Dan Clarke Update

Hey all, this is my first months newsletter.


Since I last wrote my last newsletter after my first week, I have been extremely busy.
I have been continuing going to the prison at least once a week, something I still feel to be incredible. With some of the boy's faith inspiring me. Since I last wrote a couple of the lads have left the prison after being in there for about 6 years, and I hope to keep in contact with them now they are out.

I have also carried on helping out at the “We are Giants” football at a school, which is a Christian based coaching session. For a long weekend we travelled to Durban for a couple of events we were hosting. It was a long 8 hour journey in the minibus but on the day we arrived we as a team lead a “youth” event, which I lead some Icebreaker games for the introduction. The night went well and we developed a good relationship with the church there.

The next evening we hosted a TUG event ( The Ultimate Goal) telling the church about our aims in 2010, with the opportunity of more than 2 million fans coming over for the World Cup, with many big screen events combining football and Christianity.

On the Sunday, two of us from AIS who had stayed with two guys from a charity called “Lions Raw”, went with them to see a few of their projects, and helped coach in the Valley's near Durban, which is in complete contrast to the rich city. There we taught football to the kids, but also attended a church with all of them, in the language of Zulu, which I didn't really understand, but it was a good experience anyway.The next day we went to an orphanage and workshops for people in the Valley who don't have the opportunity to go elsewhere for education.

Since being out here I have joined a Youth Cell, that meets every Tuesday, with a load of guys from the Church here that I attend. As I mentioned in the last letter, we have hosted another “Freestyling” event. Football Freestyling is basically trying to do as many little skills and kick ups and tricks as possible, keeping the ball in the air. (for more info on this type football freestyling into youtube).


This is very popular over here and we have used this freestyling as a competition to bring the locals to get to know our charity and our message. We hosted these events in shopping malls, and hundreds of people attended and took part, even more watched. However the main reason for these events are to raise awareness of our biggest event of the year, in October our “Match For A Day” event, with endless possibilities. For more information on this event, visit www.justgiving.com/dan-clarke or www.justgiving.com/match-for-a-day or join the facebook group “match for a day”.

BBQ's are very popular out here (they call them Braai's) and last weekend I had 3 Braai's in 3 days, one at church, one for the youth and one at my host family's house. I won't complain though, :) I love my BBQ's.

This last week was very busy and full of work. Me and another intern who arrived this week (Jacob) did a lot of preparation for a tournament we hosted, the preparation was very long and sometimes tedius but necessary, and eventually all the work was finished just in time before the teams arrived. There were 10 teams who took part, 2 from Nigeria, 1 from Zambia, 1 from Durban, 1 from Port Elizabeth and 5 here in Pretoria. It was a 4 day tournament with 5 of the teams staying with us at a campsite. In the evenings we lead little services, with songs, sermons and testimony's, which was amazing seeing all the guys dancing and singing. For some it could be for the first time they were worshiping God, and I am pretty sure some gave their lives to Jesus this week.

The 4 day tournament was very tiring and some days were as long as 18 hours long, with all the setting up to do for each day, as well as packing away. So I woke up today after having nearly 13 hours sleep, which was very relaxing and so what is left of today I have off.
Please keep me in your prayers,
Dan