For people in Europe, July means holidays, relaxation, travel. For people in Southern Africa, July means cold weather and, for those who have no electricity, a struggle to find a way to keep themselves warm. The results are often tragic: people are smothered in tin shacks where paraffin stoves or open coal fires made in buckets provide heat but use up limited supplies of oxygen. The matches and candles that are stored in these shacks have a strange fascination for the children living there.

One day last July, Naomi, who lives with her family in Mmakau village outside Pretoria, went to the Home Affairs office in Ga-Rankua, leaving her two children playing at home. On her return she found her shack had gone up in flames, completely gutted, only the sheets of corrugated iron (that had been the walls of the shack) were left lying on the ground. Fortunately nobody was injured. The neighbours gathered round to support Naomi and to decide what to do. One of them approached Elizabeth O’Sullivan rsm to ask for help. The most urgent need was to build the shack again.

All that was left of Naomi’s home

Two of the groundsmen, who work in Mashiko Adult Education Centre run by the Mercy Sisters, were delegated to put the house together again. They needed poles, more galvanized iron, windows, bolts and screws. A kind donor had given Sr. Elizabeth R1000 (?100) and so off they went to the hardware store for all that was required.

In two days Naomi had a roof over her head. The neighbours presented her with beds, bedding, curtains, clothes, tables, chairs and food. One young woman gave Naomi her own bed!

The floor was non-existent, but the men got busy with the cement and soon you could dance a jig on it and so a living proof of the power of ‘community serving humanity’ stands in Mmakau for everyone to see.

Naomi’s new house

South African Province