Welcome!

Welcome to my research blog. This blog documents a month long journey through South Africa exploring the importance of architecture in the healing process for individuals and communities impacted by the AIDS epidemic. Please browse through my experiences that I had exploring the diversity of community building and architecture as a social act.

Reflection

Design rendering of new Home Based Care Center in the Umlazi Township

This research has culminated in the design of a home based care center for Zimisele - a community based organization in the Umlazi township of Durban. The design will be used as a tool to help Zimisele fundraise for some of their community programs and the construction of their future center.

back in joburg

Time for last minute connections, visits......preparing to head back to the US! Finally stationary, working in Mandlas office....see how much typing I can get done before heading back to work.....

Project Build and the St. Clemens Home Based Care Center

This was my final site visit for Durban. One of the project managers at Project Build took me to see a clinic/community care center that they built 3 years ago for a retired nurse. Ms. Mlambo is one of the grandmothers of the community and she started the St. Clemens center in 2001. This project has been the most comprehensive community health center that I have seen so far. There are spaces/programs for economic development, farming, computer training, HIV Counseling and testing, food distribution...and the list goes on.....They are not a full running clinic, yet, but the Dept of Health is working with them to get a volunteer doctor to visit during the week. I popped into one of their home based care training centers to find a room full of women being trained on treating people with AIDS......

Tomorrow I will take a break before my flight to Capetown on Thursday........

Zimsele! Get Ready!

"Yazi Isimo Sakho" - Know Your Status

vacant site for first Zimisele building.

Visited another township/informal settlement today with a Project Officer from the AIDS Foundation. Umlazi is located southeast from the Durban City Center. The AIDS Foundation is working with a group of nurses (Zimisele) who are trying to formalize their home based care project for people infected with HIV/AIDS. They are presently renting offices and intend to build an admin building for their organization. We visited a site that the City will donate to them to build their own office space. I spoke with them to get a sense of the type of "starter" building that they want to develop and how they see this project changing in the future. It is a small site, that they currently are using as a garden and kitchen. They have a full financial committment from "Operation Jump Start" - another foundation that funds building projects.

Zimisele is currently a small community based organization, but with the help of the AIDS Foundation they will be able to apply for grants in order to expand on the services that they offer community members. I attended a grant writing workshop for the women of Zimisele by the AIDS Foundation. These women have the basic infrastructure in place to do great community work. I would love to help them in the development of their first community center.

Zulu Reed Dance Festival

Today was by far the highlight of my whole trip! I attended the annual Zulu Reed Dance Festival in Zululand. Thje festival occurs every year in the grounds of the King of Zululand. All of the virgins of the surrounding villages come to the Kings palace and dance for him. Traditionally, this is when the King chooses his new bride, but custom has changed and now it is just a cultural festival and an opportunity for the community to celebrate.

There were SO many women and young girls dancing in traditional garb and beautiful beads. Each woman/girl holds a reed that is indigenous to this area. Some girls come from as far as Botswana to participate in this festival. The speakers stressed the importance of young women maintaining their virginity and being aware of the dangers of the AIDS virus. It was simply amazing!

The trip took us four long hours to travel from Durban city to the heart of Zululand. It was well worth the trip. On the way we hit some road blocks.........pretty funny....this cow was not about to mooooove for anyone!

East Coast Architects and The Blue Roof Clinic

Yebo! - Yes....in Zulu

Today was pretty good. Derek Keerden -Principal of East Coast Architects took me and some staff on an architectural tour of Durban. Most of his design work is in poor neighborhoods, and so we visited three projects in two different townships. One project was done for Alyssa Keys' organization "Keep a Child Alive" - the clinic he designed "Blue Roof Clinic" seemed to be the most holistic project that I have seen thus far. It started as an abandoned warehouse and he transformed it into an ARV (Anti-retro viral) clinic and community center. The center has a library, community lab, pharmacy, counseling rooms and a large multipurpose room. The center was originally intended for children, but has had to change because of the need in the community.......We had a brief discussion about his experience working in poor communities.......his impression is that this kind of work is more challenging because you have to work on a really tight budget and therefore must be more creative with your resources.

His signature designs incorporate African based designs and materials and always have a component of open space for community gatherings.....I left inspired. Derek is pretty fearless and seems to be very comfortable in the rough and rugged townships of Durban. He claimed that he feels safer in a township than in a shopping mall....

