‘I’m taking home the compassion, humour, positive attitude, the music and the dancing’. These were the words of Alice Meredith, a 19-year-old Global Xchange volunteer from Oxford in the UK.

Alice is one of 18 young people who recently spent three months volunteering in the community of Mooiplaas in Mpumalanga for Global Xchange. Global Xchange is a British Council initiative whereby 18 young people from the UK and South Africa are selected to volunteer their services, share skills and make a contribution to needy communities.

The initiative sees the British Council partnering with Volunteer Services Overseas VSO, an International charity organisation that places volunteers. VSO and the British Council are currently running Global Xchange projects in Syria, Indonesia, the Philippines, Kenya, Egypt, Malawi, South Africa and the UK. Global Xchange participants spend three months in one community, and then three months in a UK community.

The Mooiplaas volunteers are leaving South Africa for Swansea, a community in Wales, to spend the remaining three months of the initiative volunteering their services in that community.

British Council in South African project manager, Lion Pasha, is proud of the work done by the volunteers during their three months in Mooiplaas. ‘They have done very well, I have received fantastic feedback from people in the communities where they were placed, and the volunteers have addressed issues affecting those communities.’

‘They have learnt a lot from each other and have established mutual friendships. They have also become role models in a sense, because the work that they have started will continue after they have left. The young people in those respective communities have been so inspired that they will continue the work.’

‘I know that the UK volunteers have learnt a lot from the South Africans. They have engaged with learners, care centres, orphanages, and child-headed families. They have also learnt about traditions, customs, and values and even the languages spoken by the community they were living in. I believe that the South Africans will also learn a lot in Wales. This is all part of global citizenship and becoming a global village,’ he says.

Pasha says that the volunteers will be doing work in the Swansea community in Wales, a much larger community than the one in Mooiplaas.

UK volunteer, Alice Meredith, says she has learnt many different things from her experience in South Africa. ‘I learnt how to make grass mats, sweep, clean and wash a basin, and I have learnt a lot about people’s attitudes. I learnt to speak some SiSwati and I now have an understanding of how things work in such a community.’

‘I was placed in a primary school for children with special needs. I had no idea how hard teaching was until I tried. Working with kids has been very interesting and eye-opening,’ she chuckles.

‘What I loved most about South Africa was that people here are very welcoming, in a sense that they easily take a stranger into their homes. We experienced some language barriers but I soon learnt a bit of SiSwati, so it wasn’t that difficult to communicate with the locals,’ says Meredith.

‘I have formed friendships with many of the volunteers. I will miss my host family and I have been setting up email addresses for some of the community members so that we can communicate better’.

Felicia Ledwaba, a 25-year-old from Garankuwa in Pretoria, enjoyed every moment of the programme work in Mooiplaas. She says that the experience has left her with a number of skills and a number of friends.

‘I was placed in a home-based care centre where we spent time with orphans and child-headed families. It was a challenge and a moving experience, especially with the child-headed families. Sometimes you would find that they did not even have food. We helped them with the little resources that we had. We helped people to apply for social grants, and we motivated them to improve their lifestyles. They are now helping homeless children, helping teenagers who are battling with drug use and helping malnourished children,’ says Ledwaba.

Asked about what she expects to find in the UK, Ledwaba says, ‘I know that the UK will be different from South Africa, because our challenges are not the same. I have heard that there are problems with drug addiction, and that there are many homeless people. They might not have challenges like poverty and malnutrition, issues that South Africans are grappling with.’

Pasha says the next round of Global Xchange will start in September. ‘The British Council is already in consultation with communities to identify issues and host homes. This time the volunteers will start in the UK and come back to South Africa in December’.

The most recent Global Xchange article published can be read on the British Council website. Find more information about how to join Global Xchange and read success stories on their website. If you would like more information about the British Council and projects that are currently running, please visit their global page. If you are interested in learning more about upcoming and past events, please visit the events calendar. If you are moving abroad and would like to take the English test, please visit British Council’s IELTS page. Find out more about British Council school partnerships here.