Home

After being one of the first volunteers (2 months) at MOP in 2007, I had to go back one day and see 'my' kids again. 1,5 year without their smiles, hugs, love, jokes, honousty and enthusiasm was too long:). That day arrived the 23th of december 2008 when I could celebrate Christmas and New Year at Mother of Peace!
 
So you probably wonder if I am happy I went back? How many things have changed and what still was the same? If I am going back again and again and again and....?

Let me start by confirming that I am very happy I went back! It was a bit scary, since you are not sure how it will be and the memories I had were so great, you don’t want to dissapoint yourself or MOP. But going back was one of the best choices I could have made. Thank god the children still recognized me and were happy I returned:). The great memories I had, became real-life again and even greater memories are in my head now!

Finally the sun has pleased us with some frequent visits over the last couple of days:). So it was time for some wateraction with the kids. Sometimes kids are very easy to amuse. Ingredients:

*Water
*Soap
*A slide
*Some foam

Result: Splash!!!
Extra result: the foam (that we didn't knew we had) was cleaned very well by the kids afterwards and can serve perfectly as yogamats;)
Extra extra result: The children get very tired:)


I also did something that was already a while on my 'what to do in life list' but for which I have been way to scared: Skydiving! I decided to face my fears and jumped for joy today! I don't think I have ever been so scared in my life. But it was a great experience. They also made a movie, which is to big to upload here, but which you are more then welcome to come and watch!

Just a short update on life on the flip site.

Time is flying by, there are still so many things I would like to do, but I only have until friday... But I am enjoying every minute of it!

The kids are really behaving extremely well, they listen much better and help out a lot. Even without asking they start cleaning or help you find your keys. And I think they realize that it benefits them as well, since it so much easier to organize outings, games, swimming lessons etc. Some of you mentioned you like my pictures very much and that they were even artistic. Well, most of them were made by the children! I wouldn't have dreamt about giving them my camera last year, but now they know that they should treat it carefully, give it back when I ask to do so and are capable of making the most beautifull pics! Then it is not about how I see them, but about how they see eachother. So you can really look via there eyes to the world.

First of all: HAPPY NEW YEAR! May 2009 bring you lots of love, happines, health, fun and much more!

No long story from me this time, things are going very well. I think the pictures will speak for themselves and show it. Enjoy :)

Love,
MJ

Picture 1: All in one tire
Picture 2: Pretty girl
Picture 3: Handsome boy
Picture 4: In the pool
Picture 5: Diving
Picture 6: Almost diving
Picture 7: A bridge over troubled water
Picture 8: Yoga
Picture 9: Miss, I like the sleeping excersize of yoga best:)
Picture 10: Playground
Picture 11: Playground thinking
Picture 12: In the grass
Picture 13: Jumping!
Picture 14: Beautiful faces
Picture 15: On the swing
Picture 16: Playing netball, very competitive!
Picture 17: Tired
Picture 18: Walking home after a day of playing

It is good to be back! It is very nice to see all the kids again and it feels like I haven't been gone for 1,5 years. Besides the fact that the children have grown older, some of them went back to their families and some new ones arrived and Mother of Peace has had some very good changes.

I am very impressed by the homeworkroom, computerroom, theatre, English classes, new houses, new church and offices. It is all very professional. However these things are all material things. And despite the fact that these are all in place, some of the same problems and challenges still influence the behavior of the kids. Of course these tangible things need to be in order to help the kids, but it feels like now is the time to start focusing on the causes of the challenges instead of healing the effects.

So exciting to go back to a place that has tought me so much last year and still gives me a lot until the day of today. A place that to some extend changed my life. How will it be to go back? How much will have changed? Do they still know me? Will it meet the expectations I inevitable made the last weeks?

I don't know.

But I think the best way to approach it, is to just let it happen. Let it take me by surprise, not think about it too much. Enjoy the moment. That is difficult however, I have wanted to go back for a while now and of course I am imagening how it will be...

I am sure, however, that I won't be dissapointed. Mother of Peace is a little place of stability, hope, joy and peace that children need. It is about people giving and receiving love and taking care of each other. In a way it is a place where the Christmas spirit is present all year round! 

Dear weblogreaders,

long time no speak! But do I have some great news to tell you:)! I am going back to South-Africa!

I will see 'my' kids again and celebrate Xmas and Newyear with them. The 23th of december my plane will touch down in Durban and I will have untill the 9th of january to give (and receive) all the love, hugs and kisses from everybody at Mother of Peace. I hope 18 days are enough for that;)

And ofcourse I will not go without a plan. December is traditionally a time of giving and receiving. And I am sure the kids and housemothers will receive lots of nice presents from the volunteers, their family and supporters of MOP. But I am not sure if the children ever had the ability to GIVE a present away. They have so little themselves that giving something away is hard. They compensate by giving all their love, kisses and hugs, but it must be nice for them to give away a present. Don't you agree?

