Project News  

Sibongile: Where Small Things Make a Huge Impact  

The second Tremendous Hearts volunteer to work full-time with the children and caregiving staff at the Sibongile Day & Night Care Centre for children with disabilities, Becky Molinini has been witness to many changes there. It is a place where even the smallest successes make a big difference, and reminds us of the "power of one" that Tremendous Hearts holds at its core.

Becky & Bukelwa

As Becky reports, some children who were carried everywhere and always spoon-fed ultimately did not need this level of dependent care. Relying on "tough love," she has helped the staff encourage these children to crawl or push themselves outside and to feed themselves. To the surprise of all at Sibongile, they learned quickly and are now doing it "with a smile on their faces and their chests out with pride." Such success inspires the staff to hope for, and accomplish, more than they once thought possible.

The last few months have also seen a number of Sibongile field trips - something that was challenging to convince the staff to do, due to the cultural taboo in South Africa against people with disabilities. Time out in the community, especially multiple trips to story time at the local library, has proven successful, and the children look forward to their next trip.

Becky has also been working hard to develop within the children a sense of independence and pride.  She has:

• Advocated for hip surgery for one of the teenage girls, who had been in pain from a dislocated a hip for months. It took some persistence to schedule surgery but now, every time she is asked if she has any pain, "She gets a huge smile on her face and shakes her head, 'No'!"


• Helped to arrange feeding appointments for the children who are fed via feeding tubes. Many have never had the opportunity to eat by mouth and they watch in envy as others are fed. These appointments will help teach the children to eat using their mouths for the first time.  


• Worked with the staff to identify which children in daycare would benefit from the use of gait trainers and walkers. One little boy responded so well from using a gait trainer that he is now able to walk around the classroom. He calls the walker," iMoto," meaning his car. 

Sibongile's mission is to "make children with disabilities feel loved, and receive excellent physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual care. They are doing this, with the support of Tremendous Hearts volunteers like Becky.  She is  helping create individualized programs of physical, occupational and speech therapy - with knowledge transfer to, and training of, the local staff - so that each child in their care reaches his or her full potential.

The Masazane Soup Kitchen, which was opened earlier this spring to feed more than 145 orphans and vulnerable children in the Paarl township of Mbekweni, has increased its reach to serve another 300 local food-insecure children daily.  The six grannies who run the kitchen are working creatively to stretch their food supplies to ensure each child who comes to the soup kitchen receives a serving.  In the coming months, the Tremendous Hearts support team will be working with the Drakenstein Municipality to ensure the sustainability of this project.     

Click the image above to watch the Masazane Soup Kitchen in Action

Alumni News   

What Really Happened

In 2009, our family came to South Africa to spread the ashes of Johan's grandmother who had grown up in Stellenbosch near Cape Town.  While we were there, Marilyn Votaw invited Johan, a pediatric physiotherapist, to visit Sibongile, and our family spent two days working with the children there.  

We fell in love with the children, the carers, and the mission and vision of both Tremendous Hearts and Sibongile.  When we returned to the U.S., we decided we had to find a way to spend a year volunteering at Sibongile through Tremendous Hearts.  In August of 2011, we packed up our suitcases, rented our house, and boarded a plane with our children, Zachary (12) and Violet (9), and began our adventure in South Africa.  

Here's what happened:  Our daughter Violet loved being at Sibongile more than anything else. She requested to go there as often as possible to play with, help with, work with the children. When we weren't at Sibongile, she talked about the children, told stories about them, and came up with ideas of what to do with them on her next visit.  Our son Zachary formed lovely relationships with some of the smaller, quieter children, and relished his time with them.  He helped plan projects for Sibongile including buggy soccer and a trip to the aquarium, and did hard physical work during the daycare renovation.  Johan spent the year working full time, training the carers, collaborating with them on ways to better the children's care, reinforcing proper positions for the children, re-fitting their buggies, supporting weekly carer meetings, developing relationships with Red Cross Hospital, and running trainings for the larger Khayelitsha community.  Sara helped Sibongile raise funds, run events, and plan lessons and outings.  It was our hope that this work would move Sibongile forward and pave the way for the organization to better care for the children in the future.    

