Dear Friends of Golden Sunbeams
We hope you all started the new year happily and healthily. We, here at the Cape, really enjoyed the long summer holidays, which have just ended in mid-January 2025.
Our kindergartens opened their doors to children in the second week of January, but classes in private and government schools will not start until 13 and 15 January 2025.
Some of our kindergarten children will now move on to Year 1 at school at the start of the year. In South Africa there is a new regulation for kindergartens that have previously also educated pre-school children – including some of the institutions we support. From 2025, pre-school is to be assigned to the primary school system, so some of our kindergartens will lose both first-graders and pre-school children.
This of course also has economic consequences for the kindergartens affected: With the start of the new school year, school children and preschool children no longer go to kindergarten. As a result, school fees and thus secure income are lost, which in turn can lead to greater financial losses.
In the past, all of our sponsored children began their “career” in one of our kindergartens and many of them are now attending primary or secondary schools.
Today we would like to introduce you to the sponsored children we have been supporting for many years and tell you what sponsorships mean and what they can achieve.
After the sponsors support their sponsored children during kindergarten, primarily by paying the kindergarten fees, the sponsorship changes as soon as the children start school. We then no longer have the opportunity to visit the children directly in kindergarten; as we then are obliged to visit and keep in touch through the parents or foster parents.
Before the start of the new school year, the parents receive a list from their children’s school stating which school uniforms are mandatory. The schools have different colour codes, which are also reflected in the school uniforms.
Some of our sponsored children were lucky enough to get to know their sponsors personally here in South Africa and to build close and personal bonds over many years. For example, Beatrix, Dita, Jörn-Erik and Klaus-Detlev Fröhlich have been lovingly caring for their three sponsored children, Liza, Liam and Nazeem, for several years.
Thanks to their support, we were able to go Christmas shopping with the children before the holidays. There were trousers, dresses, shoes and much more to buy, so that the children could proudly go to church on Christmas Day in their new clothes.
Dita and Jörn-Erik Fröhlich from Germany were there in person again when we went shopping for school uniforms and school supplies with three of our sponsored children on January 13, 2025.
The boys need short trousers in the summer and long trousers in the winter, along with matching short-sleeved or long-sleeved shirts. The girls need skirts that are worn with knee-high socks and short-sleeved blouses in the summer, and long, thick tights with the skirts and long-sleeved blouses in the winter. The colour of the socks and the type of sportswear are also specified by the school at the beginning of the school year.
There is also a detailed list of required writing and craft supplies. These items can be purchased in stationery stores, which are set up specifically for this purpose at the beginning of the year and are available to provide advice.
We met at 11 a.m. at Somerset West Mall to go shopping with our three godchildren Liza, Liam and Nazeem, who were accompanied by his house mother Alledine. But before we plunged into the hustle and bustle of shopping, the children needed a little refreshment because they were very hungry. Then everyone rolled up their sleeves to work through the long list of school uniforms and writing and craft materials.
Liza is now in Year 5 and Liam and Nazeem are in Year 4, so they needed different school supplies. The shopping trip was great fun not only for the children, but also for us adults. Since the beginning of the sponsorship, the sponsors have been able to build a close relationship of trust with their godchildren. In the beginning, it was not easy for the children to communicate with their sponsors: on the one hand, they were shy and reserved, and on the other hand, they did not speak English well, which made the language barrier even greater. Today the children can articulate exactly what they want and like. The children know exactly, for example, which backpack they want for their school supplies and which ones they don’t like at all. It’s lovely to watch because the process is always peaceful, happy and full of joy.
In the end we had three fully packed backpacks with clothes and school supplies, not to mention the other bulging shopping bags.
After we said goodbye to the children, they went home in a shared taxi with Nazeem’s house mother with their new backpacks and shopping bags. They are now well equipped for the start of school on January 15, 2025.
But there are also many sponsored children who have never had the chance to meet their sponsors in person. That is why we try to keep our sponsors regularly informed about their godchildrens’ development. The parents are very proud and grateful that their children are supported by sponsorship money and are happy to provide us with photos and testimonials from their loved ones, which we are then pleased to pass on to their sponsors.
Joshua Cupido is one of those boys who has never met his godfather in person. Joshua is very proud to have found someone who supported him.
He knows full well that communication can only take place via photos and videos, and so he is always ready to have his photo taken for his sponsor. Esther Epson is also a girl we supported in kindergarten. Today she is already in the 4th grade and her reports are continually above average.
Bernd Holtkamp’s three godchildren – Alicia, Sholene and Mauricia Hartnick – now have children of their own:
Jade, Kayde and Wade continue to receive support from Golden Sunbeams, for example by paying their school fees. Jade is now in the 4th grade and Kayde is in the 1st grade. Both attend Marvin Park Elementary School in Macassar, and Wade, the youngest, is still in kindergarten, also in Macassar.
We support most of our sponsored children beyond their kindergarten years. For example, Osvin Nöller has had a long-standing sponsorship of his godchild Amala, whom he has known since her kindergarten days at Hope and Light in Sir Lowry’s Pass. And that was before Golden Sunbeams e.V. was founded.
Amala has developed into a young, ambitious lady who is now in the 11th grade. She has not lived in the Hope and Light childrens’ village for a long time, as she still lives with her foster parents Alice and Robert Young, who have lovingly cared for her from the beginning and support her with all their might.
Whenever Osvin Nöller and his wife visit South Africa, they meet with Amala and her family. He follows the young woman’s development with great interest and both are always very pleased to see each other again.
Osvin Nöller, also a member of Golden Sunbeams e.V., is deeply interested in the lives of people in the Cape region. He supports young South Africans wherever he can. Last year, for example, he learned from one of our newsletters that Jodeci Davids, an intelligent young man, would like to study after graduating from high school, but lacked the money.
Osvin obtained further information about the young man through Golden Sunbeams. When he visited South Africa again in November 2024, we met with Jodeci Davids and his father for a personal discussion. After that, it quickly became clear that Osvin wanted to support the young man and he took on a sponsorship for Boston College in Somerset West for a whole year.
What this means for Jodeci Davids and his family, what a joy and relief, and shortly before Christmas – it is simply indescribable. At 19 years old, Jodeci Davids is our oldest godchild, if we can still say that.
We would like to thank our sponsors very much for making it possible for our sponsored children to begin the new year under such excellent conditions and “fully equipped”. We wish all our sponsored children much success for the new school year and are pleased that due to this huge support, they are starting the new year motivated and full of optimism.
If you would like to know more about sponsoring a child, please contact us.
For today, we send you our warmest greetings from summery Cape Town.
Yours
Britta & Claudia