Showing posts with label covid19. Show all posts
Showing posts with label covid19. Show all posts

Today was doubly exciting because not only is it a Thursday and we get to serve our regulars at The Gathering's weekly Soup Kitchen,but today our Matha@Home Homework Club restarted after an almost two year furlough thanks to the pandemic.

It just felt so right to have the Homework Club operating again and the kids were really enjoying themselves and the attention they were receiving from Delena our beloved facilitator.

The highlight of my week is always The Gathering's weekly Soup Kitchen, and today I am blessed to once again be making 100 litres of delicious homemade Cream of Chicken Soup.

These are the main ingredients but I'll also be adding a lot of salt, pepper, garlic, herbs & spices and some soup powder just to top off the flavour.

Today, 26 March 2022 marks two full years of South Africa's 21 day lockdown announced by the government back in March 2020. Back then there was a serious amount of concern about what the lockdown would entail and how it would affect us all.

Initially there was broad support for the lockdown despite the fact that before it started there had been no local Covid related deaths and infection rates were minimal. 

Three Down, One To Go

Three quarters of the House of Trouser are down with Covid and looking at the bulk of the symptoms it seems fairly clear that we've been got by the Omicron variant. There are plenty of headaches, sneezing, sore throats, runny noses and fatigue to be going on with. 

However, not all things are equal. 

Dean seems to be getting away with the lightest symptoms, Paula's definitely the worst and then some, whilst Joel is just really fed up with not being able to go to work.

This is heartbreaking but sadly necessary.

For the first time since South Africa entered its 21 day lockdown two years ago, The Gathering has had to close its weekly Soup Kitchen because a few of us are ill with Covid.

We've done our best to ensure that word is out, especially amongst the Macassar folk to save them the walk for food later.

There's little worse than seeing our church venue locked up with no sign of life, especially when we make such an effort to be open as much as possible so community members know where they can find The Gathering when they need us.

Positive Tests

Following Paula's positive Covid test I tested myself this morning and got a very clear positive.

I'm feeling very tired and achey but beyond that just have regular cold symptoms.

Joel is beginning to cough so it looks like he'll test positive next. Hopefully Eli might escape it.

I guess it had to happen at some point... After two plus years of the pandemic Paula officially has Covid (she believes she had it once before but didn't test properly), and I've developed cold like symptoms which may or may not be Covid, especially as the season is changing here. 

Either way I know we're both feeling a bit rubbish, so it was nice to have a delicious Dirty Mac & Cheese with steamed broccoli for dinner, even if Paula couldn't taste it.

In the words of Skipper the Penguin: "Smile and wave boys, smile and wave". 

Sometimes it's all you can do given that shooting people (especially politicians) is frowned upon.

South Africa's 21 day lock down was announced by the govt on March 23rd last year giving us all just four days to prepare for the coming few weeks.

Life got a little hectic as we knew certain items would be banned from sale for the duration, and so many people went crazy with hoarding, and it wasn't just loo rolls!

Alongside doing the bulk of the donkey work in terms of collecting donations, I also get to do the fun bit of passing them on to those that  are in need of them.

Over the last few weeks The Gathering has been blessed with just over 6 pallets of peanut sachets, with each pallet holding 72 boxes and each box containing 150 sachets. In total we've received about 450 boxes and as of today we have so far given 300 boxes away.

What a contrast two consecutive days can be!

Yesterday afternoon I was left feeling very deflated after once again running in to an unhelpful & unyielding branch of South African bureaucracy.

This morning I was blessed by the joy of borrowing a friends trailer and driving out to Muizenberg to collect 47 boxes of the peanut paste sachets that are so popular amongst our Soup Kitchen regulars.

It was pure joy and a real privilege to spend a few hours with my mate Shaddie this morning serving My Father's House as they prepare the food for their daily feeding programme providing for the most vulnerable members of the Simon's Town community and beyond.

I love what My Father's House are doing and their vision and motivation behind it all, so it's probably a good thing that we don't live any closer because I would invest more of my time in to their vision and work to the detriment of my main focus.

