Kickin' it in Cape Town

Last week I traveled to Cape Town to spend some time with my sister Jesse, who’s studying abroad at UCT, as well as to perform as the featured artist at the Verses Poetry Session.

I was already a big fan of Cape Town after the last time I visited back in October, but with it now being summertime down here in the southern hemisphere, I fell deeply in love with this place all over again. I still believe that, despite its often sour reputation, Johannesburg is the gem of South Africa. Like a fine wine that one slowly but surely acquires a taste and fondness for. Cape Town on the other hand, is like a big jug of mama’s homemade Kool-Aid. As soon as you taste it, you can’t get enough. You’re immediately enraptured by the natural beauty of Table Mountain, the converging shores of the Indian and Atlantic Ocean, the eclectic mix of European and African cultures, and how all of the girls in Cape Town seem curiously and captivatingly good-looking.

I had a great time kicking it with Jess, going to the beach, people watching at UCT, partying with the Cape Town GRS Interns, and hanging with my old Davidson bud Jessica Walker, who’s getting her masters at Africa’s top university.

The week in Cape Town concluded with my show at the Verses poetry session. The setting was intimidate, the audience was energetic, and everyone seemed very receptive to my work. And between Jesse, Jess Walker, the GRS interns, and all of these people’s respective friend groups, it was awesome see some familiar faces and have my own unwavering cheering section in the crowd. I did some old classics as well as some new pieces. The night was great and I’m glad I’ll be making my way back to Cape Town soon.

Below you’ll find one of the newer pieces I’ve written, ‘Dear South African Girl’, performed recently at the African Leadership Academy. Check it out, pass it along, and I hope you enjoy:

One Africa & U2 Concert

Over the course of my time working for Grassroot Soccer here in South Africa, there have been a number of occasions where the perks of working at the world-class Nike Football Training Center have made themselves apparent.  Whether it be access to track suits and tennis shoes supplied to us by Nike, being able to watch professional and international soccer teams train and play, or being able to meet the multitude of activist, policy makers, and celebrities who pass through to tour the facility during there time in Johannesburg.

Last week, we were told by the Cape Town headquarters that the one, the only, legendary, world famous, internationally acclaimed, globally renowned, universally extra-super-awesome-amazing band, U2, would be coming to the Nike Center before their big concert on Sunday.

So while I’ll admit that U2 isn’t necessarily one of the most frequently played artists on my ITunes, I was still excited for the opportunity to meet and liaise with Bono, the guitar player who always wears that same beanie, and the rest of the crew.

The morning they were supposed to arrive, Tizzy, AJ and I blasted U2 in the office and played our imaginary air guitars as our South African colleagues looked at us as if we had lost our minds. When the van pulled up to the center, we all peaked our heads out of the office to be amongst the first to catch a glimpse of the guys. Then, there they were. Out of the van stepped…a group of white people I didn’t recognize at all.

Turns out Bono wasn’t coming to the Nike Center, it was members of his advocacy organization One. Initially, we were disappointed. After being under the assumption that I was going to meet U2, meeting some policy advocates on international development seemed like the worst thing in the world. Turned out to be far from it.

While I had heard and read a bit about One, we ended up learning much more about the organization and their strategies on tackling the problems of global health, extreme poverty, universal education, and a multitude of other important initiatives.

Following their visit, we were invited to be guest the following Tuesday at the “One Africa Symposium: Economic Transformation Through Transparency and Technology.” The event brought together African leaders in economics, agriculture, development, and technology for an evening of thought-provoking discussions and impressive displays of how Africans are taking great strides in some of the continents most difficult problems. It reminded me of a TEDTalk. And I’m obsessed with TEDTalks, so to experience an event like this in person and have the opportunity to meet with some of the speakers at a reception afterwards was really great. More than anything, it was an incredibly inspiring event and definitely reinforced why we’re doing the work we’re doing.

Also, and unexpectedly, we were given two tickets to attend the U2 concert at Soccer City on Sunday night. And with none of our coaches or staff really knowing who U2 is, and with Tizzy frolicking down in Cape Town, AJ and I made our way down to the stadium to rock out with our favorite Irish superstars. I had never been to a concert quite like this one, but I have to say I enjoyed it.

