Holders of Hope

This week I have had some big conversations, this is not that surprising as I tend to initiate deep conversations with most people I meet. But this week has been quite full on in that way, homosexuality in the Bible, faith and politics, the death penalty and the faults of capitalism to give you an idea…

Teaching Chelsea about who is running our country! Featured political quizzes and wine - good combination...

Lunch with people from Heathfield Baptist Church, discussing faith and politics and marriage in the Bible.

I have been doing workshops on children’s human rights this week.
It feels slightly odd to be talking about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights with people who have never heard of them or have any idea what World War Two is…. a topic I am so familiar with in a place that causes me to regularly re-evaluate my assumptions – takes some thinking about.

I explained that no one has to do anything in order to get human rights, you don’t have to belong to a certain religion, be rich or be a law abiding citizen in order to be treated with dignity and respect.

Later in the workshop I talked about human rights abuses and used two examples from last years ‘Write for Rights Campaign’ by Amnesty International, these blew their minds. They couldn’t believe that someone could be tortured and imprisoned because of a text between friends or accused of trying to overthrow the government due to a photo of political graffiti on Facebook. We then talked about how they would feel in this situation... (I did a similar activity with the group of young people at Alderbrook Sixth Form, encouraging them to empathise – there couldn’t have been more different results!)

The teenage boys honestly believed that killing people out of revenge was an obvious decision and by no means morally questionable.
Their mind set was so defensive, if you attack me then I’m not going to blink before getting my own back.
They wanted to kill the teacher who had reported the joke between friends, they wanted to kill the police officers who arrested them and they wanted to kill the witnesses that had got them into prison in the first place.
Suggesting that all those people are human beings with the right to life was an alien concept, clearly their human rights were more important than those who were offending them. These boys didn’t talk to shock or get a reaction out of us, they were simply answering the questions bluntly, it was obvious to them what action they would take.

That evening I turned to my notebook, and wrote a page of questions:

-          What makes me different to these boys?

-          Why do I have higher aspirations for my life?

-          Where does my hope come from?

-          When God looks at them what is he thinking?

-          Why should you treat people better then they treat you?

 And so the list went on and on.
 I then mind mapped some of the things that have helped me get here:

-         Consistent education with family and friends encouraging me to try my best.

-          People holding hope for me when I couldn’t believe in a better tomorrow.

-          People listening to me when I expressed an opinion.

-          People trusting me to make independent decisions and plans.

One of the five notebooks I bought with me, this is where I splurged all my questions.

I then prayed for all the people who I am working with and asked for wisdom on how I can offer an alternative view point without coming across as ridiculously idealistic and naive.

This also got me reflecting on people who have held hope for me, I was reminded again just how powerful this is. I am in awe that so many close friends and youth workers (Sarah Sharpe!) continued to pray for me, continued to listen to my expressions of utter hopelessness and anger whilst firmly believing that there would be a day when I could step back and hear their words as statements of truth. I am so grateful for their persistence and patience for I know that I didn’t make it easy for them being stubborn and a little opinionated.

I heard a comment recently that ‘As Christians we should be the most positive people on earth because we know what is to come’ I struggled with this a lot.
I care so deeply about the injustice and suffering that overwhelms the world – how can I possibly care about this and be positive at the same time?
I have to ground myself and trust that God has the last word and he is loving and just ALWAYS and therefore justice will come eventually if not in my life time.
Ahh why is my reaction even as I am typing this!

There is a clip I always go to when I think of hopelessness, it has got me through some difficult days, it was one of my important things I quoted at my baptism and it came to mind again today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGuO6hzI8Ok

Prayer requests:

-         -  To resist the urge to become numb to what I am experiencing, had some dips in mood over the last couple of days and can get to the point where I simply don’t want to care about anything.

-         -  To trust that God is in control and he holds hope for these young people.

-         -  To always listen to the young people I am working with, not getting distracted by running the session exactly to plan but taking the time to give them my attention fully.

Thank you for making it to the end of my eighth blog post!

Ps. The Christians in Politics PAX clip is now up! I went to London just before I came here to discuss my faith and politics and young people, was brilliant  - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LIV2xMyR95s

Pps. Here are some skydiving photos I got sent from last week.

Perfecting the balance of workshops and west wing

Time works differently over here it seems, the days feel long. For each one requires so much brain work, I am now coming to the end of my second week and it feels only an hour ago that I was writing up last week. This makes no sense to me.

