THE ISITHUMBA SPORTGARTEN/ DURBANGREEN CORRIDOR ...

THE ISITHUMBA SPORTGARTEN/ DURBANGREEN CORRIDOR
WORK CAMP
Over the Easter weekend the iSithumba Sportgarten/Durban Green Corridor
partnership hosted a wonderful work camp at iSithumba, a small Zulu village in
the Valley of a Thousand Hills.

During this work camp we cleaned up of the iSithumba Adventure Tourism
Centre, extended and levelled the soccer pitch, held the Isithumba Sportgarten
Sports Day and hosted a Kaefer Thermal staff football team who joined the
work camp and played football against the iSithumba All Stars and visiting
Bremen youth club, Union 60.
This was not just about the work that the visitors from Bremen did together
with the community volunteers, but sharing life experiences and learning more
about each others’, background and lifestyles.
SPONSORS
We want to thank all those who made the work camp a success.
The Bremen Sportgarten, Durban Green Corridor Project and the departments
of Sport and Recreation and International Governance and Relations of the
eThekwini Municipality for their organisation and sponsorship.

We also thank Kaefer Thermal, the Union 60 football club and community
volunteers and sports teams for their participation.
HOME STAY ACCOMODATION
We had 20 participants from Bremen’s Union 60 and Sportgarten Bremen,
under 19 team who stayed in the village of Isithumba for seven days from
Thursday 21 April to Wednesday 27 th April. Five families accommodated our
visitors. This allowed our visitors to experience the way village people live their
lives by staying with them in their homes. This experience was very good for
the hosts and for the visitors and we believe it shows that families in the village
can also accommodate tourists in the future.

ISITHUMBA ADVENTURE TOURISM CENTER
The iSthumba Adventure Tourism Centre is a 16 bed tourist lodge. It was built
in 2002 and functioned until 2008 when it was abandoned. It had become a
home for cows and goats for the past three years. Our project was to clean it
up within the seven days we all spent in the village. With the involvement of a
large number of the villagers, people worked really hard together with the
Union 60/Bremen Sportgarten team to get the tourism centre ready for
reconstruction. Each day we had 20 different locals working on the site
voluntarily together with the 20 German volunteers. You could see by the
participation of so many men and women of all ages, that the community really
wants the place to come into operation again.

THE SOCCER PITCH
Work on the soccer pitch started on the Thursday before Easter but it was clear
from the beginning that we needed more time and a grader to do the job. Also
we needed advice from different people, especially the soccer teams in the
area as they are the ones who should decide how they want the soccer pitch to
be. This project was finished after the work camp, and the pitch now looking
ready for the soccer players to use it. We hope that we will be able to do
another project in spring time to grass the field.
THE ISITHUMBA SPORTGARTEN SPORTS DAY
The iSithumba Sportgarten chose Easter Sunday to be the iSithumba
Sportgarten Day. We invited six teams from different villages around the area
of Thousand Hills/KwaXimba to take part in this multi sport event that involves
boys and girls. The iSithumba Sportgarten together the organisers and sponsors
from the Bremen Sportgarten and the eThekwini Municipality’s made this
event possible. There was wonderful participation and the day showed a lot of

us that the gender does not really matter, but what matters is the fun and
togetherness that sports can create in our society.
There is so much more to speak about what happened within this short stay,
also good memories for all those who participated. Now that the Bremen
people have experienced life this side, people from this side (isithumba) would
love to do the same in Bremen some day.
In conclusion the iSithumba Sportgarten and the Durban Green Corridor thank
everybody that supported the work camp.
SIYABONGA, DANKE SCHON, THANK YOU......