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Sunday, August 1, 2010

simple sillyness

Last week Saturday, 24th July, a group of ladies from Kommetjie Christian Church held a pamper party for the LifeXchange girls. So to keep them sober and off the heavy drugs I arranged a decoy, a Friday night movie night at my house.. only my house is in Ocean View, the same neighbourhood as theirs and just a stone’s throw away from the Friday night party. So more decoys were put in place to prevent them wandering off soon after they arrived.

The decoys consisted of a huge sit down meal at my house, some music and sober sillyness (such as sliding down the passage in our socks, breakdancing, piggy in the middle), then off to McDonald’s for ice creams and onto the late night movie at Blue Route mall. Most had not been to the cinema before and those who had, had only been because a LifeXchange mentor had taken them.
A big laugh for me was when we left the cinema and I turned around to see no-one following me. Eventually the girls walked out nonchalantly with arms loaded with popcorn and coke. They’d collected everybody in the cinema’s leftovers and were eating it happily, completely oblivious that this isn’t correct social behaviour. I just laughed, and fell in love with them even more.
Getting to bed at 3am and waking up at 6am was a toughy, but we all ‘made it to the church in time’! Phew! At last they were there, the hard work was over, I could finally relax.
The Pamper party was a blast! Starting with learning how to do our own facial, a foot massage, cooking demonstration by a renowned cook (who revealed her secret brownie recipe), a talk on correct eating and dinner etiquette, followed by a 3 course meal and ending with a talk on inner beauty.
But it’s hard to read the expressions and the body language from a culture that hasn’t learnt how, their faces seem to reflect a look of disinterest. Completely wrong! Rochelle commented, “it was the best weekend of my life”. Another girl, Chone, said, “I wish I could rewind till when we were sitting in the movies”. She also said something so simple, her highlight was the part where we just chatted (at 2am!!). It wasn’t anything significant, just normal girls talk. But I realised that it was different, normally the topic of conversation is on ‘other matters’, or they’re drunk or drugged. Chone is one of the quietest girls, it’s hard to get much out of her at the best of times, yet here she was going on and on about the weekend saying she wishes it had gone on until Sunday.

2 comments:

Kathy said...

Wow, you summed it up well, Mandy, and I'm so impressed with the picture slide show you added too! It's so cool that you showed the girls an alternative way to enjoy a weekend! Keep it up!

Anonymous said...

Well done to all of you for making these ladies feel so special!!We are sometimes so concerned about 'self' so it's good when we can give back!! God will bless you!! Rene