We have an Internal Review Meeting every Friday morning, we share stories and cases from the different legal clinics and social justice projects. This week I have been to five projects and talked about the following things: peer pressure, children’s human rights and the women’s marches following Trumps Inauguration (see placards made by the women at St Anne's).

Got introduced to this song that was part of the protest at the Women's March, would highly recommend giving it a listen:' I can't keep quiet' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeQD9QwYC5M

I have seen one of the young people slap another right across the face with no reaction from prison guards, I turned up to a session where we were expecting 20-25 boys and were met with 54, I have been turned away from a prison because policemen had been bought into help search the boys for weapons after some had been found on the premises.

Additionally I have led an activity of match up with key words, definitions and images with 54 boys all of different ages and abilities with success! They behaved well, listened and took pride in their teamwork. I have spoken to a mother who has been trying to get her child into a disability school for years thank me many times when I told her that the school thought it would be two months before her son could have a place. My heart has only just started processing what I have been experiencing. This makes me feel small.

Another thing to add into the mix is goodbyes, already the legal team I was introduced to last week has diminished in size from 6 to 2. Come Monday there will be 5 volunteers with one starting last Friday and two more coming this morning.
This chop and change in the team and unpredictability in the workshops probably explains why time doesn’t make sense, my brain is playing catch up constantly. I have been processing this by trying to leave work at work and have separate activities to fill my time at home.
This feels a bit odd, but am sure it is worth it. When I get home I eat, sleep, watch west wing and read books. There isn’t wifi at home so can use data to get in touch with the world but don’t have it on for more than a few minutes at a time. This stops me from getting drawn into wasting time scrolling through BBC News or Facebook.

Goodbye meal last week, AMAZING food!

I am on the third book in the Narnia series, have begun Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell and am 13 episodes into the first series of West Wing.
My love of West Wing persuaded me that it was necessary for my sanity to bring the entire box set with me, all 168 episodes.
This was a good decision.
These fictional spaces allow me to switch off and spend some time in a familiar world. Furthermore one of my house mates is a West Wing fan and is interested in global politics, this allowed us to talk about electoral reform within 24 hours of knowing each other – how exciting is this?!

This is how I packed my hand luggage!

Overall this week has had its frustrations and joys, I am taking each day one at a time in a way I have never been able to do at home. I also find myself praying much more than I did at home, instead of the twice a day I am used to I seek wisdom during my planning time, for patience and compassion as I walk into the prisons and rest as I go to sleep.

Also this week I went skydiving! It was absolutely incredible! Will share photos in my next blog post, am still waiting for them to be sent through to me.

Prayer requests:

-          - To continue to take each day one at a time and enjoy living life in such a different way

-        -   To build good friendships with Ryan and Julia (people I have met at church who I am spending the day with on Saturday)

Thank you for making it to the end of my seventh blog! 

A World of Contrasts

I am in South Africa! This fact still hasn’t quite sunk in despite me seeing Table Mountain on my way to work each morning. Am definitely waiting for my brain to catch up with everything I am seeing, experiencing and hearing.

I landed on Sunday morning collected my luggage and met the driver from Projects Abroad, we began chatting about my previous trip to South Africa and how corrupt the government is, but within 15 minutes of leaving the carpark I witnessed my first car crash, a lunatic driver swerved through cars in front of us, driving very recklessly before crashing into a van and causing it to flip over several times. It is common for people not to wear seatbelts in Africa this resulted in passengers being propelled out of the windows and onto the side of the road. 

As you can imagine this was not the welcome to Cape Town I had imagined. Eventually the police and ambulance arrived but the driver had kept going only to cause another crash round the corner. The driver I was with got out to give details of the car to the police and after a short while we continued on our way, at the scene of the second car crash we heard that the driver had been caught as he had abandoned his car and ran for the Township.

All along the side of the main road coming out of the airport is a huge Township/ Informal Settlement with a population of 1 million people. The multi coloured shelters have been a sight I have seen again and again this week as I have gone to the prisons. It never ceases to fascinate me how stark the difference between the rich and poor is, this is very apparent in Cape Town as they live in close proximity.

I had inductions on Monday to Projects Abroad and to my Social Justice Project. Met the full team of the legal volunteers, having met a handful of people on my trip to the Water Front on Sunday. I have consistently felt disorientated this week as I walked round the Water Front - I might well have been in any sunny country with a sea view. I saw a H&M, Monsoon in air conditioned shopping centres, but encountered Zebra, Warthog and Caterpillars in the food market. It was clear that the Water Front is a man made tourist destination for foreigners and not seen as part of Cape Town by the locals.

