We hope that this year, we will be able to help the students and educators at Amun Shea in a more tangible way by helping to fund new classrooms for their growing success. As great as the school here is, it only teaches through the 3rd grade. Without help, students graduating will have to return to the El Salvador education system which is among the poorest in Central America.

El Mazote

As we have already written here, Morazan is know for its beauty, quiet way of life and its significance during the war. Over the past few days, we have seen the beauty of the landscape and seen the lives of people in this community. Today, we went out to see the effects of the recent armed activity that has shaped the way many have lived over the last quarter century.

The beginning of the conflict in El Salvador began well before all-out warfare spread in the early eighties. In the 70s, a very unstable government switched hands several times making for a very dangerous situation. This instability and extreme poverty helped pave the way for a guerilla movement that in turn forced a strong military response. After a series of "civil wars" erupted into Cold War disasters in Cuba and Nicaragua, the world superpowers were getting nervous about any conflict in central american. Many international forces were quietly or overtly taking sides in El Salvador with the guerillas, the military or both. The war raged on in brutal fashion until a peace accord was reached in 1992. The details and significance of this war is something that we encourage everyone to learn more about, but there is not enough time or space to tell the entire story here.

If there was a defining moment from this war it is the massacre at El Mazote. Over 800 civilians (estimates vary) were murdered on December 11th, 1981 by a U.S. trained military unit called the Infantry Batalion Atacatl BIRI (rapid reaction unit). Today we visited the town and memorial sites to take note of a disaster that too many people around the world have forgotten. Driving to El Mazote we learn a little about the region from our guide and host, Ron. We drive through the quiet town of Arambala while passing buildings with Guerilla grafitti still visiable. Time has definately passed this area by, or maybe it is just opportunity that they have missed, but there is nothing like it anywhere I have seen to compare it to. The streets are cobblestone, the adobe brick buildings are quaint but perfectly adapted to the weather, and men walk around everywhere carrying machetes in their hand. We have not gotten a real reason why machetes are still carried around. It may be for protection, it may be for its use as a tool, but it is just something that we will have to get used to.

The center of El Mazote has an eerie quiet and the town seems to have more dogs than people. The massacre of the village left only 3 known survivors. The few people who have since repopulated the village are very much aware of the brutal history of this place and many will answer any question you have. With over 300,000 people displaced by the war, there is no end to the personal stories that exist for those who might listen. There is a memorial built in the center of town with all the names of the victims that have been recovered. We may never know the full list. Next to the memorial is the church of El Mazote, rebuilt after it was burned down during the massacre. It is a simple structure but stunning in its significance. The "walls of peace" as the murals painted on the churches facade are called, tell a sad and great story. On one side the disaster is given its due. You can stand in the "Jardin De Reflextion" that is built on the site of the old rectory of the church and look at a beautifully realized mural and mosaic while praying or relecting on the memories of the victims. Along the base of the wall is a list of all those who died with their ages. 146 of these names are under 12, and some of them are as young as 3 days old.

On the opposite side of the church is a painted mural representing hope through time and education. There are many different opinions on how to go about life after the war, but one slogan struck the public then and still is spoken today: "NUNCA MAS" (never again).

After a very sobering and emotional trip to El Mazote, we came back to Perquin to visit the Museo De La Revolucion Salvadorena. Perquin was the headquarters of the FMLN and some of the museum guides fought in the war as guerillas. They were surprisingly matter of fact in their descriptons of the war and gave very non-biased viewpoints on the details represented in their showrooms. We saw pictures, mortars, weapons, and many artifacts that helped us imagine what soldiers from either side may have gone through. Walking through the rooms line with recovered guns was very eerie. So was the fact that most of the weapons used in the war were supplied either directly or indirectly by the U.S.

The two most amazing parts of our tour were the large crater left untouched that was created by a 500 lb bomb, and the remains of a downed helicopter. The crater represents many that still scar the countryside. The helicopter is from a story that will certainly stick with us for a while. The man behind the massacre at El Mazote was Lieutenant Coronel Domingo Monterossa Barrios. He was known as a brutal war machine, and many attempts on his life had failed throughout most of the war. His desire to collect war "trophies" was well known and the FMLN set a trap for him that ended with him carrying a sabatoged war prize on his helicopter that exploded seconds after takeoff. The story of his death and the memory of his brutal legacy live on in the minds of the those effected by this war and in the remnants of his helicopter at the museum here in Perquin.

We have certainly had a memorable day. It is easy, too easy to forget what some communities have had to go through just to survive. As sad as the history is in El Salvador, it is their history and important to learn about and understand as they move foward. NUNCA MAS

The Little School That Could

The picture above was taken today after a visit to a local school.  He holds a picture of himself that was taken on our first trip here in February.  As he saw the picture and recognized himself, he giggled with a happy nervousness that made everyone who saw it smile.  But when he learned that the picture was a gift and he should go home to show his mom and dad, he glowed with an exuberant pride and skipped away to show off his prize.

Amun Shea (land of seads) is a small school in Perquin, built and run by a  international aid worker from the U.S., and staffed by a handful of dedicated teachers.  It is a ray of hope in a region of the world that needs just that.

