After a stormy
weekend filled with disastrous wind and rain I had to embark on the journey to
Johannesburg and do note that my journey started in the rain from Leliefontein.
Bear in mind that the road from Leliefontein is gravel road and after a weekend
of pouring rain the road was just ride able, going through rivers that never
existed just barely staying on the road but at last we made it to Kamieskroon
where I had to catch the taxi to Cape Town. After waiting for hours I finally
got in the taxi and joined Rouchet Daniels as we took on the road to Cape Town.
After a refreshing night in CT we went to the CT offices to kill time and left with
Tennille Rode and Tshepo Morokong to catch our flight to JHB. We met Nolubabalo
Kwayimani and we hopped on the plane and waved goodbye to the Mother City.
After landing in JHB the waiting started, first for the shuttle (that was not
organized) and after catching a shuttle to the Birchwood Hotel, we still had to
wait. Personally I can relate to elephants because I have a boatload of
patience, but the waiting took its toll on me. We waited and we waited and we
ate and we still had to wait. I don’t think I was ever that happy to see a key
to a room in my life!Finally we got to our rooms, and we got to kick back take a
nice bath and prepare mentally and physically for the week ahead.
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| me chilling at the Birchwood sign |
Day 1 started
off as what I would call boring but beside the boredom of the speeches I
learned a bit firstly I never knew that SANBI was in charge of all the
botanical Gardens in South Africa. And I think that what SANBI stands for is
very noble especially the part where they are developing human capital development.
They also informed us about their various foundations including the research,
taxonomy, ecosystem classification tools and mapping and many more.
After the introduction to SANBI the CEO Tanya Abraham talked
to us about the Groen Sebenza Project.
The one thing she said that really struck a chord with me was: “We have
the third richest biodiversity in the world, but why are there still no jobs?
Why are the youth not interested in working in green jobs?”
Various people from different organizations talked and they
included The Department of Environment and Nature Conservation who presented as
part of the government section. Indigo was a representative from the non-
governmental organization and NCC Environmental Sector represented the private
sector. All these organizations presented on how they fit into the Groen
Sebenza program.
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| me and my homie Rouchet Daniels |
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| me and my other homie Nolubabalo Nkwayimani |
After lunch one of my favorite presentations took place with
the theme ‘branding and networking’. As we walked into the hall after lunch I
already sensed that this was going to be something I would remember for a long
time and I was not disappointed. The music filled the hall until everyone was
seated and then Mr Carl Smit took to the stand and introduced himself as the
branding expert of Africa. And I can surely say that I do believe him because
for the whole week we still talked about him, as he said was the whole thing
about branding yourself, is to get people to talk about you. What I remember
most about his presentation was how full he was of himself and how self assured
he was and the brute manner in which he described “if I google you and nothing
comes up, then you do not exist”.
He also gave us some homework which required us to network
with people whom we have not met yet and I enjoyed this so much. My facebook
contacts got quite a boost.
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| Here me and Rouchet are posing with Curtis Hartnick whom we met there |
The next day started with a reflection session where the
incubators( that’s us) got a chance to reflect on the previous day, though I
think most of them did not quite understand the term ‘reflection on previous
day’ as it mostly consisted of thanks toward SANBI, which was sweet I would
say.
After that Ms Vivian Malema did a presentation on the
Incubator Model which raised the question about the naming as incubators and in
the end they agreed to start saying colleagues instead but later turned into
calling the incubators eggs which was another story on its own. She also
covered the topic of mentors as some of the ‘eggs’ had questions about the role
of the mentors and the selection of mentors and what to do when your mentor
does not support you. This led to Ms Malema saying that the mentors will be
trained on mentoring as soon as possible.
After lunch we got the opportunity to divide into groups
that would be kind of a mentoring session about our specific jobs, which I
found very satisfying because we got a better understanding and it was easier
to raise questions and join conversations in a smaller group than in the large
venue with 400+ people. I especially enjoyed this because it was a great
networking opportunity and I could network with people who I can actually ask
for advice in the future since they are basically on the same job line as me.
After the planned events of the day was done and we got some
‘time off’ (even though we were told we were on duty the whole time we are
there) the CSA group decided its time to go get some fresh air and see a
different part of Joburg other than the Birchwood Hotel. So we went to
reception to catch a shuttle to the mall- what an experience! Nolu went to
reception to ask for a shuttle to take us, so we waited by the golf carts
outside. As we were waiting for the driver who just went in to get the keys
another driver came and started to drive with the car. Obviously we stopped him
because we were waiting in the cold for a while now. What an attitude. But
after a bit of talking he told us to ‘GET IN!’ so we got in and the highlight
was when Tshepo told us to “Buckle up guys”. I was crushed by a wave of
laughter and later saw my life flash before my eyes as I experienced a real ‘bumpy
ride’ for the first time ever. But we made it to the mall and it was so refreshing
to get out a bit.
The following day we were greeted by the group Harambe who
specializes in uplifting youth and motivating them to grow and develop
themselves. Again we got divided into groups and we got to discuss our self and
our goals as well as challenges we might face. After this we had some
reflections and an opportunity to discuss the issues we had. It was surprising
that they were surprised by that fact that there were quite a few issues among
the incubants and we later got to share our issues with our coordinator.
The next day we had Ms J. Mangaba, representing Old Mutual
and at first I was skeptical thinking this would be a boring financial
presentation, but boy was I surprised. She had quite a few jokes up her sleeves
that had us all giggling and between being cute and funny she taught us to be
like the big 5. Ms Mangaba was really practical about this presentation, and
thought us not only the value of money, but also the mistakes we make with
directing our money.
After all this, another outing to the mall was just what I
needed for a good night’s rest, though after our trip to the mall none of my
bags could close properly anymore.
The next day they had a gala event planned at the botanical
gardens in Pretoria, so we all had to take all our luggage and be at the busses
by “7:30 sharp” as the busses was going to leave at 7:30 not a minute later,
but in the end it left a hour later. But that was all part of the excitement
and we got an opportunity to take a few photos. So the road trip to Pretoria
started and we left with me and Rouchet sharing a seat with a lot of bags. The
trip there in itself was an adventure not because of the fact that I’ve never
been there before but in the sense that the driver kinda sorta got lost (and by
kinda sorta I mean he had to make a u turn with a bus that can fit an army in
the middle of a busy road!). And if that in itself was not bad enough he had to
go off the road quite a bit with more than half of the bus on the wrong side of
the road. But we survived and made it to the gardens with no harm done, another
story to tell my grandchildren buried firmly in my memories.
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| The group of eggs from CSA: at the back is Tshepo Morokong in front from left is Rouchet , myself and Nolubabalo. We have another colleague who unfortunately had to leave early and missed getting her picture taken. |
After getting to the Gardens we had to move from the busses
in a line to enter the gardens officially in order for the security people to
count us, which brought back fond memories of high school. After that we ‘played’ a bit of follow the
leader as we all just walked from one point to another without any visible
reason, just because someone said so, which for me wearing heels was not that
much fun, but the sun was shining and the birds were chirping so I had no
reason to complain, though some of the other were not that impressed (read
really pissed).
The event itself was a bit stiff but we got the opportunity
to see DJ Sbu as our MC and got to hear some inspirational stories. After that
we headed to the airport and I think we were just all glad to be home. Though I
think Rouchet had more fun there than the whole trip because she got to see an
actor from one of her favorite soaps and walked past Jack Parow. Pity we were
not presumptuous enough to take some picture to go with our memories.
In the end we all had an awesome but tiring week, one I will not forget. I am truly thankful to everyone who had a hand in getting me this opportunity!