Me post eating a fried caterpillar, was not great! 

I discovered my week will look quite a bit different from what I had imagined:

Monday – AM, case work and planning – PM, Vredelus a centre for juvenile female offenders both awaiting trial and sentenced offenders.

Tuesday – AM, Lindelani offers specialised assessment and care for young people who have been identified as needing care due to neglect, abuse or behavioural problems. Girls alternate weeks with PM Lindelani Boys

Wednesday – AM, case work and planning – PM, Bonnytoun a detention centre for sentenced teenage boys

Thursday –  AM, St Anne’s a shelter for abused women – PM, Bonnytoun a detention centre for teenage boys awaiting sentence

Friday – AM case work and planning with Internal Review Meeting at 10:30am with all Human Rights staff and volunteers – PM off

As you can see this is full on! This coming week will be my first experience of this from beginning to end, I am nervous to be constantly walking into new places but am keen to have a taste of every project I am working on. Look forward to Friday afternoon next week when I can take a step back and see what I will actually be doing.

So far I have only been to Bonnytoun (Wednesday and Thursday) and spent the rest of the week being introduced to the different topics verbally and been handed 13 cases to work on. Cases come from people walking in to the office asking for help but mainly from legal clinics run three times a week in different impoverished areas for people who can’t afford the transport cost to get to the office. I will be working on cases that have no legal element, most of them are problems that in the UK would be worked on my a social worker.

As I have mentioned this week has been full of contrast, some time has been spent sat working on my laptop in a cool office with other volunteers around me, some time has been spent in stuffy prison rooms with young offenders leading a workshop about peer pressure whilst Michael (the new head of Social Justice, an ex offender who started the week before me) translates as and when needed into the language of gangsters ( a mix of languages spoken around Africa with words of its own, I am told even if I wanted to I could never learn this without being a member of a Township gang). Some time has been spent eating pizza at the Waterfront and taking stunning pictures at Hout Bay. Putting sun cream on has become part of my daily routine, so has conserving all possible water as we are currently experiencing a big drought across the cape. This truly feels the thousands of miles it is away from my old routine in the UK.

I have so much more to talk about but know I have many weeks to fill you in on all my racing thoughts and mind blowing experiences.

Prayer Requests:

- Energy! This is SO exhausting, am going to sleep much earlier than I am used to in order to get plenty of sleep in before my early start in the morning, am looking forward to things being familiar in a couple of weeks.

- Good relationships at church to form, went to two churches on Sunday and think I am going to go to the one at the bottom of the road regularly, was great to be introduced to new people who are completely separate from work.

- Good planning to fit in my church work during my lunch breaks at work where there is good wifi connection. 

Thank you for making it to the end of my fifth blog post. 

Hopes that have become realities

Ahh! This is my last blog post before I go to South Africa, just two sleeps left!

I am so incredibly amazed at the opportunities that have come my way since September, I wanted to share with you my hopes and dreams that have come to fruition.

As recorded in my notebook on the 13th September I prayed for three things:

1) For exciting opportunities to make a difference, open my mind and empower others.
    'For the sake of the world burn like a fire in me'

2) For a support team as I left DBT and with friends going of to university. I wanted to grown with great friendships that promoted courage and optimism.

3) For eagerness to explore the bible and my faith more.

Exciting opportunities:

- Christians in Politics Youth Engagement Board
This has involved working with other young people around the country who are eager to reach out to young Christians and encourage them to engage with politics.
CIP - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aa4canKcoYo
As you can imagine this is right up my street! Have loved doing listening workshops with young people in Knowle and hearing about what politics looks like to them. Also had an amazing opportunity to do some filming with PAX a Christian Organisation that aims to look at how faith impacts life. Will let you know when the clip is complete and ready for viewing - it is an interview with myself and two other young woman each of us from different political parties, sharing our views on faith and politics.
PAX - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-RBmxb6_pI

- Amnesty Enrichment Project at Alderbrook Sixth Form
Last year my Solihull Amnesty Group was contacted by Alderbrook Sixth Form in Solihull to see if we wanted to run 10 weeks of enrichment sessions on a Wednesday afternoon. This was an amazing chance to spread awareness of Amnesty International in Solihull and engage young people in Human Rights. So exciting! So I took on organising it and running the first five sessions with the lovely Pooja and am now handing over the David and Celia to do the last five weeks. It has been great to facilitate discussion about the Refugee Crisis, encourage debate and independent research with 6 students. Did my final session this week on Guantanamo Bay, always love talking about the tension between terrorism and civil liberties. To find out more like the Solihull Amnesty International Group on Facebook to get the links for the weekly blog.

