Easter Drama 2010

This evening the children of Salvokop performed their Easter Drama (see previous posts). The children were sooo committed. When we started with drama in Salvokop 10 years ago, we practised for weeks and weeks. The children then were very unruly, stole sweets and toys and were just generally very difficult to work with.
Now the children are ... well still noisy children, but there is generally much, much better co-operation and good manners and lots more enthusiasm.
God is working there and angels abound....

Here we are all dressed up and ready to start the Easter Drama.

Pastor Joel welcomes the people, because it is already 17:15...

But where are the people? The parents in Salvokop do not really support their children. I pray that these children will one day support their children. (My mother never attended any of my ballet lessons, but I made sure that I very regularly attended my children's classes and certainly all their performances! It takes a community to raise a child, and a generation to really make a difference.)

Tannie Lalie explains what this drama is all about.

Joyful, joyful.... (The highschool girls did two beautiful dances)

"King of King and Lord of Lords... "the Junior boys await the coming of Jesus to Jerusalem with gusto.

"Jesus is coming!" (You will never guess who is sitting in the back row! What a pleasant surprise Retha!!)

The devious religious leaders scheming on how to corner Jesus.

Eat this bread, it is my body... Sabatha (with brown head cloth) was Jesus for this part. She has been part of Inkululeko since she was 3 years old and is now in Grade 7. All the other children in the picture had been in the pre-school while I was still the principal there.

Shaen, Tamerin's brother and my niece Eugenie singing Panis Angelicus. Eugenie also sang other background music and Shaen was a pillar of strength at the computer and C.D. player! Thanks Shaen! Thanks Eugenie!

The tired disciples sleeping in the Garden of Gethsemane.

"We found this man misleading our people!"

(Dimakatso, the priest, was still a preschooler, alone in their house when it burned down. Later their shack burned down too. His mother was convinced they had been bewitched.)

Jesus walking down the streets with the cross bar of his cross.

A willing Jesus being nailed to the cross by zealous soldiers.

"When I survey the wondrous cross..."

Christ the Lord is risen today... Halleluja . (I coached the disciples and this dance and what a joy it was!)

Celebrate Jesus!

Joyous celebration from the stands.

Vigorous gumboot dancing, celebrating Jesus.

At least the hall is fuller now...

Jesus is alive today - this man was shot, but because he carried a Bible on his chest, he was not killed. (A skit by boys from the shelter across the street of the Community Centre.)

Thank you Jesus for being there tonight!

May you all have a very blessed Easter. Our Easter has already started on a very high note!

Drama Jitters

I have so much news. Last week was Martelize's Ouma and Oupa day at her school and in the afternoon she and I had a lovely outing.... ending at her meeting Janita.
I have been too busy to blog (or to read blogs): Tomorrow is our Easter Drama at Salvokop! We are no where near ready, but the children are sooo positive and committed.
Please pray that their parents (or someone) will come and support them. Several of the children were the "underachievers" while at the Day Care Centre and they probably are still underachieving at school... but in the drama they too can be SOMEONE and they eagerly participate.
Dear God, please bless all the drama children. Please let their parents allow them all to participate tomorrow.... (Carmen did not come today, because she had to clean the house!) Please let no-one be sick, and please let the parents support them and come to watch the drama. And most importantly Lord, please let the children meet YOU in all this!

Long time no see

We've been rather busy! Here are some of the things that kept us busy.

45:32 (!) That's how long it took me to complete the Midmar mile this year. (In case you don't know, the Midmarmile is the biggest outdoor swimming event in the world.) I swam a minute slower than last year and I was (am) much fitter this year than last year! I mean, I actually trained a bit in December and January and I have spent a whole year religiously doing water aerobics at least 4 times a week!

Why the dissapointing time? I never looked at my watch once during the race - I thought it would discourage me. I had a good time swimming, even though the water was a bit choppy and I swallowed quite a bit of water and got the usual amount of kicks by other swimmers. I talked to God and He talked to me all the way as I reflected on specific chapters and or verses for about 100 metres each:
Matthew 1
Mark 2
Luke 3
John 4
Acts 5
Rom 6
1 Cor 7
11 Cor 8
Matt 9 (The books after 11 Cor do not have enough books so I started with Matthew again.)
Mark 10
Luke 11
John 12
Acts 13
Rom 14
1 Cor 15
11 Cor 13 (11 Cor does not have a chapter 16)

The adrenaline to compete and to push myself never really kicked in, and I am dissapointed in myself for not trying harder, but very, very grateful for good health and the ability to still swim a mile.