We visited the school today to say hello, see how the school has progressed and maybe help teach a class or two (more about that later this week).  The school teaches 52 students from pre-K to third grade.  Unlike the public schools in El Salvador, Amun Shea teaches a full-day curriculum.  The school was created by our  new friend Ron Brennenman.  He was in the country to help build shelters for those displaced by the war and he never left.  Now with a family and strong roots in this community he built a school to fill the need a solid education for his children and those of the surrounding villages.  

The first semester started just this winter and has already received recognition for academic achievement. After only one semester it is amazing how well the school runs, how successful the program is and how happy and eager all the children are.  The school itself is a humble but well built structure at the end of a dirt road.  It has all the facilities that a school requires but not much  more.  As with many of the schools that we have seen and heard about, they need more materials, more rooms and more teachers.  

As we have mentioned, the school only reaches the 3rd grade.  As their current students get older, they will need help building more buildings to expand.   

Stay tuned for more details of the school, but for now check out this video of Amun Shea.  http://www.youtube.com/watch\?v=ahYRUDt0y68

Traveling Far

Another season, another country and another long travel day by Focal Point Aid. After 10 hours of travel (half the time it took us to complete our first plane ride to South Africa) we are sitting comfortably in the Perkin Lenca Hotel De Montana tucked away in the mountains of Perquin somewhere near the El Salvador-Honduras Border. The first sign that El Salvador is not exactly a hot spot for vacation travel was while we were riding on the airplane...it was less than half filled and we were the only native english speakers on the flight. We found amusement watching the airline staff dilligently call out each row for boarding even though though their were only a dozen people waiting to get on. It certainly made for a pleasant flight. The flight went smoothly, Immigration went smoothly, Customs went smoothly, then we tried to pick up our rental car. Start with a language barrier plus the standard rigamorole of rental companies, then add 100 degrees in the shade and our good mood was put to the test. But we were finally here and we left San Salvador with our air conditioned car, malaria pills and a large stock of bottled water.

The impressions of El Salvador change with each town and village we pass on The Pan Americana highway. It has been 16 years since the 1992 peace accords officially marked the end of the war here, but you can't avoid the remnants of the damage that the war has left behind. There is a permanent feel of temporary in most of the areas we pass. In the last 15 years, El Salvador has had many setbacks in their post war developement. Mudslides, hurricanes and earthquakes have left much of the region moving from temporary home to temporary home. El Salvador has more seismic activity than any country in the region (because of this fact, the area around San Salvador has been called the "Valle de la hamaca" , the Valley of the Hammock). Some are just tremors, but some are large and dibilitating disasters like the ones in 1986 or 2001. Now former aid camps and refugee villages have been turned into towns of run-down huts or alluminum sheets propped up to make shelters and endless piles of wood that used to be somebody's home.

Along the way, we passed a few urban centers with storefronts and market places. The road between was packed with roadside stands selling papayas or plantains. One unfortunate trend we witnessed was the trash. The infrastructure of El Salvador still hasn't figured out how to dispose of garbage. It has ended up in piles on front lawns or lining the roadside. Development has made its mark however and there is a strong workforce, something of a transportation system and the endless advertisements painted every few feet along the highway.

As we expected, the feel of El Salvador changes drastically as you get into the mountains. The province of Morazan is in the northeast corner of the country and is known for its beauty, agriculture and its place as a guerilla stronghold during the war. Many people have first hand stories about their recent history and we look forward this week to learning as much as we can about the cultures that have repopulated the region.

One final note about our trip here before we begin. It is the rainy season here and as we drive into the hotel and meet up with our hosts, it is pouring down buckets of rain. We expect rain every day while we are here, but usually only at night. Thanks to Ron Brenneman, his family and his staff at the hotel and his school for their welcoming us into their world. We expect a productive week here and hope you all back home enjoy our dispatches.

El Salvador

We leave tomorrow for El Salvador. We will be blogging daily about our trip, so please stay tuned.

Our project in El Salvador will once again focus on children and education. In the small municipality of Perquin, near the border of Honduras there is a small school called Amun Shea (Land of Seeds). In a region where you can hardly avoid the markings of a brutal civil war, the school and surrounding community is a reminder that big change can happen in small ways. It is a school opened to rebuild a proud community, that is after just a few years, helping to build a bright future for over 50 students.

The community is made up of former refugees displaced by war. It is twenty-five years later and many have never returned to their former homes. As the country has undergone a slow rebuilding process, some areas such as Perquin have been forgotten. Amun Shea was built by a few caring individuals who wanted a safe place to educate their own children. Now, it is the pride of the region and teaches classes up to the third grade.

We hope to keep an ongoing relationship with Amun Shea and the Peqiun community. With your help, we can assist them in building new classrooms to hold future classes as they grow.

Pictures

Hello, we are back in New York. We look forward to spending the next week discussing our trip with everyone so we can announce the details of our project. We are starting to sift through our notes and photographs. We will share them with you on our website as soon as we can. In the meantime, you can see a sampling of what we saw here:

Joe's Pictures here

John's Pictures here

We're Coming Home!