Support Team:

It has been amazing to strengthen friendships with so many people in the last few months. In particular friends who have been or are on gap years now, sharing memories and experiences has been such a source of encouragement. Very grateful for the late night texts, long skype calls and many coffee catch ups! Thank you to Kara, Charis, Fiona and Victoria for keeping my sane and sharing this journey with me!

Faith:

- Christianity Explored
In October I started the Christianity Explored course at Knowle with Anna. It was brilliant to work through Mark's gospel with a group of people over a series of 8 sessions picking out how it was relevant to our everyday lives. It was a chance to get to know more people within Knowle Church and deepen my understand of the Bible. Really grateful for everyone in my group who shared their stories and insight into the bible study.

- Home group 
I have joined a home group, a proper adult thing to do! I have managed to go to two sessions before my trip and discuss Genesis and how God reveals his plans and promises to us, which has been great. I am very grateful for them taking me on as a temporary member during my gap year, it will be amazing to have this as a link back to Knowle church when I am in Africa. Thank you for committing to pray for me and keep up with what I am doing, really appreciate it.

- Knowle Church
I have been going to the 7:30pm service for the last couple of years now and enjoyed hearing from a range of people. Getting to know both the young people and the adults who go there has been great. In the last few months having the chance to work for the church, doing social media and admin for the Youth Team has really boosted this. I feel much more at home there now then I did last summer, was lovely to share my a few details of my trip with them on Sunday and give prayer requests. Look forward to updating them when I get back.

Prayer Requests -

- Saying goodbye to my family on Saturday afternoon
- Pacing myself when I get to South Africa, got induction days on Monday (office& small tour of the city) and Tuesday (in the Social Justice Department, getting my schedule)
- Good relationships to begin with my host family on Sunday

Thank you so much for reading PART ONE of my blog posts, can't wait to share the start of PART TWO next week. Eeeek!

Structure makes me happy

On Friday I found out lots of information.
I got both my host family allocation and my placement details. WOW I imagine you are thinking in response to this, my head started to spin a little as I began to process this news.

First my host family allocation -
I will be living with Brenda Moses and her granddaughter in the suburbs of Cape Town with up to 5 other volunteers. There are 3 volunteer rooms with bunk beds, a shared bathroom for all of us, kitchen and lounge. It is amazing to see photos of all these spaces that will become so familiar to me a couple of months from now.
At the moment I can see that when I arrive there will be one other volunteer who has been there since the 2nd January, they will be there the whole time I am, additionally there is a volunteer who will arrive a week before me and stay till March.
There is a Facebook group for all of the volunteers in Cape Town, which I have just introduced myself on. It is amazing how many projects are taking place there!

I also got my weekly timetable for my placement -
Monday - Wednesday I will be doing workshops on life skills, human rights awareness and drugs and alcohol rehabilitation in the community.
Wednesday morning - I will be visiting shelters for abused and destitute woman.
Thursday - This is debriefing day, I will be working in the office (image below), researching and planning the next weeks workshops, as well as reflecting on the week.
Friday - The law firm is closed to clients due to weekly meetings.

Monday - Thursday: 8:30-4:30pm
Friday: 8:30-1pm
Weekends - free

Now my visa is sorted (being collected on the 8th Feb) and I have structure to my trip I can begin to get very excited!

It was so lovely to have so many brilliant people come over on Saturday afternoon for cake and be able to share all this information with them. I am very grateful for everyone who has supported me over the last few months through financial support, prayer and encouragement. Look forward to writing weekly blogs when I am in South Africa to update you all on what I am doing!
It is now 33 days to go!

Prayer requests:

- I have a few weeks left in the UK so am meeting up with lots of people for the last time in a while, please be praying for those times full of excitement.
- I have mentioned energy before, but reading through my weekly timetable I am reminded just how much of a challenge this is going to be.
- Hopefully I will be able to get in touch with some of the people I will be living and working with before I go, please be praying for good relationships.
- I will not have any internet where I am living, I hope this will be more of a blessing than a annoyance, but it will defiantly be an adjustment! Please pray that I get the balance right between keeping in touch with people at home and embracing a new culture fully.

