Families of organ donors can honour and remember their loved ones at the new garden installation at the Durban Botanic Gardens.
Durban, South Africa (26 August 2021) – The Circle of Life Donor Memorial was unveiled at the Durban Botanic Gardens on Saturday, 21 August in recognition of all those who have generously donated organs, bone and tissue to enhance the lives of others.
The memorial is an initiative by Hero777, a non-profit organisation committed to raising awareness about organ donation in South Africa. Janet Legemaate, project coordinator and trustee for Hero777, explains that they wanted to erect a fitting memorial for organ donors in Africa’s oldest surviving botanic gardens in the month of August, which is Organ Donor Awareness Month.
The memorial will create an uplifting place of reflection. “It acknowledges that while donors may have died, their selflessness and altruism in donating their organs has restored recipients to health and markedly improved their lives,” Legemaate explains.
Circle of Life is a colourful, cheerful space in the garden, aimed at both honouring organ donors and their families, and creating a conversation piece that seeks to stimulate discussion around organ donation. The space was designed around an existing plaque commemorating donors, which has been enhanced by the addition of a wooden bench, donated by the Organ Donor Foundation, that looks out onto the butterfly garden. Here donor and recipient families can reflect on the obvious symbolism of renewal and transformation.
The main element of the design was three interlocking rounds of paving reminiscent of a child’s drawing of a butterfly, with a large central “body” and smaller “wings”. The interconnected circles represent links between the families who have donated and the organ recipients, whilst the rounds themselves represent the circle of life, wholeness and the trinity. Hand-painted butterfly stones have been set into the centre of the rounds to acknowledge individual donors with their own unique stone.
A unique butterfly selfie frame, donated by Vitanova, the connective tissue bank of South Africa, invites people, particularly youngsters, to take a photo and spread the word about organ and tissue donation.
At any given time, some 4300 South Africans are in need of organ or tissue donation, but only 0,2% of our population are registered organ donors, according to a 2019 publication. To find out more about organ and tissue donation, please visit odf.org.za.
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