After 2 life changing weeks here in Coffee Bay, we are headed home. We have seen more than we had planned, and met more people than we had hoped and now are ready to come home and make this project work.

We will miss the dozens of new friends we have met, the warm welcome of the community and the endless breathtaking landscapes and coastal views (like the world famous Hole-In-The-Wall seen above).

We will be without Internet for the next few days, so we will not be able to update this blog, but check back later in the week as we announce the details of our complete project. Thank you all for your support and the attention you all have given to our trip and this charity. We will see you all soon...not too soon however, as we still have a 20 hour plane ride ahead of us.

Red Tape, No Problem

Anyone who has ever had to build a building knows that the list of things you have to do that don't involve actually building is long and very frustrating. Blue prints, zoning boards, approval plans, contractor agreements, etc. And when the paperwork includes a government office or two, most projects don't get off the ground easily. But today, we had a rare experience with breezing through a bit of red tape.

We woke early and once again employed our guide Sanele, a great new friend to us, and headed down the road, the only paved road for an hour. We travelled 100 kilometers to the city of Mthatha (pronounced oom-tah-tah). The government office that houses the Department of Education was there and that was our destination. We needed to procure the blue prints for DOE approved school buildings that we wish to build in order to get an estimated cost for our project.

If we were in NYC showing up without an appointment, we would never get past the security desk (now imagine what would happen if two strangers from another country tried to get blueprints for a public building). But in the poorest region of South Africa, we walked in without an appointment, without ID and were speaking to the man in charge of school inspections for the entire Eastern Cape in a matter of minutes. He was very excited to talk with us. After a quick rundown of how we have spent our time in Coffee Bay, we shared with him the list of schools that we wished to help. We were happy to find that our choice was also at the top of his list of schools that need aid. Within 10 minutes, he brought us upstairs to his boss (again, no appointment or proof of who we were).

Now in a larger office and in front of more people, we made our case again and were promised the blueprints we needed. They didn't make plans to mail it to us, send it to us, or have it ready in a few weeks, but actually walked with us across the street to the Department of Public Works and waited while our copies were being made. We couldn't believe how kind everyone was to us.

After spending months going through unbelievable amounts of red-tape just to get our non-profit off the ground, it took us less that an hour to go through two separate Government buildings to get the plans. This is just one more in the long line of examples of how kind and welcoming people have been to us here. It has been a pleasure working with people of this community in creating a joint effort to help the region.

Building a Plan

Today we started learning what it actually takes to build something here on the "Wild Coast". We have seen old buildings, new buildings, renovated buildings and some that shouldn't even be called buildings. When we started this project and thought about the possibility of building something, we had no concept of the process. However, we thought that if we kept moving forward we would come up with the proper plan. Well, that part of this trip is now upon us. There are a number of details that we have to pin down, even before we figure out the actual price. Here are just a few:

• Find a licensed builder (not an easy task where the most common building material is mud-brick).
• Get permission to build from School Board and acquire "approved plans" from the Department of Education (again, not easy for 2 New Yorkers 8,000 miles from home).
• Find someone who lives here and someone we can trust that will act as our project manager to take care of the plans while we are back home fundraising.
• Decide what materials to use (as any contractor will tell you, the list of materials and design decisions can cause quite a mess).
• Make sure that only local labor is used (the unemployment rate in South Africa is close to 40%, here in Coffee Bay its closer to 90%).
• Plan out site security (materials can disappear very quickly).
• Make sure builders and workers know that we will be back to supervise project. We must ensure that all money we raise goes towards that project (in most cases this idea has been very well received, as too many charity projects just give money that doesn't benefit what is was supposed to).
• Get an honest price estimate (difficult anywhere, but in a place where there is a language barrier...).
• Decide which school we want to build for (by far the toughest part of this project).

Tommorrow is Sunday, by Monday we intend to Travel to Umtata to get building plans, take care of all the needed details while we are here, and then head home by week's end. We will see you all very soon.

Children and Families

The first thing you notice about the Xhosa people is that they have a very solid family structure. Everything is connected to your family and the family is connected to the community. Within Coffee Bay, there are several pockets of smaller villages, usually separated by a valley, a stream or a large hill. If you live in one part of this community you are welcomed by everyone else. You call every woman Mother and a each boy and girl is your Brother and Sister. The families live together in bundles of Rondewels, several generations together. If one person has a job, and sometimes only one person in the family does have a job, they use that to feed all their relatives. It is safe to say that without the strong bond of families, things would be much worse here.

That said, in some areas things are very bad. Even with one breathtaking landscape after the next, you can't get away from the poverty. There are children running around everywhere, no shoes, torn clothes, and the look of someone who hasn't had a full meal in a while. On the way to each school we saw this week, we passed hundreds of children idly sitting in the fields or helping their mothers carry buckets of water from the nearest river. They weren't in school, even though it is required by law that they attend. Some children don't go to school because the 4 or 5 kilometer walk is too far, some don't go because they can't afford appropriate clothing, and some children don't go to school because they serve a more immediate and valuable role for the family...they stand in the streets and beg for change from the passing cars. Tourists are coming through here more often to see the beautiful coastline and some are wiling to throw a penny or 2 to the hungry child reaching out her hand. It is highly discouraged to give in to the strong desire to help those children, as it is seen here by many to be teaching the children a bad lesson for a small amount of money rather than the lessons they would get by going to school instead.

