The Bhambayi Project’s “Stories of Hope” evening honoured and highlighted all the stories over the last ten years of partnership with the students at Durban Girls’ College.
Durban, South Africa (25 April 2023) – This past Thursday evening saw a wonderful celebration of 10 years of partnership being celebrated. The evening was to highlight Stories of Hope and how the Durban Girls’ College has played an important role in the Bhambayi Project’s Friday afternoon Maths Club in Bhambayi, Inanda, for the last decade.
The Bhambayi Project runs a community-based orphan support model, which looks to re-story the lives of orphans and vulnerable children, through relationships and empowerment, enabling them to become courageous agents of change in the world. There are over 200 children on their programmes. They believe in, and practice, what they call eye2eye giving, a two-way approach, where every person is both a giver and receiver, with dignity not being compromised by the ‘powerful’ giving to the perceived ‘powerless.’
Rather, what you will find on a Friday afternoon are volunteers, mainly from DGC, teaching Maths and Neema Literacy Programme to Grade R to 12 children. What you will also find are children from Bhambayi teaching the volunteers games, dance moves, an abundance of laughter and relationships growing between people whose lives ordinarily would not have crossed paths.
The benefit of these afternoons is staggering in its two-way giving. Many a DGC pupil has shared that it is the highlight of their week, one going so far as to say she felt it had in some way saved her. The children in Bhambayi say that they have new friends and they are now good at Maths. For a number of children, this has also led to their Maths talent being identified and them being given bursaries for Inanda Seminary and St Nicholas. One of these individuals is now in her second year at UCT studying Civil Engineering and is a leader in her residence.
At the end of last year, the Bhambayi Project had a thank you for the DGC helpers. One of the young boys from Bhambayi was nervously thanking the girls for the difference they had made. Suddenly his face lit up and he shouted “Especially You!”, pointing at one of the DGC helpers- obviously the helper of his group.
The Stories of Hope evening is an opportunity for powerful stories of impact to be shared. The stories follow the themes of The Bhambayi Project’s H.O.P.E. Building Model which believes that how we see others and how we give has the ability to change our nation.
H is for Honour rather than pity, O for long-term Outcomes rather than handouts, P for a focus on Potential not lack, and E for empowerment rather than solving problems on the other’s behalf.
The evening was truly memorable, with DGC girls performing marimba music, djembe drums and an a capella item, fantastic shwe shwe gowns and outfits created by Bhambayi Project’s seamstress Thembi Biyela, stories shared which ignited tangible hope, and new relationships formed across often impenetrable divides.
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