Safe and Sound

24 Jul 2008 at 01:11

Hey everyone! First off  I apologize for the extreme lack of  recent bloging. I am at home now back in Canada and safe and sound. I luckily found a great job 3 days after I came home which was a big relief! I have been working a lot though as a councilor at a kids sports camp at McGill. So far its quite a change from working at Agape. Some big differences I have noticed between the kids at the camp and those at Agape is that the Agape children are so much more self sufficient at young ages. While the 6 year olds at camp cry every time they get so much as a bug bite the Agape 4 year olds could trip and fall and summersault down a hill landing on top of another child and both would get right back up and continue playing as if nothing happened. As well the Agape children really know how to look after themselves in a way that Canadian kids their age would never be capable of doing. They can bath by themselves at 4, clean up after themselves at lunch, and help around the kitchen. I...

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The Garden Route

06 Jul 2008 at 20:48

Image Hi everyone!
Soory it’s been a while but the past few days have been a blur. After touring around Capetown some more and visting the townships, climbing ( well riding the cable car) up table mountain, driving up to cape point and taking a sunset cruise in Table Bay( after a failed attempt at Robben Island) we had to said goodbye to Louise as she was off for London England to start her summer job. The next morning Sabine and I hopped on the “baz bus” a student travel bus that takes you all along the coast and you can hop off in whatever town you like. Together we have travelled down the Garden Route which is a lovely view of the mountians on one side and the beach on the other for miles and miles and miles. We have had some hilarious moments together and it has been amazing so far. Today I somehow convienced Sabine that it would be a great idea to bungy jump off the highest jump in the world…it was an unreal experience and so much fun and hilarious to watch Sabine go...

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Capetown

29 Jun 2008 at 08:57

Image Hello again!
Yesterday was our last day in Waterfall and now we have finished our work at Agape and are in Capetown for a couple weeks. It was really sad to leave all of the kids and the other volunteers who didn't come to Capetown with Louise and Sabine and I. My stay in Waterfall was an amazing experience to say the least and I can only hope that one day I'll be back and see all the kids again.On our last night all of the volunteers went out for a goodbye dinner which was really fun but the best part of the evening was when we came back to the volunteer house just in time to turn on the tv and see the older Agape children's choir preforming at the 46664 concert for Nelson Mandella's birthday. They were amazing and getting to see them preform was such a proud moment. They sang "We Are Together" with Annie Lennox and then stood next to Mandella when he gave his speach so look for them if you watch it again! I really wish I could see them when they get back and hear all...

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KCA and the Dream Center

26 Jun 2008 at 10:57


Hi everyone!
I hope everyone is doing well! Don’t worry mum the cheetah farm was perfectly safe there was a trained professional right there with us, just not the right trained professional.....haha but seriously I’m fine and continuing to be safe. Right now I’m staying at a woman named Rona’s house who is the South African representative of Keep A Child Alive , the organization that Louise and I work with at McGill. She basically is the only liaison in South Africa for KCA so she has a huge job coordinating all of the projects that KCA funds, the main one being a clinic called the Blue Roof that provides Anti-retroviral drugs for people with AIDS. Rona had Louise and I over for dinner and since she runs a bed and breakfast on the beach she was sweet enough to have us stay the night. Rona has lived in South Africa her whole life so it was really great to sit down and talk about the history of South Africa and the future of it as well. After speaking to Rona and other...

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4 birthdays and a safari

24 Jun 2008 at 13:32

Hello everyone!

I hope everyone is doing well! Last week on Thursday the other volunteers and I organized a huge Brai(BBQ) and joint birthday party for the kids at Agape. We ordered a ton of meat from the local butcher and bought 4 cakes and presents for the birthday kids. It was a great night with lots of good home cooked African food and a ton of laughs. One of the older girls braided my hair into snoop dog (that’s a rapper mum) cornrows which looked pretty ridiculous but I ended up keeping them in for a few days because they were pretty convenient... The birthday kids loved their presents and the other kids pied them all in the faces after they were done eating which only added to the laughter of the night. Some of the older kids left for England the next morning because the Agape Children's Choir was invited to sing at Nelson Mandela’s Birthday party. They were all very excited and asked us all how long the flight to London would be( the longer the better they said) The...

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more photos

17 Jun 2008 at 14:23

Image Hi everyone I don't have much time to write a long message but I thought I would post some more pictures. I hope you enjoy! Everything is still going great here (except for when I got peed on by one of the kids today haha) and everyone is healthy and happy xoxo
Margo

p.s the first picture is of the volunteers minus Jeremy in the valley of a thousand hills national park( I think thats the right name)There is a waterfall there and that's where the town that we live in gets it's name from(even though the waterfall is actually in the next town over)

The second is at the beach in Bluff where we spent the weekend

And the third is of the other volunteer Jeremy and one of the older girls who we took out to lunch at "wimpy's burgers" today....no one else seems to find the popular fast food joint's name a little odd except for Louise and I.....haha

and the last photo is of me and a couple of the younger kids just hanging out inside on a rainy day. They were eating...

