By Brittany Tiplady
@yellowbird888

Community for a Sustainable World, a local non-profit organization, is hosting a Family Day event in efforts to raise proceeds and make bracelets for the Botshabelo Community Development Project and the members of the community.

Last summer, CSW made their inaugural trip to South Africa to begin their collaborative partnership with the Botshabelo Community Development Trust and the founding Cloete family. Their project will assist in the funding, planning, and coordinating, of a solar panel installation that will drastically improve the community’s access to power for daily operations and reduce the cost of their astronomical utility bills.

The Botshabelo Community started in 1990 after the Cloete family bought a plot of land in Magaliesburg, South Africa creating a safe haven for those displaced and seeking refuge due to HIV/AIDS or Apartheid. Their mission was to take anyone and anything in need-including animals. “Their goal is to be a modern and sustainable African village,” says Alanah Morin co-founder and operations specialist for Community for a Sustainable World.

Today, the community has grown into a children’s village welcoming over 1,000 members.

“We learned about the community in [2016] and we co-hosted a concert in February that was really successful in hopes of raising money to [assist Botshabelo] in launching a solar panel installation project,” she says.

“In a whim, over a few text messages, we decided that in order to really connect with this community we actually had to go. It was only eight days, but the most exciting and inspirational eight days that we have ever had.”

The Bracelets for Botshabelo event will donate the ticket sales to the Botshabelo Community Development Project. However, the event shares a sweeter sentiment: attending will allow you to make a bracelet that will be gifted to the Botshabelo Community members when CSW returns this August.

“Every single bracelet will be tagged and numbered and we will take a photo [of the recipient], so that those who made the bracelets can hop on our social media and see who the lucky recipient was,” explains Morin.

“Our vision is to support and develop sustainable self-reliant communities around the globe. If you go on our website it’s on the top of the page and totally out there. What’s really close to our hearts is collaboration, and community. It’s important that in everything we do, we collaborate. ”

Tickets will be available to purchase at the door, or online. Single Entry is $10, and a Family pass is $35 and admits 4. Follow the event on Facebook to learn more. 

Brittany Tiplady is a part-time poet, a full-time Nasty Woman, and the co-founder of Loose Lips Magazine. She loves the indoors, fast wifi, collecting maps, and a generous glass of red wine. She is a self-proclaimed wizard of time management, and a notorious loud talker with a penchant for all things Internet.