On Thursday we arrived to the city of Pretoria, South Africa so that we can work with an organization called Popup. Popup stands for people upliftment program and its goal is to provide skills training so that people may have the opportunity to have a skill or trade that will allow for employment. Popup also offers medical services, dentistry, optical, and a kids center. This organization really tugs at my heart strings because someday I would love to open a center similar to this one in the States. I would love to open a center for kids coming out of the foster care system and coming out of juvenile detention centers. I would love to offer counseling, job training, teach them how to write resumes, find jobs, and just give them an opportunity to succeed in life when others tell them they can’t make it. Also, my center will include afterschool care for kids with activities to keep them out of the streets. Being here at Popup truly motivates me and tells me that it is possible. The heart of this organization is to truly help those in need. This month I will be working at PopKids helping the teachers.
Yesterday, I had the chance to play with some of the toddlers here and what shocked me was that most of them did not smile. Children naturally have this joy about them and to see these kids not smile hurt my heart. My goal for these next couple of weeks at this ministry site is to make these kids smile.