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Durban

15 Jun 2008 at 19:13

Hey everyone!!
Thanks for all the messages guys there really sweet and make being here a lot easy when I feel homesick. Also Happy Fathers day Dad!
Right now were staying in a little surf town called Bluff just outside of Durban. It’s beautiful and really nice and relaxing. It’s a long weekend here so we’ve had a nice little break. Yesterday we went into the city to watch the Agape children perform in a concert. They practiced for weeks and were all really excited about it and thought they were performing 6 songs a 3 dances and then they were only able to perform one song and some of the kids had to be left behind at Agape because they didn’t have enough tickets. They were really disappointed since they had worked so hard for it. The whole night really showcased how disorganized a lot of things are here. No one at the center knew anything about the performance and didn’t even tell the kids they couldn’t perform all their songs they just cut them off after the...

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A typical day at Agape

12 Jun 2008 at 14:32

Image Hi Everyone!
So Some of you having been asking me(mainly mum)what exactly we are doing on a day to day basis at Agape. So I thought I'd fill you all in. On a normal day we wake up around 7 eat breakfast in our backyard and watch the sunrise over the mountains(the perfect way to start any day if you ask me). Then we either walk to Agape from our volunteer house, which is about an hour or if we are lucky get a ride from "slow" who works for Agape and drives all the kids to school.Today we rode with the kids to school and crammed all 38 of us into the van, unsafe yes but anything goes here haha. Every morning we pick up fruit from the market for the children so they can have a snack when they get home from school. Since all of the food at Agape is donated from the local grocery stores and is food that is past the selling date they otherwise wouldn't get to have fresh fruit. When we get to Agape the little preschool kids are all anxiously awaiting our arrival and love the...

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weekend adventure

08 Jun 2008 at 14:12

Hi everyone!
so I'm currently sitting at an internet cafe in the biggest mall I've ever been to in my life...out of all the things I've seen so far on this trip I'd have to say this was the worst. It's possibly greatest example of insane income inequality you could ever imagine(considering for the past 3 hours we drive through slums and shanty towns) However the rest of this weekend has been unreal. We drove up on Friday through the mountains and watched the sunset which was so beautiful. At night we arrived at our giant log cabin where most of the other be-more volunteers from different projects where also staying for the weekend ( all of whom where also Dutch haha) We had a lovely night sitting by the fire and hanging out Lousie and I were doing our best to understand what everyone was talking about as they spoke Dutch for most of the night haha) But it was a good night none the less. In the morning we awoke(at 6:45)to a beautiful sunrise over yet another lovely mountain range....

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South Africa!!

05 Jun 2008 at 14:06

Hello everyone!
I am here in South Africa at last! After a very long flight to England with the man beside me blasting techno music while holding his crying baby the whole way I finally made it to London. Then after a day well spent in London I hopped on another plane to Johannesburg
(Joburg as everyone here calls it)and that flight was much better than the first. There was a really sweet South African girl a few years older than myself who was sitting beside me so we chatted for hours which helped pass the time. It is Thursday here and we have spent the past few days getting organized and learning how the orphanage is run. The kids are all amazing and even though many of them have lost both their parents to AIDS they still are so kind and loving and are always laughing and singing. They all take care of each other and the moto of Agape is "We Are Together". Yesterday was a rather hard day because the manager of Agape, Pam, sat us down and told us the story of how...

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Leaving tomorrow!

30 May 2008 at 20:04

Hi Everyone! I can’t believe that May is almost over already and that I am flying out tomorrow! I’ve spent the past couple weeks getting ready and I think I’m pretty well all set now and ready for the over 40 hours of travel time….(I’m bringing a lot of books to read). Contrary to the popular belief I did fit everything I need into one backpack and I can actually get it on without any help! haha   Now I know some of you have expressed some concern about the current political situation in South Africa and the recent violence that was been occurring throughout the country. For those of you who are not aware of the present situation in my understanding, there is currently a lot of animosity between some of the native South Africans and the immigrant population from neighboring African countries that are now living and working in South Africa. Some people feel that the immigrants have unfairly taken jobs that should belong to South Africans themselves. The violence has...

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Agape

19 May 2008 at 02:42

Hello everyone! First and foremost thank you so much for checking out my blog! I leave for South Africa on May 31st to volunteer at an orphanage outside of Durban called Agape. Agape is an orphanage for children, most of who have lost their parents due to HIV/AIDS.  Earlier this year I was able to watch a documentary on Agape and some of the stories of the children that live there. Although I don’t believe that the movie has been released in Canada yet make sure to look for it when it comes to HBO. It’s called “We Are Together” and it is an amazing movie. I feel so fortunate to be able to meet some of the children from the documentary and visit Agape in person and I am very excited to meet the other volunteers I will be working with. I hope all of you continue to read this blog so that I can share my experience at Agape with you all. I will be going with my friend Louise and we will be volunteering and traveling together afterwards so I’m sure there will be some...

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Name: Margo Warren

Volunteered at Agape from 02 June 2008 to 28 June 2008.

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Would you like to know more about Be More, then check the website at www.be-more.org. You can find the latest news, more information about my project and you can become a donor!

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