Alphas in Joburg

When I entered college, I never really envisioned myself joining a fraternity. Not that I had anything against them, I just didn’t think it was something that fit my personality. Even amid the fact that most of the men in my family were members of Omego Psi Phi, and almost all the guys on my soccer team were members of Kappa Sigma, I didn’t think it was something I was that interested in.

That changed however, when I met the Alphas at Davidson. I was immediately impressed with all the guys and how it seemed like a group of motivated young black men who shared my values, stood up for what they believed in, dedicated themselves to service, and were just overall really about their business. For me, the opportunity to surround myself with a group of guys like that outweighed any apprehensions I initially had about joining a fraternity.

Phortue501A - My boys for life

Being a member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity has had an immeasurably positive affect on my life since I joined my freshman year of college. It’s how I’ve met some of my best friends, been involved in some great service initiatives, and have also enjoyed my fair share of parties with the guys. But my appreciation for Alpha and what role it has played in my life has been reinforced over the past few weeks during my time with the Rho Phi Lambda Chapter of Alpha here in Johannesburg, South Africa.

I had heard rumors that there was an Alpha Chapter in Joburg before I came, but for some reason brushed it off as some sort of random fabrication. “Alphas in Africa? That’s just silly.” How wrong I was. So a few weeks ago, I found information about the chapter online, reached out to the guys, and was immediately and without hesitation brought into the family of Alphas living here in Joburg.

Joburg chapter being introduced at the National Convention last year

Through the guys I’ve been introduced to an assortment of really interesting people I never would have met before, and aspects of life in Joburg that I had no idea about before. And as much as I love the beautiful game, it also doesn't hurt that AJ and I now have a group of people to play basketball with on weekends.

Additionally, (I feel a bit spoiled by my timing) because last week the Alphas of Johannesburg hosted the National President of the fraternity, Skip Mason, and the entire board of elected officials within the fraternity. The guys from the US came across the Atlantic to officially charter the second chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha on the continent (there was already a chapter in Monrovia, Liberia).  To mark the occasion, amongst a series of other events, there was a dinner that was attended by nearly 200 people, of which the proceeds went to the African Leadership Academy and the Teboho Trust. Both great organizations doing amazing work.

The night was a lot of fun and reminded me of the reasons I joined Alpha in the first place. Good guys, worthy causes, and a good time. I’m excited that Alpha, which also has now has chapters in Europe, is extending its reach throughout the world, and I’m excited to be a part of it.

Sidenote - shout out to my boys at the Tau Omicron Chapter of APhiA for winning 1st place in the Davidson College Stepshow...no big deal

Heal the Hood

Shout out to Jessica Walker for showing me this...

Heal the Hood is a dope organization operating out of Cape Town that uses Hip-Hop and B-Boy culture as a tool to engage kids and give them something healthy and productive to do with their free time. Even here with GRS I've found that one of the things that often hinders these kids from making healthy life choices is the fact that they have so much free time. And anywhere in the world, the US included, the formula is pretty consistent...kids + free time + not many options when it comes to how to spend that free time = bad decisions.

So organizations like this one are absolutely necessary in the holistic approach to changing the trajectory of these kid's lives. Here out their website here.

And here's a video giving a rough breakdown of what they do:

Thembelenkosini Library

In our efforts to recruit the best possible  coaches to join our Grassroot Soccer Soweto family, we exhausted pretty much every resource we had available out here. And while many of the people and organizations we went to were extremely helpful, there was one person stood out above the rest.

Khosi

Khosi, a women that Thato – one of our Community Program Coordinators knew – provided us with a vast network of qualified young adults she knew throughout Soweto. This provided us with a deep and talented applicant pool and gave us the opportunity to select the coaches who would best deliver our program in local schools.

In continuing to get to know Khosi, we learned about an organization she had founded in Seaoane, Soweto that serves as a community center for orphans and vulnerable children, Thembelenkosini Care Givers (Thembelenkosini means "Trust in God"). AJ and I were inspired by Khosi’s compassion and commitment to her community and decided that we would help the center in whatever way we could.

Before...

 

After checking out the room that the kids of TCG often studied in, AJ and I decided that it could use a bit of a makeover. Hence began the renovation of the Thembelenkosini Library.

