A very rainy dry season – July Update I

Over 30 volunteers from various universities in the United
States had a great week with Khula Holiday Club.

July has certainly been an eventful month in terms of weather! The volunteers battled the downpours of rain in their waterproofs and overcome the strong winds, determined to continue their work on the projects. We also had over 30 volunteers from the University of California and Louisiana State University join our team of volunteers for one week. The end of July brought the height of our peak season and the volunteer house was soon bursting with volunteers from all around the world. Here’s a brief highlight of what went on during the past few weeks here in St. Lucia. 



Home Based Care 



In July, the volunteers came up with innovative ways of helping our home based care patients. The volunteers delivered a newspaper to Veronica, whose condition remains very much the same. They have also been cleaning and doing household chores for Christopher and Gogo One Leg. Christopher was having a lot of pain in his eyes (a side effect of the TB medication he is taking), which the volunteers and Nokwethemba were very concerned about, though his condition seems to have improved over the last few weeks. The volunteers are planning to bring him a care package of cleaning supplies in the coming days. Gogo One Leg currently has a sore on her foot so the volunteers have been encouraging her to go to the clinic. Although she was sick at the beginning of the month, Gogo Breast Cancer is doing well despite her old age and the wound on her chest is healing well. Bheki, after numerous visits to the hospital and still more to come, is still in pain although his Kaposi’s Sarcoma is looking much better. 



10 Families



After being quite worried about the Mthembu II family, the volunteers this month have been paying them extra attention, creating a CV for Gugu, making regular stops at her house, and starting a garden for her. With frequent help from Zakhele, volunteers also spent time repairing the Luthuli fence, digging holes for new poles and reinforcing the garden’s wire. Gardens have also sprung up all over the 10 Families project, as volunteers have been working in the Mavundla, Ntimbane and Mkhwanazi gardens and have been clearing Gogo Joyce’s yard to make room for a possible toilet. They have also made plenty of food parcel deliveries to the Mkhwanazi family, as they continue to be affected by several tragedies, including the death of the oldest Mkhwanazi son. The volunteers also visited the Mtshali I household, where they are planning to patch the family’s house. Our growing donations have allowed us to also distribute a number of clothes, shoes and school supplies to a couple of the families, including Mavundla and Mkhwanazi. 



Support Groups



July saw the Ezwenelisha Support Group relocate to the local church for the first time. Although numbers dwindled at the beginning, we soon saw more people start to attend. The Ezwenelisha group also spent one morning in Khula to see how the morning flows at their Support Group. They also took the opportunity to listen to hear how their garden and craft selling works, which gave the Ezwenelisha Support Group food for thought. We are hoping that next month we see the start of their own vegetable patch and their own crafts ranging from bags to purses. 

The Khula Support Group had a very successful month filled with many interesting discussions – in particular, the group discussed pregnancy with HIV and the use of ARVs whilst pregnant. The ladies spent one late morning watching Dolly’s debut performance in a movie filmed in Khula. As always, the ladies have been making and selling crafts by the bucket load and having a blast doing yoga with David. They even spent one Support Group teaching the volunteers all about how they make their crafts and jewelry.