Johan & Sara and their Sibongile Family

But here's what really happened:  We thought we were coming to Sibongile to offer our time, skills, love, and help.  And we did.  But the truth is that what actually happened was so much more than that.  Because Sibongile is full of love and songs and humor.  Everybody shares.  People work incredibly hard.  The children know they are part of something, that they are loved, and that they belong.  We saw bravery and determination from these children that amazed us and inspires us to be braver and more determined in our own lives each day.  We developed meaningful friendships with the carers and staff.   We shared some traditions, spoke each other's languages, laughed, celebrated, and cried together.  Our family gained just a small sense of what it means to be part of the Xhosa community, but this has powerfully affected our understanding of the idea of community.  We are full of amazement and gratitude for our amazing year at Sibongile.  Our year at Sibongile was a gift.  This gift has transformed our family, our lives, and our way of looking at the world.  

As we have settled back into our lives at home - Johan with a new job at the THOM Metro Early Intervention program in Boston, and Sara back with the Actors' Shakespeare Project -

we find some thread of our thoughts, and a large part of our hearts, remain on the other side of the world. 

One Turns To Three 

Jumping into the middle of an unfamiliar culture, making a temporary living situation feel like home, adapting to driving on the left side of the road, mastering the Cape Town highways and byways, living and working in buildings void of central heat during South Africa's chilly rainy winter...all of this required a variety of resourcefulness skills.  Often it is only when you are furthest from home, and the least sure-footed, that you realize - or remember to draw upon - your own strengths.

I went to Cape Town in mid-2012 to "preview" volunteering for a year and to help wherever help was needed. Since I would be a Tremendous Hearts volunteer for only two months, it was necessary to speed up my learning curve so I could jump right into one of Tremendous Hearts' projects.  And, as is often the case in South Africa, "one" quickly turned into volunteering for three projects, in three different townships (Khayelitsha, Mbekweni, and Nyanga), using three very different skill sets.  I did event planning for Etafeni Day  

Beatrice & Joye

Care Trust. I held some intense individual counseling sessions with an overwhelmed Home from Home social worker. And I did grassroots development work with six grannies starting a soup kitchen for 150 hungry and vulnerable children. What a ride!

My motivation for volunteering was to make a difference wherever possible.  The need was so great and available resources so lacking, it was evident early on that my efforts would be useful and welcome. Every other volunteer I've talked to says this is what makes it so hard to leave when responsibilities back in the States call you back.

The two months flew by, and I am back at my job in Fort Collins, Colorado, thousands of miles and many worlds away from the struggles of the people in the Cape Town townships. But in a nanosecond, I see the faces of the people I met, and feel the incredible connections made as we worked together to serve the most vulnerable among us - the children. 

And now, I am left with an unresolved dilemma - how can I be most effective for them moving forward? I may return to South Africa for another year to work where every interaction with a child seems to make a difference, or remain in the States to recruit volunteers and raise the funds necessary to ensure that Tremendous Hearts continues to make a long-term impact. Either way, I am left with a continued sense of purpose, a great sense of hope, and an unrelenting desire to continue to make a difference.

Currently, we are seeking volunteer professionals who can devote 6 months or more of service. This time period allows volunteers to get up to speed and make a significant difference in the lives of both the children and caregivers with whom we work. There is an especially intense need - and we hear it from every organization here - for professionals who can provide counseling and emotional support to our caregivers, all of whom are under stress and many of whom have suffered tremendous loss and abuse throughout their lives, yet continue to find the strength to care for children in need.

Of course, Tremendous Hearts welcomes volunteer professionals with other expertise as well, including: physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech and language pathology, fundraising, business, athletics, education, and more!