August Monthly Update

What a month and what an incredible way to end 'peak season'! August alone saw 32 volunteers give their time, effort and skills to our three projects and we are so happy that everyone gave 110%, 7 days a week!

Some sad goodbyes were shared as we said farewell to long term staff member AlannaWallace. She will be greatly missed here in St. Lucia but we know she will be moving on to inspire and empower more people as she has done here.

Volunteers planning for the week ahead

Our MedicalOutreach and HIV Awareness project has been very busy this month with so many volunteers. 

We have been able to visit the clinic up to three times a week, community members have been getting a lot of help on home assistance and we are starting to see improvements with some patients on Home Based Care and 10 Families. 

We have begun to visit a new family on our 10 Families nutrition program who are in great need of love and support. 

Gogo has been left with her four grandchildren who are all very malnourished and in need of some serious attention.

Volunteers along with Nokwethemba visited the family and took clothing donations, toys and cleaning items. After giving all the children a bath and fitting them in their new clothes, help was given to Gogo around the house and garden.

All five of the members are now on our nutritional supplement Epap and we are beginning to see improvements in their weight and health.

Melinda and Abby on their way for a morning at clinic

Clinic has been extremely busy with volunteers seeing 1118 patients!

Amongst our Adult HIV Education graduates there were two B&Bs in St. Lucia that participated. 

All who took part passed and not only did they receive a certificate but the business did as well for showing their commitment to their staff members. 

We have had some difficult times on the medical project with Big Mama passing away from Home Based Care and Skinny Boy from 10 Families. This was tough for volunteers and Nokwethemba as they both were patients who we visited regularly. Both funerals were attended and we took a donation of food to show our support to the families. 

So much happened this month on our Medical Project, and volunteers were instrumental in it has being so amazing! 

Our VulnerableChildren and Rural Family Support project has gone from strength to strength over peak season with the garden in Ezwenelisha for our Support Group being a huge highlight. 

With the fence completed and the soil ready, volunteers and support group members have planted all types of seedling; spinach, onions, green peppers, tomatoes and beetroot are all starting to take great shape.

This has been such an achievement for all involved and we hope that it will continue to develop and grow as the weeks go on. 

The girls enjoying their garbage pick-up day

Garbage Pick-up and Girls Club joined forces for one afternoon and cleaned the primary schools play ground collecting 15bags of garbage, bringing the total of bags for the month to 60 bags of garbage! 

Girls Club have also journaled on topics on inspirational women, and were able to decorate new journals whilst learning about taking pride in everything that you do. 

This group of girls are very special and we are excited or the rest of the years activities.

Inkanyezi Crèche continues its makeover with all the tyres in the play group getting an expert paint job. Volunteers spent one morning painting amazing designs on the tyres and it really brightens up the yard. Needless to say Mama G was delighted by the results. 

Meeting the crocs!

One of the highlights of this month’s community project was returning to the Crocodile Center as volunteers.

 Each week volunteers have been visiting the centre or go out into iSimangaliso Wetland Park and clean crocodile pens, cut back alien plant species and make new paths in the forest.

 Volunteers and staff have learnt a lot about crocs whilst at the centre and have even had the chance to get up close and personal!

 We are excited to continue our work with this fantastic project.

Peak season is always a great time for our OrphanDay Care and HIV/AIDS Education project as we can visit multiple crèches! This month we attended Snenhlanhla Crèche, Khula Nomathiya and a week at Inkanyezi Creche (still including Fridays).

One very happy learner

Child Assessments were completed and it was amazing to see how much the children at Khula Nomathiya and Snenhlanhla had improved since the assessments at the beginning of the year.

The teachers were thrilled with the progress the kids had made and it was lovely to see our Zulu education coordinator Shwele so proudly showing the report cards to the principal.

 All the children at Khula Nomathiya can now write their ABCs and 123s without help or looking at the wall chart!

 Well done to all the teachers, volunteers and of course Shwele for all the hard work that has been put into helping these children achieve such great things.

 Reading Club has now seen 5 members gain their gold certificate status with three of these becoming ‘Zulu leaders for Zulu readers’.

Adult English Class enjoying an afternoon of lessons

All the children at Reading Club continue to impress us with their reading skills and more and more reading goals are being achieved each week.

Adult English Class is fast becoming a volunteer favorite as the students are getting more confident every week in their ability.

Mama Doris especially is practicing her English whenever possible and she is really enjoying the lessons volunteers have been putting together.

With the amount of volunteers this month we were able to put on some awesome events nights as well as attending some in the community.

 THAF (The Happy Africa Foundation) intern Stacey held some great fundraisers, including quiz nights and a Mexican themed evening, all raising a lot of money for THAF, find out more by visiting the monthly update from Stacey!

Happy Hearts vs AI 

International Women’s Day was a highlight for many people as a game of netball pursued. African Impact played against ‘Happy Hearts’, the local team in Khula. Happy Hearts did extremely well and beat African Impact hands down!

 THAF delivered a donation of football jerseys received from some lovely Irish volunteers to the local football team. 

Following this hand over everyone cheered on the football teams who battled it out for the winning title.

Although the rain was pouring down it didn't dampen anyone's spirits and everyone had a great day. 

After both the matches volunteers performed a short play on drug awareness demonstrating the dangers of how drugs can affect you.

Our final group of peak season

Overall it has been an amazing month and a fantastic way to finish peak season. Thank you to everyone who has been part of the year to date. 

The passion and dedication shown by all the volunteers is truly inspiring, and we are so proud to have you join us as part of the African Impact St Lucia team.

 You all really have made an impact! 

We look forward to keeping you updated on how everything in St. Lucia is going!