Evening Sessions

Evening Sessions

The Umthombo Evening Sessions run every Wednesday and Thursday night providing alternative activities to street life for children outside of conventional working hours. Hosted by Sihle and Sox the sessions seek to explore daily feelings and experiences through performance and to workshop new performance ideas.

In preparation for the Talent Showcase competition in March small groups of former street children have written songs and rehearsed a short drama reflecting their experiences in finding Umthombo.

Art Programme

Independent Beadwork

The new art room at Umthombo Safe Space is designed to facilitate daily arts activities for children using the drop-in centre. Many children previously enrolled in soccer and surfing programmes in the morning can now spend more of their extra free time engaged in arts activities throughout the day.

Mxolisi together with volunteers lead regular craft, drama and music workshops, additionally arts materials are available to access all day for independent activities. Beadwork has been extremely popular example of this type of activity allowing for meditative, focused, independent work.

Beanbag Armchairs

Umthombo gratefully receives donations of clothing from the community, occasionally unsuitable, oversized, ladies’ clothes, are included in these donations. Such items have now been put to extra use in an art project teaching practical life skills and sustainable living: we’ve made recycled, patchwork, beanbag armchairs.

We combined the donated items with wornout rash vests to reflect collaboration between Umthombo programmes in the artwork.

Children learnt pattern mapping and cutting techniques as well as basic sewing skills over the course of the project.

The chairs will be used to furnish the new, quiet social work room and library space linked with the art facility, enabling a safe and comfortable arena for counselling and relaxation.

The new art Room

Umthombo Safe Space office and administrative staff relocated to the

west side of our centre to make way for a bigger art facility and for Life space to start operating on a bigger space. Participants of the

arts programme took ownership of their new space, working together with volunteers-

from the Netherlands and UK, to decorate the new rooms. Murals were designed and painted by the children around two broad thematic inspirations: dream,

fantasy and creativity and belonging, identity and community. The art work took 3 weeks to complete and now fills the wall space alongside a dedicated photography display

area which has been allocated to be filled with photos from all Umthombo programmes over the coming months.

This facility will humanise the space and serve as a permanent, yet flexible, visual reminder of the positive activities and journeys engaging Durban’s street children at Umthombo.