There is a new Youth Project in town that supports youth sports leagues and offers local children a place to gather and keep them out of trouble. We were also invited to the home of a local family that houses an all-boys dance team (a very impressive group that dances in a style similar to step or stomp teams in the U.S.). The team members were aged 12-16 and most of them lost either one or both of their parents.

Children as always are the foundation of any future that a community wants to build. From what we have seen, most children here are vibrant and hopeful but with little, or really almost no chance to improve their situations. We are starting to realize that the schools here may be where we spend most of our time.

The outdoors is no place for school!

Another day, another school, another story hard to believe. The longer we stay here the more see. Today we were welcomed at the Bekizizwe School. Before we even met with anyone here at Coffee Bay, we were shown pictures of the students at Bekizizwe carrying bricks one at a time to help build their school building. They were pictures that represented hope. Before that building was built a few years ago, they had no building at all. Children were being taught outside protected only by the shade of a tree.

By looking at those pictures, we thought all that had changed. When we drove up to the school today, children were still sitting outside attending class. Those buildings we saw being built could only hold three classes. That's 3 out of the 9 that Bekizizwe teaches. So, after the school had benefitted from the best improvement it has ever had, there were still six grades being taught outside in the fields...the same fields being grazed by cows, goats, and horses.

This is by far the worst school conditions we have seen here in a place that judges the quality of school by how many children have to learn by sitting on the floor, with or without a roof. Mrs. Mangisa is the principle of this school and she has been teaching outdoors for 19 years. It was obvious that she told the students that we were coming and they were on their best behavior. They waved to our cameras and sang songs for us as we walked along the school grounds. Even with the show however, it is hard to hide the truth of the situation: this school needs help!

To add to the list of outragous conditions, the only food the children recieve is bread for lunch. They eat this too, while standing outside. The nearest bathroom is an outhouse a hundren feet from the school building (this is for faculty use only), and the only water source is a half dried-up riverbed at the bottom of a ravine about a quarter mile away. There is nothing about this school that is safe or not in need of vast improvement. I can't imagine being a teacher in this school, but all 11 of them are heroes. We have been constantly amazed at how the children still go to school, learn, smile and play. It is becasue they don't know anything different that they accept this standard of education...we think we owe it to them to show them a little more, don't you?

The Cat in the Kitchen

It is hard to describe farming as a vital part of the economy around here, because there really is no economy. However, to be a Xhosa is to be a farmer, and around here, farming is not a job as much as it is a way of life. Cattle graze freely and are not marked (for farmers can recognize their own cows and do not need to protect against theft), goats and sheep are not fenced in and nearly everyone relies on community gardens for produce.


Over the past few days we have visited some of these garden projects. When we tell you that we have traveled "beyond the beaten path", that is not merely a figure of speech...we have really traveled beyond the beaten path. We were taken by our guide and translator, Sanele, to a remote valley somewhere inside the lush hills of Coffee Bay. A kilometer from anything resembling a road, we had to remove our shoes and roll up our pants to cross a stream or two. This everyday trek through the water that seemed so effortless to the farmers caused enough trouble for us that we attracted a small crowd of local children who were giggling and watching to see if we would fall in (we did not).


The farms looked like any farm you would see in any poor farming village. They have tried to set up a simple irrigation system, but the pump has been broken for some time and the streams around here don't always stay wet. They rely on the woman who work on the gardens (Often 50 years or older) to carry buckets of water balanced on their heads up and down hills that would make a 20 year old huff and puff. Each garden has about a dozen workers, mostly woman, and they cannot manage more than an acre at a time. Most of the food goes to the families living in the small section of the village where they work, but they try to sell their food to the local hotels, backpackers, and to passers-by on the roads.


They grow cabbage, spinach, peppers, carrots and corn. Although we have only seen a few, it seems that they all grow the same produce forcing prices to bottom out well below any market value price. We asked several people why they don't grow fruit and nobody had a concrete answer. Many fruits can grow easily in the area such as peaches, citrus and grapes, and are a great source of vitamins that are generally lacking around here. Since there are little if any fruit farmers here, it could help balance out the variety of crops and could easily sell. People here grow what they have always grown. Things like "Market Value" and "Crop Diversity" are not concepts that subsistence farmers have ever had to deal with.


The Farmers here are in need of some very basic things. They need more tools, water pumps, a central market to sell their produce, and some transportation to get them there. Walking a few kilometers through muddy trails, fields, and streams to sell a bucket of peppers for pennies is not enough to get this community out of poverty.



The name of one of the farms we saw was Susi Kati Eziko which translates into remove the cat from the kitchen, it is a local saying around here that symbolizes a community trying to fight against poverty.

Ubuntu

Ubuntu is an age old idea in Southern Africa that describes a credo that all humanity is connected through a bond of sharing. It is a Zulu word but is shared by all South African tribes like the Xhosa here in Coffee Bay. There is a folk saying that defines Ubuntu.

