Around 70 gogos and makulus got to go shopping for free, thanks to a special market where everything is a gift:
Embo, South Africa (19 May 2024)—With all the emphasis on other pressing social issues in South Africa (from youth unemployment to struggling parents and children needing access to educational resources), elder South Africans are often pushed aside. But in a heartwarming effort for the elderly, a special market welcomed around 70 gogos and makulus to enjoy a shopping experience where everything is a gift.
In Embo, non-profit the Robin Hood Foundation’s Mahala Market popped up—bursting with everything from clothes and shoes to household items and accessories. And biscuits. And even new loadshedding lights. All the essentials that make the sunset years what they should be—a time of enjoyment.
You’d be forgiven for wondering how a market could operate if there are no buyers or sellers involved. In a unique dose of gifting, the Mahala Markets come to town to restore dignity through choice, as led by the Robin Hood Foundation heroes.
Where essential goodies and items considered handouts do have their place in making a big difference for so many facing life’s toughest cards, the opportunity to go to a market, shop freely, and choose your own goods similarly makes a huge difference with the added bonus of choice-led empowerment. And of course, fun.
The markets work by organising enough items to eventually host a market day, where they then get to ‘set up shop’. Earlier this year in Fairbreeze, 300 people were helped with essentials after the brutal flooding their community faced thanks to another Mahala Market.
The gogos and makulus had a fantastic time choosing their spoils, in what the Robin Hood Foundation considered “another wonderful, fulfilling morning trying to help ease the struggles that so many of our elders face everyday.”
In the wonderful words of Israelmore Ayivor who wrote a quote just for the Robin Hood Foundation’s ‘Vollies’:
“Giving does not only precede receiving; it is the reason for it. It is in giving that we receive.”
Sources: The Robin Hood Foundation
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