Day 9 – The Townships are wrapped

Today was our last production day in the Townships. We spent the first half of the day with Nelson in Ramaphosa Township, an “informal settlement” that is supported with nutritional and educational programs by The Calabash Trust. The tour company Nelson works for established this NGO in order to help township visitors make a direct impact on the townships they visit. Ramaphosa is one of the Port Elizabeth townships that is most in need. To learn more about Calabash Trust you can visit their URL http://www.calabashtrust.co.za

I will now start the photography section of today’s blog with some crowd pleasers.

This little guy had just been let out of the preschool provided by The Calabash Trust

Playing in the yard, Ramaphosa Township

The Ramaphosa kids are totally into seeing themselves in High Definition.

After Ramaphosa we headed off to meet Lubabalo and his Nephew, David. We had some “finishing touches” production to do in several areas including the Jarvis Gqamlana school in Red Location.

Keith sets up an exterior at Jarvis Gqamlana school

Everybody loves the lunch lady no matter where you are

These kids would like to reassure you that, despite recent events, print journalism is not dead.

“Schools out! hey, let’s go see what that bald white guy with camera is doing in the parking lot!”

Gqamlana kids stick around for an after school draughts program.

Keith is going to have a hard time going home. He is treated like a rock star wherever he goes.

Keith and Jason made the mistake of accepting David’s challenge of a game of checkers. They were eviscerated rather quickly.

Keith, shortly before the tears bagan.

David tried his best to be nice about the slaughter.

We wrapped for the day and for this section of the trip. We celebrated with a few Windhoek’s (local beer) and did some body surfing on the beach across the street from our hotel. The water here is steel-balls cold. It has been pretty strange spending all day in the townships, then coming back to a beach side hotel. A bit surreal.

Summerstrand beach

The slave driver in me put together a pretty taxing production schedule so tomorrow we are off to spend our last day in this part of SA at Addo National Park. Some of the other visitors that are staying in our hotel have been returning from Addo with some amazing pictures of massive wild African elephants and warthogs etc. We are excited for a little R&R.