These children never used to gather and play soccer together at the park. Park was always empty and not utilized.  Recently, however, we have discovered that Rainbow Sun SSL boys are gathering and playing soccer after their school at the park. We are hoping to have more volunteers to supervise the children’s safety and soccer skill.

We are recruiting more boys and girls (6 – 18 years) to establish Sunnyside Soccer League and planning to hold a tournament by September.

Currently we are soliciting for donations and funds for uniforms and tournament prizes. Volunteers (referees, coaches, first aiders, etc.) are all welcome! If you could offer a venue for After School or know about possible venue, please let us know.

Please contact us at: rainbowsun@africadevelop.org (Email), +27 79 267 1254 (Tel).

These are our regular members of Rainbow Sun SSL.

Mondi Recycling

What is happening to children in Sunnyside?

George Brink Sports Club (center), surrounded by apartments in Sunnyside

Rainbow Initiative has been focusing on wellness and stimulation of children who live in Sunnyside area, due to the social and economic deprivations they face. Sunnyside in Tshwane/Pretoria is a residential suburb just next to city center with at least 20 000 units of high rise apartments with and less than 1 000 houses. The convenience and close proximity to government offices, schools, diplomatic offices, sport facilities and other amenities offering good quality reasonably priced accommodation which has been attracting a considerable number of low-middle income residents ranging from local South Africans, African and Asian migrants making it one of Africa’s major cosmopolitan neighborhoods. Unfortunately, this convenient suburb with different people is also infamous for high rate of crime such as robbery, car jacking, drug dealing and abuse. The streets in Sunnyside are ranked as one of the most dangerous streets in South Africa. it is difficult for one to walk through the streets without thinking of facing armed robbers wielding knives and guns. Both adults and children are anxious about taking a walk short distances, which is necessary for health, recreation and stimulation. Parents are concerned about letting their children play outside without guardians. The children have to stay at home, not able to venture into sports and recreation with not much  playing space outside. Some develop idle minds in the process making them vulnerable and susceptible to crime. Most of the time they can be seen just hanging around by their home or watching TV indoors, or loitering the on the streets. Some apartments are overcrowded with low-income earners or unemployed residents. Children in Sunnyside live facing all scenes of crime, unemployment, overcrowding everyday in some buildings. Most of the children are from middle and low-income families. With the prevailing condition and circumstances, it is easy to imagine that these children may get involved in crime very soon. Police and municipality have been burden by the repetitive crime and at times may seem overwhelmed by the situation, which some residents think it seems authorities to have given up to controlling the crime and improving the community. There are no organized sports activities or study programs available to occupy the children’s time.

That is why Rainbow Initiative started the Rainbow Sun Sports Study League for children in Sunnyside to offer them a space to develop their sports and study ability. Currently we are running only soccer program mentioned above. Eventually we want to include other sports such as soccer and netball for girl players. We are also planning to setup After School Study Program for young residents offering tutorials, art study and other skill development. Currently we are in search for a suitable venue for the program.

We are recruiting more boys and girls (6 – 14 years) to establish Sunnyside Kids Soccer League and planning to hold a tournament by September.

Currently we are soliciting for donations and funds for uniforms and tournament prizes. Volunteers (referees, coaches, first aiders, etc.) are all welcome! If you could offer a venue for After School or know about possible venue, please let us know.

Please contact us at: rainbowsun@africadevelop.org (Email), +27 79 267 1254 (Tel).

The program started at 10:30AM with field walk in the complex. Mooikloof Ridge has considerably big area of marsh and bushes. Unfortunately some of the residents and staff (construction workers and maintenance staff) are littering in the area so carelessly. Young participants for the program walked through the area and picked up lots of litters whilst Cara (Mooikloof Ridge environmental committee) giving them lecture on how littering would affect the environment of Mooikoof Ridge badly.

After the field walk kids and parents joined in Origami challenge, the Japanese traditional paper sculpture. Lead by Ayumi participants successfully completed beautiful and useful boxes made up from magazine papers. These boxes can be used for many occasions such as home/kids parties and home decoration. Easy to make, cheap (you can use newspaper/magazine/bond paper etc.) and most importantly for Green Kids, we are recycling papers. Next time we can challenge more interesting Origami with used papers.

Lastly kids drew posters with environmental messages. The three of the best posters will receive prize.

We hope more and more kids will join Green Kids for next time. Green Kids will be held quarterly. Thank you for all the participants joining the Green Kids programe!

Good news is that while we were cleaning up the bins many residents showed good interests in recycle project. We will keep on working on the advocacy and education with residents’ cooperation.