Motho Ke Motho Ke Batho Ba Bang (a person is a person because of other people)

We have been all over this small village and talked with all types of people. There are some very specific needs that people have that could be fixed quickly and there are giant problems that will take decades to overcome. We have been overwhelmed by much on this trip, but the feeling that we cannot help everyone is a heavy weight on our emotions. It would be an easy trap for us to fall into by trying to help everyone in everyway, but that will only end in us helping nobody.

In the spirit of Ubuntu, we have kept a list of the needs of every project we have seen. When we return with our own project underway, we want to be able to pass along the needs of the others to other organizations that may be more equipped to help. We want to call Doctors Without Borders to show them a clinic with no doctor, put the Woman's Project in front of micro-finaciers, try and get a sports organization to donate soccer uniforms for the Youth Project, collect simple but much needed farm equippment for the many small farmers, set-up a children-helping-children clothing drive to name a very few of the ideas that have come from this trip.

There is much we can do in Coffee Bay, for everything else we hope we can point a global spotlight.

A Very Hard Day

The 12 foot by 4 foot aluminum building had no door, broken windows, no floor and mounds of dirt piles in the corners. This was the school “cafeteria” at the Medekeni Junior Secondary School. You wouldn’t know this because it looked more like a tool shed than a cafeteria but for the moment it held a long table with small stacks of buttered hard bread. This was the children’s lunch.

After seeing the conditions of the Coffee Bay J.S.S yesterday, we thought we would be prepared for anything, but walking up to the building this morning there were about 40 students sitting outside on broken furniture and muddy hills attending the 3rd grade. This is an unacceptable level of education for anyplace, but for now, this is normal for Coffee Bay. There are 3 entire grades that have to be taught outside because there is nowhere else for them to go. And yet the children still smile, the teachers don’t, they know better.

We were escorted around the school by N. Madlalisa who asked us to call her Kwanda. She is a very strong a beautifully spirited woman. She has done everything in her power to keep her school together and the children safe. She tracked us down when she heard that we were here and invited us to visit her school. During the tour of the school, she showed us room after room filled with students sitting on concrete floors (as you can unfortunately see from the picture above). She continually tried to show us that she was doing everything in her power to use all of her available resources, as if we had to be convince that the needs of her school were legitimate.

Without any loss of pride, she told us of having to constantly beg the authorities for more resources. As she explained how she had to stretch her budget, we suddenly realized exactly how bad the situation was. We did some quick math in our heads and came to the awful reality that the school was receiving less than $90 per student per semester. That $90 was to be spent on everything from teacher salaries and textbooks to school repair and the stacks of buttered bread that the children get served for lunch.

$90 per student…think about how little that is for the wealthiest nation in Africa.

Some Early Thoughts

While meeting with the chief, he talked about a serious concern he had about promises made from groups like ours. It is the same concern we have heard from many of the people we have talked with. They have been promised a lot over the past 15 years, but most have not lead to anything but false hope. But the region still desperately needs help, and the community can’t let the disappointments of the past cause them to miss opportunities. So they talk to strangers from New York City with cautious optimism and patience that does not come easy.

It is because of this that we feel even more confident about our work here. The best feedback we have heard the last few days is that people feel different about our project because we promise to come back to help implement the program ourselves. A lot of Charities raise money for something and just assume it will go towards what they want. Unfortunately, this is rarely the case. There has been a problem with money being raised for Coffee Bay that “somehow” never gets here. Government grants have being diverted to other regions, earmarked money has been given to what people hear refer to as “ghosts”, names of people who have died but are still on the list of aid recipients. Corruption is everywhere, but when it happens in a place like this, it is hard to take.

This idea of do-it-ourselves has been the driving force behind FocalPointAid from the start. It is that idea that has given us hope for Coffee Bay, and in turn has allowed the people of Coffee Bay to welcome us so warmly.

School Crisis

Think back to your school days. Try and remember what your school looked like. How many rooms did it have? How many desks were there in each classroom? Picture all the maps it had on the wall, the crayons and books you had in your desk. That is not what schools are like here.

Today we went to visit the Coffee Bay Junior Secondary School. When we met with Mrs. Mngquibisa at our large meeting on Saturday, she outlined a pretty grim scenario. She told us they had 800 students and only 20 teachers, little materials and not enough desks. Unfortunately this is a very standard educational experience in these parts. Nothing however, can prepare you for seeing these conditions in person.

We got to the school after our meting with the Chief and immediately were struck by the stark contrast of the conditions of the school with the unbelievably breathtaking surroundings. If you look out over the dilapidated school buildings you see ocean view cliffs with white surf crashing on the shore, endless vistas of rolling green hills behind children with no shoes sitting on dirty schoolroom floors.

Here is what the school looked like: Two crumbling buildings with no doors and broken windows, caved-in ceilings and cracked concrete floors that children sit on due to lack of places to properly sit (the school has not benefited from new desks or chairs in over 20 years). Today was the first day of classes for the new term so many students didn’t attend class and yet class size was already reaching 50 per room, although in a week the largest class in expected to be as high as 108.