It's been a while since we were able to deliver any food parcels, so it was a joy to be able to package up just enough food today to be able to bless our HOPE Home Based Care ladies in Chris Nissen with a decent hamper each.

Despite the government recently easing our lockdown restrictions, life is still very tough for the poorest, so it was a privilege to be able to put a smile on the HOPE ladies faces as they received their hampers.

One of the joys of what we do is being able to collect donations, sort them and then send them out again to the right people/places to ensure they have the maximum impact.

So recently it was great to be in touch with a local who had several boxes of brand new flip-flops left over from a recently closed business enterprise. They were keen that the flip-flops were not sold but rather would go to people who need them and would appreciate them, which is where The Gathering comes in. Sadly some of the boxes were water damaged so we've had to bin the worst of the damaged flip-flops, but we were able to rescue seven boxes of 24 pairs to be given away. What a blessing!

Over the last few weeks we've seen some steady growth in the numbers coming for The Gathering's weekly Soup Kitchen as well as seeing some old regulars that were holed up in other places reemerging. And what we know from all of this is that the need for food is greater than ever!

So last night for the first time since our 21 day lockdown began almost a year ago, we used the 70lt pot, and we served over 150 cups and gave away thirty 1lt pots for folk to take home.

It's exciting to be serving so many, but it's heartbreaking that the need is so prevalent!

Soup Kitchen

As ever it's a joy and a privilege to be able to serve our community through The Gathering's weekly Soup Kitchen, and last night was no exception.

Normally this one in the month would be our quietest given that pensions and disability grants have just been paid, but such is the need in the current climate that we were far busier than we had expected.

What this confirms to us is what we already know; the need is very real and those that come for soup are genuinely grateful for the reliability of the Soup Kitchen.

South Africa's lockdown was eased a little on Monday which means life once again has some semblance of normality about it, whatever that is, and we could feel it in the community as things felt a little lighter than they have of late.

Back Online

It's not how we wanted church to be, especially after the last few months where we've been gathering back in our building in Firgrove.

However, it is what it is and it was a joy to be able to gather freely, to worship without a mask and to share prayers and words of encouragement.

It was also a blessing to welcome a couple of new folk to join us online.

The Gathering will only grow from here.

Thank you LORD!

It's with a heavy heart that after the Christmas/summer break we have to reopen The Gathering online again. 

Church life was really picking up towards the end of the year and we were seeing exciting stuff happening, but sadly with the new Covid variant being more virulent than before, we (along with every other church in SA) have had to close our doors on Sundays. 

So, just as we did last time, The Gathering will be going back on to WhatsApp so that we can keep our gatherings in real time and open to contributions from members. 

 In the meantime we must pray that the virus is finally brought in to check so we can get back on with life.

I've yet to see a truly positive reflection post on 2020 so I'll take it upon myself to write one...

What a year it was! 2020 started with a bang as The Gathering set about getting its house in order in terms of being fully compliant with the terms of our Non Profit Organization registration, registering with SARS for tax compliancy, obtaining the relevant CCLI licenses to enable us to use music in church legally and a few other bits. The progress we made was quite amazing and we have now submitted three years worth of verified accounts and reports to the Dept of Social Development as part of our NPO compliance. We're still waiting on SARS, but given how slowly the wheels of bureaucracy turn here, Covid or not we'd probably still be waiting.

As the coronavirus appears to be surging again both here and around much of the world, it's only sensible that as a church we do all we can to ensure that we minimize any risk of spreading the virus, so we're doing all we can to ensure that anyone entering the building wears a mask correctly, sanitizes their hands and maintains a social distance where possible. Thus far it seems to be working.

It's been a huge blessing being able to Gather again physically in the second half of the year, there's little more uplifting in life than corporate worship, even if one has to do it from behind a mask.

Despite the horror show 2020 turned out to be, it has been a year of incredible blessings for The Gathering and one we'll remember for years to come for all the right reasons.