Since I’ve been here, I’ve been blessed to win a few poetry competitions, perform at some great shows, and even make a video of a poem I’ve done. I’ve been even more fortunate to receive monetary compensation for many of these. And while this is internship certainly doesn’t cut me a lucrative paycheck – or any paycheck at all for that matter – I’m the kind of person who doesn’t really need all that much stuff anyway. So rather than use the money I’ve gained from poetry gigs to buy some stuff I didn’t really need, I figured it would be better to use it to buy the paint and materials we’d need to renovate the room.

Due to the fact that work has been extremely busy lately, we had to settle for working on the library on weekends.

Now I don’t claim for AJ or I to be any experts when it comes to the craft of painting – I actually consider myself pretty artistically inept – but I think both of our dad’s busted our butts enough growing up to drill the basics of painting into our systems (shout outs to Big Daddy Smith and Papa Grant).

Careful not to get paint on the new dreads coming in...

Pops will tell you this was all his doing...

After a few long Sundays, some spilled paint, a couple ITunes playlist blasting, some more spilled paint, some help from Tizzy and Thato, and a bunch of little kids begging to leave their own mark on the project, the Thembelekosini Library came out better than I think any of us anticipated.

Call me Lil' Van Gough...

The final touches...

There’s only one thing left to complete the project…BOOKS. And lots of them. These kids are so eager to learn and read, but unfortunately they don’t have a great deal of books to choose from at the moment. And the center is struggling for monetary resources.

They were alot better at this than I was

This is where you come in! If you have old children’s books (ages 3-17) laying around the house or know someone that does, toss them in a box and send them to:

Clinton Smith, III

6610 Marigny St.

New Orleans, LA 70122

I’ll be home for the holidays and will work out a way of getting them back over to South Africa.

Or if you’re in South Africa and are interested in donating just shoot me an email at cwardsmith@gmail.com and we’ll work something out.

Whooo!!!

AJ and I have also been busy building a website for the center: http://www.thembelacaregivers.org/

We don't claim to be any experts with web design either, but we figured it was a decent start.

Please consider donating

Please please please consider donating books to Thembelenkosini Care Givers, it would mean more to these kids than you’ll ever know.

World Aids Day HCT

Yesterday, December 1st, we held an HCT at the Nike Football Center in honor of World Aids Day. An HCT is an HIV Counseling and Testing Tournament where participants are involved in a day long soccer tournament, go through a series of GRS SKILLZ interventions, and are presented with the opportunity to be tested for HIV by qualified nurses & counselors.

As we've come to expect, there were some last minute obstacles thrown in our way (last minute adjustment and willingness to adapt are the name of the game here), but all things considered, the event went really well. Kids, coaches, and community members got tested, the weather was beautiful, house music was blasting with DJ Tabiso on the 1's and 2's, and most of all the participants had a great time.

It was a long long long day, but well worth it in the end.

If you'd like to learn more about World Aids Day and what it is all about, check out the official World Aids Day website: http://www.worldaidsday.org/
 

Interventions

Team waiting to play

Kids waiting to get tested

The winning girls team

After a long day at work, sometimes you just gotta dance

Training of Coaches

Last week was a long but rewarding 5 days as we held our Training of Coaches Seminar (TOC). After spending the previous few weeks recruiting and interviewing potential coaches throughout Soweto, we decided on a final 20 who would become the newest members of our GRS Soweto team.

Throughout the week the new coaches and staff took part in a series of activities the included team building, HIV/AIDS education, facilitation skills, how to hold a vital conversation, referrals, and learning how to effectively deliver our curriculum.

Although we certainly put in some long days, the week was especially rewarding for me since I had had the opportunity to interview all of the coaches. To see how much some of them grew and came out of their box within just the span of a week was pretty amazing to see. It was the first time I had been on the opposite side of the desk during an interview. The experience made me realize that while an interview can be helpful in determining whether or not someone is qualified for a position, you really won’t know what that person is capable of until you spend a significant amount of time with them.

While Grassroot Soccer’s primary focus is providing kids throughout Africa with the life skills they need to make safe healthy choices, the transformation undergone by many of the coaches during their tenures with GRS is no less significant.  They become more confident in themselves and their abilities, become role models in their communities, become part of a family that will always support them whether they remain with the organization or not.

We now have a total of 44 great coaches who change the lives of kids everyday, and I’m proud to be a part of that family.