Commonwealth Youth Exchange Project
Scotland & South Africa

This is a Commonwealth Youth Exchange Project involving young people between the ages of 21-25yrs from Scotland and South Africa.

See the News section for the latest update...but here's the background.

A group of young Scots are participating in a workshop programme funded by The Scottish Arts Council and out of the blue, based around contemporary and traditional Scottish culture. This group visited South Africa for a month in January 2002. There they shared a programme of activities with a group of young people from Mamelodi Theatre Organization (MATO), who use the Arts as an educational tool to Combat illiteracy, truancy and crime. These activities were devised during an advanced planning trip to Mamelodi by Suzanne Merrall and Dana MacLeod in February of this year, funded by a British Council Youth Millenium Award.

out of the blue and Mamelodi Theatre Organisation (MATO) first met during the Fringe Festival 1996, MATO returned in 1997 & 98 with sell out Fringe performances.

Mamelodi, 'Mother of Music', is the largest Township in Pretoria, the capital of South Africa, with a population the size of Edinburgh. Though apartheid has finished the problems have not. Unemployment is higher than ever, as is crime. Though black people are now not expected to work as servants to the white population, there has been little or no increase in alternative employment. In 1990 the highest percentage of black students in a South African universitiy was 0.3%, & though education is now encouraged, most cannot afford to study. Mamelodi Township has one supermarket with a variety of empty shelves and most families cannot afford to buy fresh produce. The lack of streetlights and poverty induced crime combined with the legacy of the 7pm curfew which existed under apartheid means there is little or no recreation. The people of Mamelodi would like to create a space where people feel safe, where people play football instead of burn cars and where children learn the value of their heritage.

Now it is the South African’s turn to visit us. We have a jam packed programme of activities planned for them from the Traditional to the Contemporary: Celidhs, Murals, Animation, Environmental Movement, Clubs, Museums, Galleries, Ghost Tours will all take place in Edinburgh; whilst a trip to Uist in the Western Isles will see them thatching, cockling, peat cutting, abseiling, canoeing and film making, and note that until this year most of the South Africans had never seen the sea let alone experienced Island life. Amongst all of this there will be opportunities for you to learn Zulu & Sotho dance and percussion at workshops (see cutting room listings). On Thursday the 23rd May you are invited to the preview of our Exhibition which will include photography, sketches, film and prose. You can watch us at work from the 24th to 31st May in situ in the New Street Exhibition Space and contribute to our Scottish Mural that will then go out on the streets in Bonnington, Edinburgh. On the 29th May you can dance and make merry at our final fund raising and high energy night here at the Bongo before our visitors head back to the Sun.

The project has been in development since 1999, and has been guided by the Commonwealth Youth Exchange Council, who are also assisting with training and are part funding the flights for both groups.

Ideas, support and donations welcome !