From Cape Town to East London, the past three weeks have been spent on the road.
Our intention of making the drive was to support my dad before and during his Iron Man race last week in Port Elizabeth and then go and visit the extraordinary Champions Development youth sports program up in East London. Here are a few pictures from the trip:
Our buddy ‘Lenny’ the Locust drove 8 k’s into town with us via the windshield. Bugs are scary here in Africa. And they are prevalent during harvest season here in the valley.
A day hike we took to ‘Crystal Pools’ with a bunch of the youth from the church.
Our favorite pose. No apologies. The Cape here is glorious…
A view from the top
The water in the pools (aka snow/rain runoff) was FREEZING so I didn’t actually bother to get in. Ha.
Everyone else who had been swimming was regretting it later in the day when the wind came off the ocean and made them freeze the whole hike down.
We located the pot of gold in a farmhouse as we were driving to George…. Lucky guys. 
Now for the Iron Man pics… I can only put a few pictures up now but we got some excellent video that we are still figuring how to load on. It was SOOO exciting and I was so proud of my dad! The Iron Man is a race that is a 2.4 mile swim (in the ocean! not a pool, people), 112 mile bike and a marathon- 26.2 miles of running. CRAZY! He finished in 13:50- of of his best times yet, at 56 years old. This was his 5th one and he did great!
Here he is geared up in his fancy wetsuit, representing home with the ‘Nevada’ cap on:
The funny story about this wet suit is that he has never swam in a race with one before. My mom suggested he get one and so did the people at the race expo because the water is just cold enough to give you a headache if you swim too long. The last thing a racer wants to do is to get a killer headache as they begin the 12 hr+ day! My dad thought he was going to be one of a very few wimps who opted for wearing a suit, but when we got out there, there wasn’t a single person with out one! 1700 competitors and all were wearing these Orca suits! So he fit right in and finished his swim time 20 min. earlier than expected!
Here is his transition onto the bike, event #2.
And running through the finish gate! (Sorry about the blur)
He was guided right to the medical tent where he sat down, had an I.V. put in and took one bag of saline plasma to help him rehydrate. (He has learned in the past that if he doesn’t do this, his body begins to shut down, his blood pressure drops and he has to get rushed to the emergency room. One race, he was so dehydrated that his body took FOUR bags.) But he was good this time to eat and drink every 30 minutes so that his system would stay healthy. While doing this race, this is half the battle.
After East London, we kept driving up to the city East London, where we stayed with new friends Jono and Sarah Kruger, who are heading up the Champions Development Project for underprivleged youth.
One day, Jono was so excited to take Jesse to this famous surfing beach to show him the waves, but as irony would have it, there was a sardine run happening off the coast that day and they attracted some visitors.
Apparently people weren’t taking it too seriously, as they were still out in the water! However, there was not the slightest chance Jesse was getting in! Sharks are probably his #1 fear and he wasn’t going to take his chances….
We went to check out the project and to help with the building by doing some real construction. Here is one building that is half-way completed. As you can see, it is unique in that these walls are actually stacks of sand bags! This is an emerging type of construction that was suggested by the visiting engineer from New Zealand. The materials were cheaper to buy, it will help with insulation, and young, inexperienced workers were able to help in the process. Their additional help made the work go much faster. They will seal the walls with plaster after running the plumbing and wiring through. Jono wants to use this building as a classroom to teach young men woodworking skills so they will have a trade to make a living.
Here, Jono is talking over the next phase of building with his right hand men. The man in the white shirt will be the wood class instructor. He is very skilled in making wooden handy things that they will be taught how to make as well and eventually sell. The man in the reddish shirt, Peter, is the engineer who is volunteering with his wife for one year here and is in charge of the design and construction.
God birthed the idea of this program in Jono’s heart when he was 22 years old and now only three years later, they are going full steam ahead in design, construction, and fund-raising. Last year, Champions Development was GIVEN 160 hectares of land by a private donor. They had been painstakingly looking for a location to accommodate developing the dream and only government land seemed to be available. The downside with using government land is that the church (who is doing most of the sponsoring) would be limited in involvement. But when this land was given to them, it not only had existing man-made contouring and building structures, but they would now be able to have full authority in project planning.
As we were walking around this property, formerly “Reptile World” ten years ago, it looked like the abandoned site of Jurassic Park 2- all the plants had overgrown the walkways, the ponds, the buidlings… The windows were broken out, and there were weeds and debris everywhere.
At one point, the main pond was turned into a trash dump and there had been no management of the site since it was left eight years ago. (It is the large cream circle in the left side of the picture. Approx 12 ft across and 6 ft deep.) But Jono has been very fortunate in having the help of a 19 year old local, Tabo, who is working 10-12 hour days on the property, clearing out all of the overgrowth. He has been nicknamed the “Human Machine” because he moves so fast and throughly while working! He is not only a hard worker but has a wonderful charisma and bright smile that light up a room. He loves people and sometimes gets lonely working alone during the day, but Jono will often hear him singing worship songs when he pulls up. He is the modern day talented young gardener from “The Secret Garden” who is transforming this land through love and dedication.
Tabo has a very moving story and we are going to put of video footage we got of him once we can figure out how to load it on. He was abandoned by his parents at age 3 and was cared for by his older sisters for a couple of years before they also left him for prostitution when he was 8. He became a street child, stealing to eat and live, until he was taken in by the children’s home Daily Bread where Jono came to know him. At the age of 18, they can no longer care for and provide schooling and many are forced to go back to living on the streets, becoming criminals and getting heavily involved in drugs and alcohol. But Jono offered to give him a job. He eventually thinks Tabo will be managing the property one day and strongly desires to raise up young black men with the intention of making them into good leaders who handle responsibility with integrity and excellence. Tabo is a shining example of one of the leaders who will make South Africa’s blacks gain more respect amongst the working society.
Along with donating $1,000 of our raised funds to this project for sports and building supplies, Jesse was able to help them design the rugby and soccer clinics. He will be contributing exercises and training drills that will put the athletes on a more advanced training system than their competitors who are at expensive rugby academies that practice old movements developed decades ago.
We left East London feeling full of inspiration. Although it is still in construction, we were happy to be apart of the process and are going to be keeping in touch with the Krugers as development keeps progressing.
On our drive home, we were recommended to try an Afrikaans favorite: “votrkerk”!
Served in a paper sack, votrkerk is Afrikaans for “heavenly doughnut bread sandwich with anything you would like on it!” I tried the most popular “Cheese & Apricot Jelly” and Jesse had the “Ham, Tomato & Cheese”. Simply stupendous. We are ruined!
_uacct = “UA-3544072-2″;
urchinTracker();