Thank you for making it to the end of my fourth blog post! Have a great week.

Between the pages of a book is a lovely place to be!

One of the aims of my gap year, especially in part one - the time before I travel, is to do things I haven't previously had time for. Having spent the last 15 years of my life in education from Monday to Friday it has been a huge shift to have so much say on how I spend my time.

One of my favourite things to do is get lost in a book, during peak exam time the only book I read was 1984 and even that was in the name of Cold War revision. So as exams ended and the long summer holiday presented itself I went on my usual reading spree - these were a few of my favourites:

- Room by Emma Donoghue, this was one of my read in 2 days books, very captivating story about a mother and son who are being held captive in a room.

- The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul by Deborah Rodriguez, this was a Christmas present a couple of years ago and I really enjoyed the insight into life in Kabul, it was a slightly less intense Khaled Hosseini book.

- 1000 lashes by Raif Badawi, this is a collection of Raif Badawi's blog posts that got him imprisoned for 10 year and sentenced to 1000 lashes in Saudi Arabia. I recognised Raif Badawi's story from Amnesty International Campaigns for political prisoners and felt compelled to know more about his story.

- Enemy Combatant by Mozzam Begg, this is a harrowing read and infuriated me to no end. It is the life of Mozzam Begg an ordinary British citizen that was captured, tortured and detained in Guantanmo Bay for 3 years. To this day it isn't clear why he was taken from his family home in the middle of the night, I would highly recommend reading this! It has increased my desire to campaign for the shut down of Guantanmo Bay in my life time.

- Labyrinth by Kate Mosse, this is a great book that switches between two interconnecting stories centuries apart. Is a long book but defiantly a page turner.

-  On Liberty by Shami Chakrabati, this is another re- read and a book that I wish I could get every person in the UK to read. It is about one of my favourite topics, you guessed it HUMAN RIGHTS. It is the reflections of Shami Chakrabati in her role as director of Liberty and how she has seen human rights legislation change since 9/11.

- Vanishing Acts by Jodi Picoult, I read this whilst lounging on the sailing boat we spent a week on in Turkey whilst the rest of my family did all the hard work (at least I admit it)! Jodi Picoult is one of my trusty authors, I know that when I pick up a book with her name on I will enjoy seeing all the jigsaw pieces fall into place as the plot comes together.

Between January and August I read 13 books.

Between September and December I read 12 books!
Whilst I was eagerly waiting for my structure to emerge during September and October I went a bit crazy on the reading front and read a couple of books a week and several I would start and finish in one day cover to cover. These are my favourites:

- Election Notebook: The Inside Story of the Battle Over Britain's Future and My Personal Battle To Report It by Nick Robinson, WOW, what a fantastic eye opener to the behind the scenes of 2015 politics! I loved the informal writing style and comments of Nick Robinson, Political Editor for the BBC as he travelled the country following the political campaigns for both the Scottish Referendum and the General Election. Especially as someone who joined the Liberal Democrats on the 10th May 2015 it was fascinating to see some of the back ground in our electoral defeat.

- The Truth about the Henry Quebert Affair by Joel Dicker, this was essentially a murder mystery with many twists and turns and intricate characters, stayed up most of the night reading this! Was possibly my favourite fiction of the year.

- Very Good Lives by JK Rowling, this is one of my favourite speeches of all time, I almost know it word for word.Last Christmas mum got me an illustrated copy of the speech and I love reading it. Encourage everyone in the world to listen to JK Rowling Harvard Commencement Speech to hear her talk about the importance of failure and imagination! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHGqp8lz36c

- Justice by Michael Sandel, I finished this book having had lots of breaks in reading it, it takes some brain work! But is worth the effort! It talks through lots of different philosophical theories relating to justice with real life examples to help you get your head round them.

- The Girl who was shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai, this was absolutely amazing! I wrote about it in more detail in my last blog post see here http://myonlinenotebookacf.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/reflections-on-importance-of-empathy.html

So that is it! And after all of that if you are interested in what I am currently reading it is Between the Extremes by Nick Clegg! LOVING IT!

Very impressed if you made it to the end, wanted to document something that has taken such a prominent place in my gap year.
Thank you for making it to the end of my third blog post.