Uthando – Helping Tourism To REALLY Make a Difference.

Every road trip should be like the road trip I’ve just enjoyed. We walked, we talked, we laughed, we drove, we went all intellectual (and a whole lot cultural) at the Cape Town Book Fair… and we went on a township tour.

What? Martin Hatchuel, anti-human-zoo-campaigner, went on a township tour?

Yes. But this was no usual township tour.

I’ve always argued against the kind of cultural tourism which purports to show ‘real people’ living ‘real lives’ in ‘real cultural villages’ and I’ve always felt uneasy about going on township tours because somehow I’ve always felt that the tour operators saw the townships as ready-made cultural villages (which goes to my new-found exploration of the concept of colonial tourism, in which the operator becomes the new colonialist).

I would prefer, I said, to see culture in a gallery or to watch it in a choreographed show, something like the Tango shows they advertise in Buenos Aires or the Flamenco evening I once went to in Madrid. I even once wrote the script for a show of my own which fused African story telling into western music – and it worked! (if only as a piece of art – commercial success eluded us).

So what made this tour different?

Well, see, it was unlike anything I’d expected – and it had a purpose beyond charity. It sought sustainability.

I’m just reading A Billion Bootstraps: Microcredit, Barefoot Banking, and the Business Solution for Ending Poverty by Phil Smith and Eric Thurman and it’s really struck a chord with me because the thing that’s always worried me about charity was that it seems so unsustainable: if I gave a woman a hundred to feed her family and I never saw her again – who would give her the next hundred?

Mr. Smith and Mr. Thurman agree – and they’ve found that by loaning people small amounts of money, you can help them build businesses for themselves – and when they repay their loans, you can recycle the money to help the next person. It’s a concept that won Professor Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize.

Even though it isn’t in the barefoot banking business, I confidently expect that Uthando – the company with whom we visited the townships – will garner just as many accolades.

Uthando is the brain child of James Fernie, a qualified lawyer who’s also a volunteer at Nazareth House in Cape Town. As a direct result of his work there, he says in his on-line biography, “It occurred to me in 2007 that an amazing plan for my life was staring right at me; to combine my passion for helping the underdog, my life’s experiences and the vast and incredible network of amazing people around the world who love South Africa and its people, and want to make a very real and significant difference.”

The plan he came up with is simple and elegant: he’s created a trust to which companies contribute on an ongoing basis – but there’s nothing new in that: the difference is that contributions are calculated according to sales. It’s kind of a voluntary tax. So contracted tour operators (inbound, outbound, foreign or domestic) would, for example, contribute R100.00 for every tour sold and guest houses would contribute, say, a percentage of every bed night.

Uthando’s job, then, is to distribute this funding to its targeted grassroots projects in the most effective way – and this is where their tours (they call them interactive field trips) make so much sense from a management point of view. Because they’re visiting the projects they support on an on-going basis, they’re able to keep abreast of what they need and so they can react quickly and appropriately. It cuts out the ‘overhead’ which is normally the killer that removes great swathes of donor funding from the actual task at hand.

The secret behind what I believe will be the success of Uthando’s field trips is the kind of projects they’ve chosen to visit – and the interaction they offer at the projects’ bases (and this was important for me – we went into community halls and school rooms and not into anyone’s private, family homes. I couldn’t have done that. I couldn’t easily come into your home, either – unless we were friends beforehand, of course. Too invasive. Too uncomfortable).

Each of the projects is genuine about upliftment (not one of them has interest in creating showcases for tourists) and the tour itineraries differ according to day of the week and time of the day – because these are projects that are part of people’s lives and you have to fit in with their schedules. Arts and culture groups, for example – when you visit them, you’re actually being invited to watch them in regular rehearsal (with all rehearsal’s bloopses and triumphs). And groups only rehearse at particular times on particular days.

On our lightning-fast tour (it was an educational, so we went to more projects than the average afternoon field trip would normally accommodate), we visited Beauty for Ashes in Observatory, a half-way house under the directorship of Stephanie van Wyk which offers rehabilitation and support for female prisoners; the Ingqayi Educational Theatre Project, which concentrates on theatre development in poor communities under director Thembile Nazo; the Hout Bay Music Project where we heard the amazing kids from the disadvantaged communities of Hangberg and Imizamo Yetho playing – get this – western orchestral music under the directorship of Leanne Dollman (and to think that they played like angels – and yet they only get to practice once or twice a week; they can’t take their basses, violins, violas – or djembes or marimbas – home with them); the James House Child and Youth Care Centre, which will soon be moving into a smart new home, and where I was bowled over (literally – I landed on my ass) by S’fiso, the skate-boarding 4-year-old who wanted to see every page of my notebook and play with every button on my camera; the Jikeleza dance project, where Edmund Thwaites and Atholl Hay work at empowering, uplifting and improving the quality of life of young people from impoverished communities through dance and music; and T-Bag Designs (I couldn’t get over this one) where Jill Hayes has created an economic empowerment project in which participants paint unique designs onto dried, used tea bags (yes, tea bags) – which are then used to decorate everything from coasters to handbags.

What was refreshing was James’s insistence that he wanted no money to change hands during his tours (except, of course, where you actually bought something – like a painted T-bag. Go visit the web site – you’ll see that I’m not being facetious). Personal interaction, he said, is the most important thing.

I like what James and his team are doing at Uthando, and I was inspired by the people I met last Tuesday in Gugulethu, Langa and Hout Bay – and I think you would be too.

We all talk about responsible tourism all the time, and here’s an easy way of putting our money where our mouths are: a self-imposed tax on sales that directly benefits the people who need it most. And the fact that you’re paying as you’re selling is what makes it sustainable (although, of course, nobody’s stopping anyone from making individual donations!).

If you’re looking to make a difference, you might look at signing up with Uthando. Contact James at info@uthandosa.org.

I WISH I Could See This Show!

While I was browsing the Jikeleza site, I found this teaser:

Upcoming Events – Jikeleza Dance Project, Zip Zap Circus School & the Hout Bay Music Project present VOOMA! – a high energy and inspiring collaborative performance in the Artscape Opera House on 28, 29 & 30 June @ 7.00 p.m. (with a matinee performance at 2.00 p.m. on the 30th of June).

Booking at Computicket or Artscape Dial-A-Seat 021 421 7695

If you live in Cape Town or anywhere nearby, do yourself a favour. I’ve seen some of the rehearsals – and I KNOW you’ll be amazed and inspired.