Over the festive season the Koranna Taaibosch Royal House was very busy with a few events. One of them was a hamper drive which then turned into a Christmas party, because our Paramount Chief Glen Taaibosch wanted to do something special for the kids of the parents who were going to receive the hampers.

How it all came to fruition was that Khoi Keith Duarte arranged for us to meet with the Paramount Chief and the group of women, in Eldorado Park Ext.1, who had been earmarked to receive a Christmas hamper each as well as a gift for their children. Pastor Gaynor Materra initiated contact with the Paramount Chief after many doors she knocked on were shut.

At an informal meeting held on a Wednesday 12 November 2019, we all met with Paramount Chief Glen Taaibosch, Pastor Gaynor Materra and the identified group of women and children in Sabre Street, Eldos Ext.1. After talking to the women, the Paramount Chief vowed to assist them with a grocery hamper to bring relief over the festive season.

A well-organized Christmas Party materialized after that meeting and took place at the J D Opperman Centre on Sunday 22 December 2019 at 12 noon. The hall had been set up and the children played on jumping castles and waterslides. Aunty Beatrice Brown and her boys, were one of the sponsors and the Koranna Taaibosch Royal House.

The Browns are one of the pioneer families in Eldorado Park who are regularly involved in successful community upliftment sponsorship and drives such as:

· Toy drives

· Community upliftment events

· And treating families to a special home-cooked Christmas lunch personally delivered to their doorstep.

This time around on that specific Sunday, 22 December 2019, the Christmas party set off with a bang when the Brown family served the ext.1 children, at least 80 plus, with a braai a cool refreshment. The festivities were so blessed that more than 100 children from the immediate neighborhood, (#BSection) were attracted but were thankfully catered for.

The children were surprised by a Santa Clause bearing numerous gifts, snacks, and goodies. Before the children were presented with their gifts, the 60 earmarked families were handed their promised Christmas hampers. All these families were extremely grateful and expressed their heartfelt gratitude, that our Paramount Chief was overcome with emotion. You can imagine how excited and restless the kids became while our Paramount Chief was being appreciated and thanked for being true to his promise of organizing the Christmas party.

Then the Paramount Chief delivered a heart-warming speech, punctuated by the history of the Khoisan, as well as an awareness piece about the importance of recognizing and acknowledging our Koranna Khoi origins-that we are the oldest and First Indigenous Nation in South Africa, our country. It is a remarkable trait of the Paramount Chief to make us all aware of our origins, our identity and right to be landowners first. When the Paramount Chief ended his speech and on a lighter note, he gave the podium over to Pastor Gaynor Materra to deliver her piece and a prayer, but jokingly told her to keep it short and sweet.

Finally, when the children could no longer contain their excitement, Santa Clause took the stage and proceeded to handout the gifts. The level of noise was so high that several people tried to calm the children down. Towards the end of the event, the children who gate-crashed party, also happily walked away with gifts.

Pastor Gaynor happily commented that she has never had the pleasure of working with such an efficient and well-organized team, who pulled off such a successful Christmas event at such short notice.

The party ended in high spirits so that the Paramount Chief and the Brown’s expressed their appreciation participants all the who contributed to the success of the Christmas Party.

Remember to pay it forward……………

Written by: The Koranna Taaibosch Media team