In May and June 2007 I lived and worked as a volunteer at Mother of Peace, a project related to the organisation Be More. Mother of Peace houses children that cannot live with their family anymore. Sometimes because they have no parents, sometimes because they have been abused or abandoned.

As a volunteer there are all sorts of ways you can help: play with the children, help them with homework, teach them basic skills and just be there and have fun!
I can truly say those 2 months changed my life and it was an experience I would recommend to everybody! On this weblog you can read all about it.

To make sure that you will find what you are looking for on this site you can choose one of the following: 

Read about my experiences in South-Africa 

To my great joy I still see lots of visitors reading my weblog every day even after my volunteer period in South-Africa has ended :-)

I don't know who you are, maybe ex-volunteers, maybe future-volunteers, maybe funders, maybe just curious websurfers, but I want to let you all know that it would be my pleasure to give you more information when needed!
If you want to talk to me or email me with specific questions or just want to know more about my volunteer period, just send me an email:
mhaenen@gmail.com

I will do my best to give an answer to your questions or help you with anything you want to know. I know it might be hard to make the desicion to go abroad and hope my experienc can give you some honoust insights and help you with making that decision!

Take care,
MJ

It seemed like yesterday when I was writing my first weblog about going to SA...and now this adventure is already over!

The goodbye was hard, I tried not to cry, but had to. I preferred the children to remember me with a smile on my face, but when the floodgates open, they open! So with tears in my eyes I was leaving Mother of Peace.

The time has come to say goodbye. I knew it was coming, but how can I ever be prepared to say goodbye to 55 children, 20 housemoms, colleagues, fellow-volunteers and all the other people I got to know here?

The last week has been full of fun (and the sun is back!), we went to a musical of the Jungle Book, had a goodbye BBQ, with lots of singing and dancing and I went for dinner at one of the houses! There was also still work to do, mainly consisting of follow up phone calls to the people that visited the Open Day. I need to make sure that we not only create awareness, but also get some funding out of them!

Drip, drop, thunder...

After all your messages about 2 weeks of rain in Dublin, 15C and rain in Holland and jalous remarks about the ever shining sun in Africa, I thought you all might wanna read that it can also rain in Africa! It was very much needed, due to a dry winter, but I do prefer the sun! Currently it feels like if I am on a camping in the Dordogne in France (you know those nice holidays were it could rain for 13 hours straight and you have to swim to get to the toilet and wonder why o why you went with a tent and are not sitting in a rented appartment in Ibiza)

It amazes me time after time how open and friendly the South African people (and especially the Zulu people) are. Comparing my place in the group now and 1,5 months ago, makes me realize that I really am part of the Mother of Peace community. They have taken me in and accepted me without any judgement or conditions. ‘Come as you are’ seems to be the motto and it doesn’t matter if you are white, black, Asian or purple. I can already see that the other volunteers are welcomed as open as I was and can only wish for them the same great experience. I sometimes look at my skin and am surprised that is hasn’t turned black yet, as I feel such a good connection with Zulus

Time flies when you are having fun and that I have! The last weekend of May Inge (fellow volunteer) and me went on a weekend trip to Lesotho. Lesotho is a Kingdom that lies as an island in SA, totally surrounded by it. It managed to stay a separate country mainly because its boundaries consist of high mountains (circa 3000 meters). Everybody kept on warning us to bring warm clothes, because at night temperature drops below 0? C. For all the Norwegian readers this is not cold at all and sounds more like the beginning of spring, but for South-African and Lesotho standards this is winter at its top! To be sure we packed our hats, gloves and an extra fleece sweater and were on our way!

After some relaxing and refuelling days at the beach last weekend, I was ready for another week at MOP. It definitely consumes energy to interact with the kids at the day-care, help with homework and communicate with the housemoms, so in my weekends I try to do as less as possible and reload the battery. But although I try hard to plan nothing, at the end my weekends are busy too: Indian banquets at the Indian Church (see picture 1), beach visits, writing letters with the kids, cleaning my house and updating my weblog.

Last week was an interesting week with adrenaline pumping through my body:
First of all the teacher of the day-care was sick for 2 days so I was in charge! Fortunately a chair dance and a puppet show kept the kids pretty quiet. I even came around making motherdaypresents for all the housemoms (see picture 2). A bit to late, but better late then never, right?