Welcome to the site where we celebrate ordinary people doing extraordinary things 

Sibu Sibaka, director of PLAY SOCCER South Africa, knows just how to bring children of both sexes fully on board using the world’s most popular game, football. "These kids will play soccer until there is no light on the streets and we figure let's provide a safe environment for them to do exactly that but teach them a thing or two in the process that will help them for life," Sibaka said.

"The need to take care of children in distress in South Africa is a calling that came to me, like a burning fire - a fire that was raging but to no good purpose”, says Anna Mojapelo, co-founder of New Jerusalem Children’s Home in Midrand. Anna, moved by the increasing number of children in her community that had been forgotten, neglected and orphaned by HIV and AIDS, felt driven to love, protect and provide these children with shelter.

The growth of FoodBank in the last few months has resulted in a network of four operational FoodBanks, serving some 900 beneficiary organisations, and providing more that 1.2 million meals a month.  While statistics measure the impact FoodBank is making on reducing hunger, behind the figures there are stories of hope for each child, women or man who is helped.

A human face and story for a tragedy of epic proportions unravelling in sub-Saharan Africa where nearly 12 million of the world’s estimated 15 million AIDS orphans live. His situation must surely be every parent’s nightmare – a once beloved child now totally abandoned, with nowhere to sleep, no shared meals at a table, no one to turn to, no hugs, no praise, no laughter, no love. 

In a scenario that will be increasingly repeated all over the country, as the number of orphans and vulnerable children escalates, the centre of Howick in KwaZulu-Natal became the operating ground of a pack of wayward street children. Tourists and residents were regularly harassed by these ragged and filthy children, who hung around outside the shops and at street corners, begging for money and food.

Many volunteers come from overseas to help non-profit organisations in South Africa. Be More, an international charity, places overseas volunteers in a number of different projects that are dedicated to helping relieve the plight of children affected and infected by HIV and AIDS. Volunteers bring hope, energy, skills and friendship into the lives of the children and adults they help. In return, their lives are enriched beyond their expectations.

Dr Hardman and her husband Harry started the AIDS Care Training and Support (ACTS) Community Clinic in White River, Mpumalanga. Fifteen years ago, when Dr Hardman realised how big the HIV and AIDS epidemic could become, she started a home-based care programme in the Masoyi Tribal Area with Lucy Ngobeni, a respected community worker. It was modelled on the successful programmes she had visited in Zimbabwe and Uganda.

This organisation was started by a group of feisty grandmothers from Khayelitsha in Cape Town. All of the founding grandmothers had been affected by the HIV epidemic in some way. Many had lost one or more of their children to AIDS and were caring for their orphaned grandchildren; others were nursing sick children or grandchildren who had AIDS.

Creating employment, empowering women and giving hope to a community is the aim of The Heartfelt Project in Makapanstad. The heartfelt story has a sad beginning: the death in prison of Emmanuel, wrongly accused 26 year-old son of Martha Letsoalo. For nine months Martha had paid more than 75% of her meagre salary to a lawyer to secure her son’s freedom.

Mama Lumka was referred to as the ‘Wheelbarrow Saint’ when she started collecting, each weekday morning, all the disabled babies and children in her township area in a wheelbarrow.  She would then carefully wheel them back to her humble house where she would look after them until their parents or caregivers returned from work.