M@nenberg Online – Shirley’s coffee shop.

The project has taken a whole new emphasis now that the infrastructure is built. We are now hiring someone to take care of the café. Someone who is used to M@nenberg Online, who knows the people and, above all, who has the motivation to start something new. We actually found this person : Audrey.

She is living in a township and knows how the internet café works as she has experienced IT training. She has been recommended by Cyril himself.

We worked with Audrey and Zachi (the muffins’ supplier) in order to create a sustainable and profit sharing relationship.

We are looking for sponsorings so we called on Coca-Cola to get a free fridge and we also went to Shoprite (a big supermarket in the area) to have free supplies for, at least, a couple of months.

This week (starting Monday 25) we need to follow the work on the partnerships and also to prepare the open day where we are going to invite the people from SHAWCO and all the workers, volunteers and people living close to the primary school and so Shirley’s café.

Audrey

M@nenberg Online – Shirley’s coffee shop.

The coffee shop is now built thanks to Joe and the whole Manenberg team. Joe (basically our driver but also a member of the team and a friend) found some wood and screws in his house and we were able to create the infrastrucure needed to start the café.

The first pilot has now started and we have already sold a few cup of coffee and some biscuits. In the township the word of mouth is spreading and people are really looking forward to seeing this project being achieved.

We think Shirley’s coffee shop is going to be self-sustainable quickly and will be a new resource for the whole M@nenberg online complex.

The grand opening day is planned for July 27.

Robben Island: between beauty and emotion

It's early in the morning that we have been on the famous "Island Seal”, almost 7km from the nearest coast for a visit of more than 3 hours including the boat ride and tour of the island. 

The History 

Robben Island was included on the World Heritage List of UNESCO in 1999 and was used as a prison, leprosy, mental hospital and military post of defense. 

The island was first listed by Europeans in 1498, when the fleet of Vasco da Gama reached the Cape of Good Hope. 

From 1658, Robben Island was used as a prison by the first Dutch settlers landed in Cape Town six years ago.

From 1961, Robben Island became a maximum security prison for prisoners serving long sentences (of ten year imprisonment), including members of the ANC and the movement of struggle against apartheid. Nelson Mandela was detained for nearly 18 years, from 1964, before being transferred to Victor Verster Prison near Paarl. President Jacob Zuma was imprisoned for ten years. 

In 1996, Robben Island service terminates center prison the following year to become a national museum.

Our History 

We took the boat to 9 o’clock for an appointment with history. The boat trip took 30 minutes and we could see seals and many birds along the route, watching for the slightest sign of a whale with attention, but without success! 

When we arrived on the island, we were divided into different buses where guides were waiting for us: the tour began. Our excellent guide explained the history of Robben Island while telling us funny stories about foreign tourists, he was even the guide of Barack Obama during his visit in 2006, when he was still Senator of Illinois. 

Then we could admire the beautiful view of Table Mountain from Robben Island beach, visit the prison, and visit the tiny cell where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for a long part of his life. We followed the entire tour with a lot of emotion and we will long remember this island, key part of the rich history of South Africa. 

SHAWCO Project - M@nenberg Online

Manenberg internet café is a small business already running inside a primay school in the township of Manenberg. They are offering services such as an access to internet, photocopies, and computer trainings. The business was able to develop thanks to the intervention of SHAWCO and all the students who went there to help Cyril and his team.

What is the next step?

We are now trying to set up a coffee shop inside the internet café which would allow people to get muffins, coffee, tea…

The coffee shop will be ran by the volunteers and we are trying to work with the people in the township. We also want to do an open day for the people to market both the internet café and the coffee shop. Finally when the coffee shop will be set up we would like to create reflexion sessions. People could share ideas and thoughts to develop the township.

We are really trying to make that internet café a place for people to gather and share, and, of course creating a new income for Manenberg internet café.

SHAWCO Project - KHAYELITSHA IT-CENTER (KIT)

HISTORY

Cape Town initially opposed implementing the Group Areas Act passed in 1950 and residential areas in the city remained un-segregated until the first Group Areas were declared in the city in 1957. When Cape Town did start implementing the Group Areas Act, it did so more severely than any other major city; by mid 1980s it became one of the most segregated cities in South Africa.

The discrimination and black population control by the apartheid regime did not prevent blacks from settling in the outskirts of Cape Town. After the scrapping of pass laws in 1987 many blacks, mainly Xhosas, moved into areas around Cape Town in search of work. By this time many blacks were already illegally settled in townships like Nyanga and Crossroads. As the black population grew, the apartheid regime sought to solve the ‘problem’ by establishing new black neighborhoods. Khayelitsha was established in 1985 and large numbers of people were forcefully relocated there, mostly peacefully, but occasionally accompanied with violence.

The Western Cape was a preference area for the local colored population and a system called influx control was in place preventing Xhosas from travelling from the Transkey without the required permit. After the historic 1994 elections, hundreds of thousands moved to urban areas in search of work, education, or both. Many of them erected shacks made of tin, wood and cardboard. Nowadays Khayelitsha has an estimated population of more than 450,000 (last figures are date from 2005), and its population is very young: fewer than 7% of its residents are over 50 years old and over 40% are under 19 years old. There are 35 Primary Schools and 18 Secondary Schools in Khayelitsha.

