Ajax Cape Town

The Ticket Ride Foundation, Masiphumelele, Cape Town

In May of 2009, Tim Conibear completed his final trip as a tour leader for Ticket to Ride Worldwide Surf Adventures, running Gap Year and Career Breaker surf tours throughout South Africa and Mozambique. After three years of travel in South Africa, and after meeting some wonderful people from various communities, he decided it was time to settle and to help some of the people who have welcomed him as a friend over his time here.

Tim chose Cape Town, where he had established firm links with Mthandazo (Thomas), a local to the Masiphumelele township, who runs informal football sessions for the children of his street.  It’s always been his passion and desire to inspire and entertain the kids of his street through sport and he has done so on a small scale, and on a voluntary basis, for several years. Thomas is a role model to the young children of the township and he is a key figure in keeping them away from the temptations of township life that often embroil the young and adolescent during their downtime after school and often lead to a life of crime. He saw the need for after schools activities, for positive local role models away from the school environment, and he saw the effect even our small and occasional early sessions had on Thomas’ street. 

Tim wanted to help Thomas expand his coaching sessions to incorporate more children, more local staff, more activities on a more regular basis, and to build in an educational angle in an area where many kids are deprived of proper schooling. Together they decided to put as much time into the project as possible with the aim of giving the kids something positive to do after school and providing the children with healthy local role models and a happy and friendly environment in which to express themselves.

From their modest beginnings in July 2009, when it was Tim, Thomas and 20 or so boys, they have now expanded and incorporate in excess of 100 boys, girls and young adults from across the Masi township. They now run football, surfing, swimming, netball and arts and crafts projects and have also recruited three new local staff in the form of Thobela, who runs senior football training for members ranging from ages 15-23, Clare who takes the girls for Arts and Crafts sessions and Pila who runs netball training.

This year, with the help of Thobela, they will operate as an official Football Club in the Cape Town Township league, giving the children and young adult’s regular competitive football on the weekends as well as potential to pursue their football dreams. Last week Friday they teamed up with Ajax Cape Town and ran a successful training session for 40 children. It was a wonderful occasion which bought a lot of hope to the kids and expanded their faith and confidence in what we are looking to achieve as a charity. As outreach projects go, it was wonderful to see the coaches investing their time and effort to bring smiles to every child’s face, ensuring they all went home happy. We hope to run another Hotspot in the future and are now on the look out for a similar scheme for the girls revolving around netball.