Rhulani Safari Lodge has recently started a new Community Project, by giving support to the "Andries Moseki Crèche" in the nearby village of Lekgophung. We are deeply convinced that this is the right project for us, to provide financial resources and active help over the next few years. But Rhulani‘s manager Carla Baasden tell us about how this collaboration came about.

From Carla Baasden
Manager Rhulani Safari Lodge

“The project starts the day I hear from our staff members that they will be closing down the crèche in Lekgophung. They tell me they will be closing down the school because of the roof falling apart and it’s too dangerous for the children to be schooled there. I think that there has to be something we can do about this.

I get into a vehicle to have a look for myself. What a sad and terrible scene I find there! The roof has almost gone on the one side. Birds and bats have moved in due to the missing roof. There is one tire in the yard for the children. The bathroom is non-existent, no grass, no nice and colorful walls or toys to play with.

I meet the two teachers from the school, Rose and Kate. They are the nicest people on earth. They are telling me that they don’t want to get their hopes up as they have received a lot of “we will help” in the past from people. They just want to educate the children and teach them as they are the future of South Africa – that is what they love! They have about thirty small children they take care off between the ages of two to five years!

I arrange a meeting with the chief and he is kind enough to allow us to help with this rather big and demanding task at hand.

We start working on this project by first getting almost all our Rhulani staff involved. They are very excited about this and can’t wait for the “next stage” to start. When the lodge isn’t busy we will get a group together and pack some meat and rolls for a nice afternoon lunch braai. 

First it is all about cleaning. Then the paining gets started, where the real creativity starts to flow and where all the staff jumps in by creating special painting on the walls: numbers, alphabet, pictures and shapes.

Our next stage is a big one: the roof! We are waiting for the busy month of April to pass and get it all going in May – we are awaiting the roof material to get started on that.

We have so many ideas and can’t wait to start going again!