Wednesday, 22 February 2006

"goei more". good morning in afrikaans.

This is the website for the The Fish Hoek Drug Crisis and Information Center, where I spend my days working here in South Africa. I am able to meet with various people from the Fish Hoek community and surrounding areas and counsel them. Some of the people we see are drug addicts, while others are the family and friends of drug users. We also have support groups for addicts on Thursday nights, and on Saturday mornings we have an Al-Anon meeting. How cool! I will now be helping facilitate an Al-Anon meeting! Experiential training at its finest!!

I have spent all day reading through material we have in our library. I was able to pray for one of our clients earlier today who is addicted to "tik" (street name for crystal meth because of the sound it makes when you flick the needle, or straw, with your finger before you use). You often hear people saying "tik. tik." as they walk around looking for their next high.

The problem here is quite severe. Statistics from my research this morning showed that 60% of high schoolers in the Ocean View aread where we work are addicted to tik. Children as young as 5 have recently been reported to our center for treatment of tik addiction. Girls are selling their bodies for the drug, creating a ring of prostitution/drug use. It's a totally different world to see this so up close.

Also, I'm starting to learn Afrikaans!! This is the language of the white and colored communities, but most everyone speaks it aside from English. My coworkers are giving me lessons!!!

4 comments:

Emma said...

Ashley. read my blog. I wrote that for you... i mean, kind of. :) but, nonetheless I love ya. Seriously, the more you talk about south africa the more i want to know about it. so thanks. also, this is totally random but guess what?! an indian director approached paris hilton to play mother teresa in his movie about her life. sorry to ruin your day.

Unknown said...

good thing i use to curse b/c now i know the appropriate response to this world-insulting possiblity.
seriously, how can we stop this? i'm close to india. so are you. let's not let them in.

Mark Kelly Hall said...

Sounds like a line to me. "Yeah, I've got this film in the works, you'd be great for it...." Hopefully, though, he's just practicing until he finds someone, y'know, desireable, to use it on.

Mark

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