Ezra's African Adventures: Family Day!

Saturday at Viva was probably my busiest day yet, in terms of total chaos. It was Family Day, the day when all the families in Viva's Orphans/Vulnerable Children (OVC) program come together for face-painting, bounce-houses, food and gifts. We had about 40 other volunteers come in to help with security, gift-giving, and food, but it was still incredibly hard to control once we began to give presents.

On Friday I went to Leon and Meleney's house to prepare the gifts with Jared, who keeps track of all the OVC families. A local church had donated hundreds of presents, each with a name and age on them. Our job was to sort these presents into families so that they went to the correct person. The only problem was that some of Viva's gifts had gotten mixed up with other recipients, so we didn't have presents for every kid in OVC. Instead of just matching names to families, we also had to sort through a pile of extra presents and find presents for "girl-16" or "boy-9" until everyone had something. After about 7 hours of that, we put them in bags and loaded them into the car for the next day.

On Saturday, the whole family came out to Viva around 9:00. Along with the other volunteers, we divided into groups to make things run smoothly. Dad and Tim were working the gate to make sure that only kids and approved women got in (since in previous years they've had an issue with people trying to steal presents), Mom was unpacking all the stuff Jared, Meleney and I had put together the day before, and I was doing odd jobs for Leon, while also patrolling the border to make sure nobody tried to sneak in the back. Luckily, I had a helper: 10 year old Sandile was following me around, helping keep a lookout for bad guys. As more and more kids and they're parents started to pour in, we brought out the bounce-houses and face-painting stations to keep them entertained.

In addition to all the gifts Jared, Meleney and I had worked on, there were another few hundred presents coming in from Santa's Shoe-box, a nation-wide organization dedicated to collecting and distributing shoe-boxes full of presents. After the initial chaos that came with trying to herd dozens of kids and their parents around a small area, we managed to get them their presents, which most of them opened gleefully on the lawn.

After most of the people had left, we let the parents come in one by one to receive their family's gift bag, as well as some maize meal and toiletries. This was one of the more chaotic parts of the day, since the only people left to help were a couple of volunteers, my family, Abie and Sipho. Some of the bags had gone missing, so we had to quickly find matching gifts that had been meant for absent families and switch the recipient's name. It all worked out in the end, though, and we got home late that afternoon completely exhausted. I think now the rest of the family might understand why I collapse on the couch after getting home everyday.