There is a third concrete building half built standing off to the side completely unusable. This was built by the Department of education, but once their vastly unsubstantial budget ran out, they picked up and left, leaving nothing but another crumbling building that acts as a reminder to these students that they have been forgotten. The students by the way, despite all this mess are incredibly upbeat, energetic and happy to be somewhere, anywhere that they can learn. Unfortunately, without help schools like these will get even worse and cease to exist at all.

Meeting With The Chief

We met with the chief today. Unfortunately we did not get any photographs of that meeting, so the picture above if from the school we visited later in the afternoon.



We were supposed to meet with Chief Nguenyathi on Saturday before our meeting with the rest of the community, but he was ill and did not make it. The fact that we went ahead with the other meetings and ahead with our project without meeting with him first was something we were afraid would be a sign of disrespect. We apologized for this right from the start and he seemed to be pleased that we made note of that and all was well.



The Chief, the son of the living Chief handles all the affairs of this land and its people. It is a traditional hereditary position and even now is much more than ceremonial. He was accompanied by three of the local Head-men and together they are a part of what they call the Traditional Council.



It is very intimidating to meet with a man of such high esteem in a place where he rules everything. However, he was genial and very receptive. As with most of our meetings, they start with a bit of an awkward "getting to know you" phase due to language and cultural differences. We felt it went extremely well and recieved the blessing from them for our work.

Sustainability

Driving through Coffee Bay, you will notice how beautiful the landscape is, you will notice how nice the people are and you will see how much effort it takes for families to do what we take for granted, like provide water and food for meals. What you might not notice at first or at all (until you go looking for some cough medicine to combat the sinus infection you got while sitting next to a sick child on the 16 hour plane ride) is that there are no stores in Coffee Bay. Nowhere to buy a cold drink, a pack of cigarettes, a newspaper or diapers for the baby. There is nowhere to go on the weekend to shop for some new clothes, the latest top-40 CD or a book to read. For a town that gets most of its money from the few visitors that travel looking for an "authentic African experience" there is no central market for anyone to sell their goods.



Tonight we met an amazing woman named Albertina Nomonde Madlalisa, but you can call her Betty. Betty runs the Masizame Woman's Project located in the Ngogo section of Coffee Bay. The Woman's Project is a group of about 10 woman, and a few men that make traditional African crafts, teach dance and promote the rich culture of the land. On the surface, walking in to the project building, it looked like a crafts shop. There were beautifully made grass woven baskets, intricate bead work, colorful dresses and shirts and a floor full of sculptures carved masterfully out of drift wood washed up on the beach.



After looking around, Betty sat us down and gave us the 10 year history of the project and where she wanted it to go. She talked proudly about the evolution of the project and proudly about being invited to places like Canada and New Orleans to show off her art work and the honor of being named community builder of the year. Then she told us that even with her success, the group will never be able to grow much further as it is. The cost of getting to the arts fairs to sell her goods is too steep, she has filled orders to ship her products to places like Germany, the US and England, but there is no transportation to get them to a mail center, so all the money made on the sale is eaten up by overhead. The woman's project is not a store and people don't just pop in to browse around. You have to know that they are there...and in a town with no shops, no market and no structure for such things, the project's future is hazy.



Betty's goal is to train 200 woman on the traditional art work of her people over a 3 years span. She wants to promote her culture and continue the traditions of her ancestors. She believes in the power of her artwork to be able to help her community sustain itself. People throw around buzzwords like "Economic Sustainability" all the time. They should look at Betty's studio as an perfect example. If Coffee Bay has a future, places like the Woman's Project have to be supported. It is business, a cultural center, a school and a gathering place all in one.

Rondewels

We have mentioned several times already that the basic home unit of people in this region is the Rondewel (pronounced ron-de-vel). As you can see by the picture above, they are circular huts with thatched roofs. They are generally about 20 feet in diameter, although this can vary, and can be made out of mud and wattle, mud-brick or stone. The name Rodewel simply means "round hut".

These homes dot the landscape and seem somewhat fitting of the terrain. They are the cornerstone of a society that is proud of its culture. As one person we met told us "We need many things here, but we don't need to be 'built up.' If we suddenly started putting large buildings and high rises where the Rondewels are now, our ancestors would turn their backs to us"

The interior of the Rodewels are very spacious and usually can house 2-5 people (sometimes more depending on the family). They are slept in, cooked in, played in. Families often have 2 or three Rondewels together and they sometimes function the same way as rooms do in a western style house. The ceilings are high and the floors are either packed dirt or covered with a thin layer of cloth.

Health Crisis

Everyone already knows that health and the access to basic health care is one of Africa’s largest problems. South Africa is no different. The HIV/AIDS rates in SA are the highest in the world and is the single largest health crisis in a region already suffering from too many problems.

This morning, we visited the Ngzwanguba Health Center Clinic and the Masibonisani Community Project. It is Sunday here so the clinic is closed but was opened for us to take a look at their facilities. We were accompanied by Zingisa, a young Woman who works at the clinic and of course our fearless guide, Sanele (the picture above is Joe talking to Sanele and Zingisa in the garden outside the clinic). The clinic includes a main center with 2 buildings, and six satellite clinics in the nearby community, each consisting of 2 or three Rondewels usually one being the home of a clinic worker. Patients get treated at the center if there is space and medicine available, but that is not always the case.