The Architecture of Community Healing

Igama La Mi Ngingu Ifeoma - My name is Ifeoma......everyday i learn a little more Zulu:)

I just came back from a visit to "Gozololo" an orphanage and community center in the Kwamashu Township north of Durban city center. I have been told that this is THE toughest township in South Africa....either right above or right below Soweto in Joburg. It felt pretty peaceful to me while I was there. I went with a few of the community organizers that attended the Project Build workshop that I held yesterday. The Director of the center "Miriam Cele" is an amazing woman that works with a network of grandmothers in her township to provide help to orphaned children in her community. She works with grandmothers because AIDS is swiftly wiping out their children's generation leaving the grandmothers to care for their grandchildren. I am inspired by them because they are not held back by the fact that the government does not give them financial assistance. Through perseverance they were able to raise funds to develop three orphanages/community centers. Their hope is to build 50 more centers in all of the townships of Durban. These centers serve to connect the community to local health centers, and HIV/AIDS assistance. Each center is built incrementally and reflects their funding structure. As they aquire more grants the center grows. I attended one of their HIV/AIDS support groups to learn more about the work that they do..........talk about overcoming obstacles.......

on my way to the AIDS Foundation....

My trip to the AIDS Foundation of South Africa was great. I met with Mandla Nyuswa - a Project Officer who gave me some great insight into the types of programs that NGOs provide communities affected by AIDS. Most importantly we discussed the connection between architecture and organization management. Having a physical structure (and the design of the space) helps an NGO build capacity in a number of ways......

The Architecture of the Community Involvement Process

Sani Bona (hello) from South Africa!
2 hour trip yesterday to a community called Kranskop...north of Central Durban. Majority of the community is Zulu and we visited a high school in which Project build is constructing a new classroom. This was a really fun session for me to try out my community workshop tool.....legos....yes, the legos that you played with as a child. I used them with the students and it proved to be a great way to get the students to talk freely about their school and their community. I started off asking questions about how they felt about their school and about the main hospital in their community. There is a huge connection between health, education and community. Schools are used by hospitals and health centers as a way to reach the community. An NGO that works through the hospital often visits the school to provide HIV testing, awareness workshops, and training in health based fields. The school is also used by the community for church services, sports events, and community mtgs. After leaving the school I am left with the question....how do you combine the two.....create a place for health and education? Is there a need for a hybrid?.........i'll post fotos later....legos will luv it:)


Today I did a similar workshop with various stakeholders for a "Project Build" project. Community organizers, construction staff, architects and admin staff were involved in the meeting. I asked a series of questions that dealt with how the different stakeholders work together to help the community and to help each other build a project. In the end they expressed that the workshop was good for them to better understand their working relationships, and the challenges that they each face on a daily basis. A major challenge that seemed to come up was communication and funding. Communication between community members, organizers and builders. We strategized on different ways to improve that connection. ...........using legos was a great way to break the ice and allowed people to be free and open with how they expressed themselves.........it was a lot of fun..... Suzanne (Executive Director) has contacted me several times to express her gratitude for the workshop....apparently the workshop has helped her employees realize the importance of connecting with the communities that they serve........two thumbs up!

I am now at the office of an architect in Durban that uses alot of community workshops in their design process. East Coast Architects - I discovered them on the Architecture for Humanity website. They have done alot of work for Oprah's angel network....I have been told that they LOVE Oprah in South Africa...I wonder why.....back to the point...........East Coast Architects has done some amazing work involving community members in both a transparent design process, and in the building of a facility. They mentioned the importance of ceremonies in African culture and incorporating a ceremony in every part of the building process....brick making, foundation building, mural painting...etc....the more the community is involved the more sustainable the project can become...........so much good stuff.....

tomorrow I visit a AIDS orphanage, and a mtg with the AIDS Foundation.........should be good

Safe and sound in Durban

Here is a pic of the new German made stadium in Durban. A brief one hour flight and here I am in Durban, One of South Africa's major cities in the south. Durban is located in Kwa-Zulu Natal - home of Zululand!...Durban is also undergoing a semi-architectural facelift.....new stadiums, supermalls, and hotels all in anticipation of the 2010 worldcup. It is a multicultural city that has a heavy blend of African and Indian influences. It is not as hectic as Joburg, a lot calmer city. I think that the largest building is the stadium in the pic above.....the scale is so large that it doenst relate to anything else in the city. The beachfront has a very Miami-esque feel to it, but minus the tourists.......

