The short September holidays are currently being enjoyed by scholars. Spring is in full bloom and the days are beautiful – walking on the beach, you can very often spot whales and their calves breaching the ocean surface joyfully.
At JBay Recycling Project, our third term was very busy, but volunteers abounded and operations went very smoothly.
The drought is still gripping our area, so even though we reluctantly had to cancel 2 trading days, the rain was wonderful compensation.
Over 7 trading days, we received 1,196 visits, with the children delivering 18,5 tons of recycleable material. Of this, 4,5 tons was plastic and 9,8 tons glass.
In August we received a massive bag overflowing with clothing all the way from Susanne in Australia. Every item was obviously carefully selected to be suitable for our children, useful and new, or nearly so. At the time of writing, another similar bag has arrived! We are so humbled and appreciative of support from far and wide.
Hotspots2C, based in Somerset West, have supported JBay Recycling Project for many years, and after a very tough time in tourism, are back doing what they love. They are very big on giving back to the communities their clients travel to, and donated a box of stationery and books in August. They have also just contacted us to say they’ve collected 2 boxes of kids shoes. How wonderful!
Jeffreys Bay Tourism shared a very informative post about the project, which was shared widely, and Estelle and Erna came to visit and see for themselves how it works. They have promised to “adopt” JBRP as a special project.. thank you guys!
Intertown Transport once again assisted with free transport of a bulk load of school clothing from the manufacturers outside Tshwane – about 2,000km away! Thanks to them, we are stocked up with all sizes uniforms, and a child can kit themselves out with:
- A dress or trousers @ 12M
- A shirt – long or short sleeved @ 5M
- Socks @ 2M
- School shoes @ 12M
- A jersey or jacket @ 15M
- A belt or sash @ 5M
This is equivalent to 25kg plastic.
We work very closely with the Masikhathalelaneni team. They support survivors of shack fires, and we assist school children who have been traumatized by such an incident, making sure that they have what they need to return to school.
CrossFit Jeffreys Bay held their CrossFit Games and asked participants to contribute both financially and with donations of clothing. They did a great job and we received loads of swanky outfits as well as over R4,650.00 in cash to use towards stock. Wesley and team, you rock!
September saw the start of a new social media video series starring Clair and Henry, who walk and talk you through some of the trading day happenings. Their videos have been extremely popular and have left us all feeling warm and fuzzy knowing we are a part of something really awesome.
As always, we are grateful to the local businesses who make sure the kids all go home with something nutritious in their tummies. Our allowance from Food Lover’s Market ensures the kids get extra vitamins from oranges, apples or bananas; First Choice Dairy donates long life milk sachets for drinking breakfast; and our wonderful restaurants – Chip ‘n Dip, Eddies Unmistakably Indian, Infood and Nina’s – take turns to serve up fresh goodies.
Surf Lodge Jeffreys Bay have recently started volunteering. Tour guide Jimeal grew up here and has inspired his guests with love and enthusiasm for JBay.
To every person who volunteered in August and September – you changed lives, you made the kids feel special and empowered them. This town is a better place because of you. Enkosi, thank you, dankie