What the clinic does not have is a doctor.

There are 13 workers running the clinic and dozens of volunteers working on the few community gardens that are set up on land donated by local farmers. The food from these gardens feed the patients. If there is any food left it goes to the surrounding community, but there is rarely extra food. The clinic has applied to the chief for more land to grow more food.

Most patients are treated for HIV/AIDS and TB. Other ailments are treated as needed and usually consist of the many effects of malnourishment, which is hard to treat at a place with no running water. You read that correctly, this is a health center with no source of clean water. And like I said earlier they have no doctor. They had one last year but his contract ran out in December and was sent back to his hospital 20 kilometers away. That is the nearest hospital that the people of Coffee Bay have to go to. I asked Senele what happens if someone in town breaks a leg. He said “They suffer”.

The clinic needs what all clinics need: Space, medicine, doctors and clean equipment. Here in Coffee Bay, those are all things that are hard to come by. It is only by the hard work of people like Zingisa that anyone gets treated at all.

Traditional Dance

Last night we were brought into part of the village and saw for the first time how the Xhosa people live. We drove in on the very rocky local roads, off the road, onto a grass pathway and stopped when we there was nothing left resembling a road. Then we walked down and around a few hills until we reached a set of Rodewels, mud and brick huts covered by thached roofs. We were indeed far away from home.

Upon our arrival we were invited into the larger Rondewel and treated to a traditional dance by 8 woman dressed in traditional attire. They are a local dance group, that dance and sing Xhosa folk songs to very fast paced drum beats. Between songs, our translator told us what each song meant and what the movements of the dance signified. Inside the Rondewel it was dark and lit only by candellight and the occasional camera flash.

After the show, we were invited into a second Rodewel that was the home of our host. As we spoke through our translator to two of the dancers there were food preparations being made, a few dogs coming and going and a child sneaking food from a clay pot on the floor. The ladies, M.Takayi and another, nicknamed Elsa spoke about their desire to bring dance to a larger audience and how hard it was to make a living in the village. There has been land designated by the Chief to build a center to showcase such local cultural customs as these dancers, but there is no money to do so.

We enjoyed our stay immesely and after sharing their talents with us, we all shared a cup of their homemade beer.

A Grand Summit

Before we left for our trip we contacted as many people as we could in Coffee Bay. Our host here at the Coffee Bat hotel was gracious enough to set up some introductions for us upon our arrival. She had told some of the schools about our plans and notified the community leaders that we were on our way. Great, we thought, we could hit the ground running. Today when we heard that there were people here to see us, we thought we would be meeting a handful of people then head off to visit a school or two. Instead, we walked into a conference room filled with about 35 people. It seems that the news of our mission had spread and many local leaders were anxious to see if we were indeed there to help.

We were quickly introduced to Sanele who would act as our guide and interpreter. The three of us walked into the packed room not exactly sure how we were going to handle this meeting. There were the expected school teachers and principles from local education centers, someone from the Youth Project, Medical clinic, Woman's Project, a few tour guides, a businessman and a about 15 local community farmers dressed in traditional clothing and painted faces, some carrying freshly grown produce each as uncertain as we were of how a room full of people such as this could agree on a common interest.

To make the situation more difficulty, less than half the room spoke English and half of them spoke it only slightly. The rest of the room spoke the beautiful language of the Xhosas (pronounced K-osa). The room was hot and the meeting started with a lot of nervous confusion by ourselves and our young and very exuberant guide still unsure of how to facilitate such an affair.

After about ten minutes of getting our bearings, we started to move ahead. We outlined our purpose of creating a project with the community involving as many local hands as possible. We would speak, Sinali would translate, someone would respond, Sinali would translate...etc. The meeting really took off in a positive direction when we asked each project represented in the room to describe to us how they worked, what was successful and what was not successful. This was the kind of feedback that we thought would take weeks to set up and now we were getting it in one giant overwhelming dose.

The meeting lasted about 3 hours and ended with us thanking them for their patience and interest in our ideas. What was the outcome of the meeting? We set up a full itinerary for the next week where we will be taken to the location of each project represented in the room as get to spend many hours with each watching what they do and listening to their stories.

Both of us walked away with some very stark impressions. The most prominent is that in a room with 30 people, there are 30 amazing projects deserving of our help. It will be one of the hardest decisions that we will ever make choosing where to spend our time. We have vowed not to judge which one sounds better until we meet with everyone individually.

The tour of the village starts tonight as we visit a traditional community dance troupe. More on that later

We are here!!!

First, let us apologize for the delay in posting. As you can imagine, it is difficult to find a reliable and accessible Internet connection. There may be a few days at a time without a post, then 3 in a day. Be assured that we are writing every night and you will be kept as up to date as fast as we can post.