On 11th (this Saturday), Mooikloof Ridge Environmental Committee in conjunction with Rainbow Initiative is going to hold Recycling Poster Competition for the kids in the estate. This is a wonderful idea from the committee and a great occasion for children to understand the importance of recycling. We will report on the function soon!

Please note…the kids program was postponed to 8th November. Please read the next article for the report of the program.

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It is the biggest inner-city community arts festival that takes place annually at Burgers Park in Pretoria Central. The Feast of the Clowns “Feast” was founded on the following premise: Celebration, Arts and Justice.　The Feast is a medley of activities catering for families and individuals, celebrating the inner city’s cosmopolitan population whilst building harmony and correlation.

Workshops are held through out the week, a march through the city led by clowns and bikers, targeting urban social issues and through its festivities. The Feast showcases upstart artists alongside prominent artists, raises awareness to social challenges affecting urban communities, and creates a mood of week long peace, thriving to make the arts accessible to disadvantaged and excluded groups.

A brief look at the Feast of the Clowns program: featuring a wide genre of local talent in performing arts across the age spectrum. The main festival hosted at least 65 artists in and around the Burgers Park, from 11am till 8pm, free entry. Featured top acts such as Kabelo and Karen Zoid. Doxa – An amalgamated flair of musical performances to suite an array of tastes. Coke Truck – Live entertainment on Burgers Park Lane with song and dance. Street Theatre – A selected few interesting performances to tantalize. Band Stand (in the park) – a lively line of popular artists from the scene. Fourth Stage (in the Park) – A medley and of sound and voice in calm of the park.. Other performances during week included 3 plays at the State Theatre.

And my friend, my son Ren and I went to the Feast on the 17^th, Sunday. A drive into Visage Street after Nelson Mandela Street in the Pretoria Central from Lynwood Road, which becomes Kotze Street and Jorissen Street through Sunnyside. After Van Der Walt Street along the drive Andries Street follows in which you take a left and Burgers Park is about 50m ahead. We traveled the same way, and wow!, we spot a parking across the right hand side of Andries Street next to the car wash. It was quite a mission to parallel park on this busy street. Metro Police, private cars and buses are all stopped out along the road. There are various sounds that emanate from the park and it is a hive of activity. The park is bright, colorful and vibrant.

The events are all varied and interesting. We walked through a line of a group of bikers with Harleys parked on left side of Burges Park Lane in front of the Methodist Church and the bikes with drop handles on the right. Alas I did not get a picture… Later I learnt from Stephan De Beer of the TLF that the bikers had led the march at 10:00 in the morning.

In the park we saw ponies and Ren was not yet ready for a pony ride. So we just watched the others enjoy the rides. We move out of the park after meeting Isabel, who was with a 15 kids from her block of flats. We went into the street walked down to Burgers Park house. Yippie! Clown Stephan is one of the clowns and Wilna was unrecognizable in her clown outfit! I mention to Stephan if he recalls I was supposed to make stone soup for the Feast this year - the event manager had taken my initial proposal as a joke and omitted the stone soup from the program, as she had never heard of this kind of soup/food ever in her life. Also I would have prepared the miracle stone soup that would be a great part of the festival. You may look forward to stone soup being part of next year’s food program!

The mood and spirits are uplifted and appropriate for the delivery of the initiative that carries a ray of hope for the City of Tshwane!

Sector 5 (part of Sunnyside, Pretoria Central, Clydesdale and Muckleneuk)meeting was also held today and ADF will be amongst role players in the sector and forming working groups with other sectors, City of Tshwane, CID, and Gauteng local government department. The community policing forum/community safety forum will also have increased liaison with other communities safety forums in other sectors and wards. The meeting yielded a positive time table of activity for the remaining months of the year.

At least four parks were identified for the Arts Festivals and relevant steps and procedure is being presented to the community and authorities for the appreciation and implementation of the Arts Festivals.

Street cameras will also be part of our agenda for increasing safety in the neighborhoods.

Sports and recreation are also a major function that is on the city council’s agenda. ADF will implement street soccer programs especially in Sector 5 which also act as a great instrument of mood creation preparation and preliminary for one of the greatest soccer events the World Cup which is to be held in South Africa in 2010.

The local food and garden network has identified at least three places for preparation and commencement of the garden network. The responsible councilors have been contacted to forward our request to the relevant department within the City of Tshwane. Other places are being sought for extended capacity and production of market gardening produce in ADF’s urban agricultural project.