Since the ANC (African National Congress – the most popular political party in South Africa) come to power in the country in 1994, the ruling party claims that living conditions in the township have improved markedly. There have been many developments such as new brick housing being built, new schools being built, and the creation of a central business district in the Township. However many residents strongly dispute the claim that the quality of life has improved. They claim that crime rates remain very high and that only a small portion of residents see improvements as a result of infrastructure and welfare interventions. Around 70% of residents still live in shacks and one in three people have to walk 200 meters or further to access to water.

OUR PROJECT

Our team, composed by Morgane Monnot (Msc), Blandine Devriendt (III^rd year) and Grégoire de la Lande d’Olce (III^rd year) went to this township. We went there to discover people, to talk with them, to understand what they exactly need, what they can expect from us. We had the opportunity to meet a pastor and his wife – Joseph and Elizabeth – from  Life Community Welfare (LCW), a Non Profit Organization which aims to make a difference in the lives of less privileged people in the communities, especially children and senior citizens. Since the first meeting, we all had a good feeling!

Our initial project was to build a sustainable business based on production of school uniforms with 6 sewing machines the organization has. These sewing machines were stored without being used. It is a very useful resource to create revenues for LCW and for the community. We when started to do researches on suppliers to get cheap raw materials (cotton, fabric…), etc. We also started to find some women willing to work for this project. BUT, during our market study we were wondering if this business would be as useful to the community as we thought at the beginning. The pastor told us that it was a very nice mission, but something could be more useful for the community.

Actually, LCW has a computer room, with around 20 computers and 1 printer that has to be fixed and which are not used for the moment. Here is our project: setting up a business with these resources. So we had the idea to create an IT-Center and an Internet Café within the township – KIT, Khayelitsha IT-center. The aim of this center is to provide IT lessons to people, and to give them an access to Internet. Two major skills that are compulsory needed to get a job. The services that we want to implement are the following:

IT-Center	Internet Café
Typing	Internet usage
Windows introduction	E-mail
Lessons on Word & Excel	Scanning
Printing	Copying
Faxing

OUR CHALLENGES

Although this project seems to be easy to do, we encounter several difficulties. The major one is the fact that we have absolutely no resources (except computers). Actually, LCW does not have access to Internet neither to the electricity. For the moment, they use the power from their neighbor. That is a good way to get electricity for a short time, but it is not a sustainable solution. Concerning the Internet connection, they do not have any one. Therefore, for the moment, we are writing a business plan that could be implemented when power and internet will be available.

Nevertheless, as we do not want to stay arms crossed, we decided to start running the IT-Center. A business plan has to be conducted in order to well understand the market, the needs, the habits of people, their willingness to pay or not etc. And when we were doing this market study, we encounter another major challenge. We thought that our IT-Center would be the first in Khayelitsha, according to what people told us. That is false as there is already another one. As we are working as social entrepreneurs, the challenge is to give lessons cheaper than our competitors does, without destroying his business.

Another challenge is the fact that we will have to give the first lessons to the future trainers. As we do not have any money, any resources except computers, and in order to make the center sustainable, we will give lessons to 5 young people from Khayelitsha who will become the trainers of the center. It means that we have to find 5 reliable persons and willing to work at beginning for free (we are going to wait to be on the break-even point to give them a salary).

CONCLUSIONS

As Shawco’s volunteers, we are the first to set up a business in this township, Shawco never operated here: a very challenging mission that give us faith to work for people who need it, who deserve it! All the more so that this experience is very professional as we will have to write several business plans in our future carriers.

The Team - From Left to Right

Monnot Morgane – Devriendt Blandine – Elizabeth – Her 2-day old baby – de la Lande d’Olce Grégoire 

SHAWCO Project - Rags 2 Riches

Most SHAWCO projects are designed to be self sustainable, however, SHAWCO still relies on donations. The Rags 2 Riches project was designed to sustain SHAWCO's other projects without the help of donations. The project in itself is a charity shop which sells secondhand clothes collected from richer neighbourhoods. The target customers are two distinct groups: the first one is students that are looking for unique, cheap and quality clothes, the second group is women from the townships that buy clothes from Rags 2 Riches for cheap and resell them back in the townships to make a profit. 

The store opened a year and a half ago and is doing well. It has reached a wide audience, still it needs to build a stronger brand image and to make more and more people aware of its goal (mostly children education). Otherwise than marketing, the aim is to empower the women from the townships and to develop a sustainable model of community business that will help improve the business skills of the stakeholders.

(Pictures of the store are to come!)

Where we live

Our gang (because we are now definitely a gang) is staying at Observatory, which if you are part the hip crowd will call OBZ. It is one of the coolest, busiest, trendiest place in Cape Town, we would not have settled for anything less. Here is a little photo tour of some places to know in OBZ, there is a lot more to see but as far as OBZ is concerned, a picture cannot replace the live experience of this exciting neighbourhood. You will have to come and see for yourself one day!