This week, Stellenbosch University(SU) joined hands with the greater Stellenbosch community to reach out to the thousands of residents affected by Friday’s fire in Kayamandi. Financial support for the victims was received from alumni as far away as the USA.
The fire spread through Kayamandi in the early hours of 15 March and at least 4000 people lost everything as their homes burnt to the ground.
According to Naweed Mullajie, an administrative officer at MCS, they could fill the Avanza they used at least four times with donated goods.
Collection points were also created at the Danie Craven stadium where supporters, on their way to the Varsity Cup game between FNB Maties and FNB Pukke on Monday, could drop off donations. A total of 15 boxes were taken from there to the fire station.
Student volunteers gathered at the fire station during the week to sort through the donations. A vehicle left the Neelsie parking lot on the hour to transport these students to the fire station and back.
Among the students who were helping there on Tuesday morning, were Erik Thompson and Lars Blomquvist, international students from Norway, as well as Nina Keller, an international student from Germany. She is involved in an outreach project in Kayamandi and more than half of the group of children she is involved with, was affected by the fire. This led to her decision to help out at the fire station. BA students Rebecca Matsie and Kelly Rosekranz also wanted to contribute while Kelsey Smith of the Elizabeth Galloway Fashion Design school and Andrew Maile, an alumnus of SU who lives in Cape Town, found out via Facebook that help was needed. Maile pointed out that a big delivery of Pieke 2012 T-shirts had been received.
Mullajie said the reaction from the University community was very good and that MCS also received a number of calls from people outside Stellenbosch who wanted to help.
Hestea de Wet, resident director of AIFS (American Institute for Foreign Study) at SU’s Post-graduate and International Office reported that approximately R32 000 had been collected in the USA for the fire victims by Tuesday afternoon. More than 1000 American students have visited SU in the past 10 years for a six- or 12-month study period.
“The news of the fire in Kayamandi spread quickly among alumni in the USA. Approximately 90% of all my students work in Kayamandi as part of a project offered by the PGIO and that’s why they have a special bond with the community. Andy Clark, an alumnus of 2008 who studied at Saint Michael’s college in Vermont, quickly created a fund where alumni in the USA could contribute,” De Wet said.
Die CEO of AIFS also contributed $2000 and by Tuesday afternoon the fund stood on R32000. The address is: http://www.gofundme.com/KayamndiFire
People who still want to donate goods can either drop it at MCS or directly at the Disaster Management office at the Stellenbosch fire station. Apart from clothes and food, the victims need basic household goods such as pots and pans, cutlery and bedding.
In the Photo:
Rebecca Matsie, Kelly
Rosekranz, Nina Keller, Erik Thompson, Lars Blomquvist, Anne Crosbie,
Andrew Maile and Kelsey Smith worked hard on Tuesday to sort through all
the donations that were brought to the Stellenbosch Fire Station.
Photo: Pia Nänny
On Friday, Maties Community Service (MCS) appealed
to staff and students to donate, among other things, food, clothes,
bedding, stationery and toiletries and these donations were transported
to the Stellenbosch fire station on Tuesday.
