On Saturday 24th October at 3.10 pm, Swedish pilot Johan Wiklund will land his Moth bi-plane in Stellenbosch having completed an epic flight across Europe and Africa from northern Scandinavia.
Children’s Book Network will be there to meet him and to sing a special song of welcome after his incredible adventure. We are giving a workshop at the airfield before his arrival. The theme will be Courage and Adventure and will be facillitated by Blaq Pearl, our song-writer-poet colleague and Lesley Beake. Ten children from Red Hill informal settlement will be present – and Michael, a young man who attended our very first workshops at Red Hill three years ago. He said then that his dream was to fly. Rose-Marie Lindfors, a Swedish drama teacher who attended one of those workshops, remembered his words. As a result, Michael has been invited to fly with Johan after the landing ceremonies. It is hard to imagine how wonderful it will be to take off into the sky over False Bay and our beautiful Mother City of Cape Town.
Courage is something we believe in and respect. It is the single motivator that gets children up and ready for what life can, and will, throw at them. We work with children who have few advantages when they begin their life-path. Caring parents, great teachers, wonderful librarians may be part of that, but even that is sometimes not enough. They have to stand on tiptoe and fly, and that is hard to motivate and do. Dreams such as Johan’s to fly across more than half the world, are inspirational to our children – to all children, everywhere.
For more information please look at:
www.capetocape.net
Many thanks to everyone who is helping us achieve our reading dream for South Africa’s children.
