Friday was the last day of the gathering 2010. We invited the guardians of the students to join us for a few hours, get to know us and share their views about the sponsorship program with us. Many came. And they came from far. I was really moved when I saw those old grannies and grandfathers coming to the venue. Most of the guardians are widowed grandmothers and they have no chance to retire. In many cases they lost all their children due to HIV/AIDS and now struggle daily in order to feed their orphaned grandchildren. Most of them never had the chance to go to school. I saw only one old grandfather who was able to read and sign the document we gave out. Other guardians are only a few years older then the supported students. Child-headed families are nothing rare here. The older brother or sister simply has to step in and take responsibility at a very young age. One boy still has his mother. He was accepted into the program because she is terminally ill. Imagine, it was her boy who got the award "Best performing boy 2010". You should have seen the proud smile radiating on her sunken face!
Awards were not the only thing we gave out. The students also received the promised revision books and were definitely very happy to have them. The books belong to TaC, which means that the students have to look well after them and hand them down to the next generation after one year.
It was such a wounderful time we had with the students, the local committees and the guardians. Three days of learning, sharing and contributing. The students surprised us with several performances on the last day: two poems, one TaC-song and a short drama about how hard it is for impoverished talents to access education. The shy students of the first day turned into a cheerful bunch of promising young people overnight. It was not all too easy to let them go...
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