We finally made it to Coffee Bay. After spending the night in Durban, we woke a bit jet lagged and confused, because with travel and time-zones, we had completely missed Thursday. We experienced our first example of Ubuntu last night. A man we met on the plane was flying back from Mozambique. He is helping to organize a pan-African arts program and happened to be sitting next to us on the flight (check out his program here http://www.cca.ukzn.ac.za/). After sharing stories about our respective projects, Peter and his wife Monica recommended an inexpensive place to stay for the night at the historic Durban Club (a fine place, but our shower didn't work) and offered us a ride to the hotel. Thank you both for your warmth, generosity and supportive words.

The ride from Durban was a ride through the diversity of South Africa itself. The further you travel outside the major cities, the more you see what makes South Africa unique. Beautiful landscaped dotted with mud huts (called Rodewels), clay shacks covered by corrugated metal roofs and other assorted dwellings. Every few dozen kilometers, we came across a semi-urban center busy with road side vendors and food stands highlighting a maze of people jumping in and out of traffic trying to sell their wares.

One fact about this region that is hard to ignore is the lack of transportation. Along every road, especially major highways are Africans walking to and from the market or work (wherever that happens to be that day). Despite what has been called the best economy in Africa, the unemployment rate can at any given time reach as high as 40%. This sad trend is most visible in the Eastern Cape as you pass by a middle-aged woman carrying a hundred pounds or more of lumber precariously balanced on her head, or a group of men holding up a finger to passing vehicles (a gesture that means "one man, one job, one day"). They are day laborers looking for work to feed their family, often large and covering three generations.

Once we pass Mthatha (Umtata), we soon reach the "Wild Coast", a stunningly beautiful region known for its rich cultural history,a region giving birth to many leaders of the country (Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo to name a few) and unfortunately its unacceptable level of poverty. Things that might at first seem quaint, like cattle crossing the road or children playing barefoot in a dried-up riverbed are just prevalent signs of neglect that this area has suffered through. Houses are left to erode without repair, school building stand empty and far away from those that could fill it with books and desks, and hours are spent everyday merely getting potable water from place to place.

We are left with a mix of overwhelming emotions that are hard to define.

We reach our destination of Coffee Bay about 36 hours after leaving NYC with tired bodies but an energized resolve to make this project successful. Our work begins tomorrow as we travel around Coffee Bay and get to know the people a little better.

Trains, Planes, and Automobiles!

The worst part of traveling abroad is, well actually traveling. We are writing this from a bar at the Oliver Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg. Not that we would ever promote drinking, but there is a special kind of of pleasure in enjoying a beer after sitting on the same airplane for over 16 hours. Westchester to Manhattan to Brooklyn to Queens, back to Brooklyn (for those of you keeping score: yes, we are expecting to navigate around the South African Veld
but yet can't manage to get to JFK without taking the wrong A-train), on to Queens, to Senegal, to Johannesburg...and we're not done yet. After this layover, we will have to take a shuttle bus to our connecting flight, a plane to Durban, then a car to the hotel for the night before waking and driving to Coffee Bay. Phew!

After sitting through a cross-hemispheric flight filled with babies crying, ribs soar from the sharp elbows of near-by passengers that don't understand the concept of personal space, and one too many leg cramps, we have just one thing to say:

Nkosi Sikilel iAfrika, (God Bless Africa)

Since we want to make these travel diaries not just a story about us, but a story about South Africa, here's a little bit about the phrase above. Nkosi Sikilel iAfrika is a song written in 1897 by Enoch Sontaga, a school teacher. It has over the years been a song of African freedom and pride. 100 years after it was written, the new constitution of the post-apartheid South Africa was adopted. During the same time, in a beautiful compromise symbolizing a united nation, Nkosi Sikilel iAfrika was joined with the long time anthem of the previous government to create a new National Anthem.

Off We Go!

After months of preparation, planning, and discussion, we are ready to begin our new project in South Africa. On Wednesday, we fly to Johannesburg, Durban and then drive to Coffee Bay. We are certainly not looking forward to the brutally long flight, but we are anxious and eager to get to work.

Thank all of you for your e-mails, phone calls and responses to our project announcement. If you wish to know more about where we are, visit this blog often. We will be posting daily dispatches from the road, with some photos and a travel diary outlining our progress. If you did not get our announcement, please send us an e-mail and we will put you on the list.

So long, friends. See you when we get back.

Welcome to Focal Point Aid

The world needs help, in many places, in many ways. But how can one person make a difference? Are the problems too large to overcome? Does giving money actually help anyone?

We all have at one time or another felt that our donations are lost in the shuffle, not efficiently utilized, or put towards a problem that seems insurmountable. Many people have been left frustrated, feeling that their charity has lead to little accomplishment, other than claiming a personal tax deduction.

The objective of Focal Point is to set up projects focused on one tangible situation somewhere in the world that could use a little help. A school in Asia that needs a bus, a hospital in Central America that needs supplies or a village in Africa that needs a pump for drinking water, to name just a few. We pinpoint one project at a time and put our resources together to fix that singular problem, then move on to the next.

The versatility of the project will allow us to undertake a project ourselves or help raise money for a program already underway. The ease of this model will also allow us to change the focus and location of our work with each project. People who wish to donate will know exactly where their help is going. As long as there are places that need assistance and people that want to help, there will be work for us to do.

Keep in touch, get involved!

http://www.focalpointaid.org/