Jan and I stayed in Umhlanga Sands and had a glorious time of rest. I took some photos but they are not blog material.

One of the things God said to me while I was swimming was to give more of myself. So I phoned the principal of Inkululeko to see where and how and I could be of assistance. Inkululeko is the preschool where I was the principal for the first 7 years of its nearly 10 years existence. It is part of the community centre in Salvokop, a very poor dilapidated residential area in the C.B.D of Pretoria. Besides uplifting children, the school has also given many of the staff members a chance in life to improve their own lives. The now principal, Thelma, was originally appointed as a cleaner there. She is now busy with her degree in foundation phase education. The middle group teacher, Josephine, was also a cleaner for several years. She is also busy with E.C.D. training.

Anyway, even before Thelma and I had a meeting, Lalie phoned to ask me to help with the Easter drama (passion play) at the community centre. So that's part of what has kept me busy: first of all to prepare a dance for my group - ballet nogal! And secondly to start practising the dance and script with the girls. Quite a few girls turned up on Tuesday for drama practice and I was thrilled at their eagerness and DISCIPLINE. Lalie and I did the first of several Easter Dramas exactly 10 years ago. We had more than 70 eager, but very noisy and naughty children! They used to steal, fight and generally not listen to us! And now! What BLISS! I could talk to the children in a normal voice (no shouting to make myself heard) and they concentrated and generally were just sweet and good. Most have them have been at Inlululeko when they were preschoolers (the eldest is now in Grade 7) and know the ropes. HURRAH FOR INKULULEKO!

Watch this space! More to follow about the Easter Drama!

Another concert at Salvokop

Here we are again! Lalie and I in front of the Inkululeko stage busy with a concert!

I was the principal of the pre-school (Inkululeko) at Salvokop from its beginning in 2000 till the beginning of last year. In this time, the pre-school performed many concerts and other performances. The community centre (older children and sometimes adults) also regularly performed "Easter Dramas" (Passion plays) and end of the year concerts. I was always in charge of the pre-school performances: not too difficult with lots of help of the rest of the staff, Win Bryant who readily made costumes and my sister Lalie who always helped with decor, costumes, dressing children etc. Jan also always helped with anything from welding tables to installing lights. The community concerts were another matter altogether! Here Lalie shouldered the burden for most of the productions alone. This year she did so again!
About 3 weeks ago, Lalie (who is at the moment once again a substitute teacher at the pre-school), got the go ahead to produce the major part of this year's community concert (again!). I volunteered to help, but my help was very limited. (I only manned the overhead projector and was the narrator for one item).
Lalie wrote the scripts, directed, made the costumes for each and every child.... and to get them fired up, she singlehandedly treated the different groups to camps before rehearsing started. These camps have been going on for years. The result is groups of committed children despite their very disadvantaged backgrounds. It is so heartwarming to see the development of individual children, but also of the community as a whole.
Here are some pics of the different items... produced at very short notice! As Lalie says, she could not have done it without God. All is part of His greater purpose for the community! He is there! God, you are so awesome!!

St George and the dragon.

The whole dragon: moving wings, tail and claw. At the actual performance, his vicious mouth no longer opened and closed so easily: the boys had so much fun practising with it, that the head nearly did not survive to the bitter end. An interesting phenomenon was that many boys who were "naughty" or poor achievers in pre-school pitched up for this drama with great enthusiam. At the community centre, anyone who wants to, can be part of the drama.

Surrendering to Jesus...

Ordinary men empowered to fight in Jesus' name

Angels against demons

A part of the Senior girl group dancing gracefully. Lalie taught them some ballet steps and they all beamed in their beautiful wide skirts and pink organza wraps. They really internalised the music and the dances.

Sabatha: She has been part of the community centre since it started: she joined the Pre-school as a 3 year old, only a month after we opened our doors. Now 8 years later, she is still an eager member of the drama group. Her younger nephew, Khotso, is also a very reliable community child: he can be sent to call his friends to come for practice. Sabatha's older siblings used to take part in all the dramas but have now moved on. What a beautiful family

Young girl angels dancing