Suzanne Edmunds - the Executive Director for Project Build helped me find a nice bed and breakfast to stay in.

Project Build is a non-profit in Durban that builds schools and community centers in some of the rural areas of Durban. They currently have some clinics in the pipeline. They are located not too far from the heart of the Durban city center. We have a community design meeting scheduled for Wednesday and hopefully we can get her staff and community members together to talk about some of the facilities that they have built. The staff seems excited about it, so I think it will be a productive meeting.

Tomorrow I will be traveling into a Zulu community to talk to high school students about their new school. moving fast.....

Star Trek and BROOKLYN comes to Jozi!

I thought that I would stand out like a sour thumb in Jozi (nickname for joburg), but everynow and then someone in the street tries to talk to me in Zulu and unfortunately I cannot respond. South Africans are so diverse that almost anyone can fake the funk:) Everyone I meet seems to have their own business. Since the ending of apartheid the government has established an affirmative action system similar to the system in the US that provides opportunities for Black South Africans to have their own businesses. If businesses are Black owned, or buy from black owned they gain points towards obtaining government based incentives. So many interesting parallels with the US. Someone mentioned that the main challenge for South Africa is that it needs to balance both first and third world issues as they relate to social/urban develoment. On top of that you can add issues of class and race.

Went out to this really great house party/40th bday party for a friend of Mandla (to the right of me). Everyone took their star trek costumes VERY seriously. Some of us just tried to look as alien as possible. A dash of silver face paint, some black clothes and voila! Instant star trek alien!We ended the nite with the electric slide which is a bit different from the US version.....maybe a little bit of Zulu style has been thrown in:)

My new found friends here took me to see Pretoria, the political capital of South Africa. Beautiful city, especially because it has a suburb that shares the name of one of the greatest places on earth! BROOKLYN!

Mandela Sisulu Clinic and the Dept. of Health

Once again I returned to Soweto today to visit another clinic. This trip was coordinated by George Kanyika - Chief Architect at the Department of Health for Joburg. He is in charge of the development of public healthcare facilities, including the provision of equipment and human resources. It was amazing how I got in contact with him and he was extremely helpful......just realized that there are no trees in Soweto....hmmmm

I got to walk around the clinic with the Architect (Noel Puta of Prism Architects) who designed it and learn about the development of the building plan and construction of the clinic....awesome! To top it off, the Managing Nurse practitioner was also there to talk to me about how the clinic is run on a daily basis. Everytime I go to another clinic, I learn a little more about poverty in South Africa and how it relates to AIDS. Talking to both the architect and health practitioner gave me a well rounded understanding of the challenges of designing/managing such a facility.

Later, I was able to pick George's brain about healthcare infrastructure in joburg. What are the ideals for community clinics? How does the AIDS epidemic affect the services that community health clinics offer? What are the different ways that clinics are intended to serve the diverse community needs? The Dept. is trying to implement more clinics to take some of the burden off of the hospitals in the area, they are also trying to provide services that are holistic, addressing issues of malnutrition, education and economic development. By the end of the conversation we were pooped.......
Here is the new stadium in Joburg for the world cup. The design is supposed toresemble an African musical instrument. The city of Joburg is amazing! The old city center and the new....there is so much development hapening because the world cup is come in 2010....new train line, new stadiums, new hotels and public buildings.....an architectural facelift......every now and then a mural about AIDS awareness....can't escape it....the problem is real.........

This weekend I will prepare to head to Durban for a week and half.......looking forward to working with an NGO there and meeting with some folks at the AIDS Foundation......

Learning about the Architecture of AIDS

Today was such a long day. Started with a long frustrating drive with a Taxi driver who did not know where he was going. Or maybe he did know where he was going but conveniently forgot as the meter was running.....but anywho....it is to be expected...cest la vie

Very fruitful morning at A3 Architects. I had a long conversation with a Project Manager(Alfonso) who is working on the redesign of a community clinic outside of Joburg. He seemed to be SO knowledgeable about the AIDS epidemic and how it relates to the development of community clinics. We had an interesting conversation about Western vs African health patterns and how it relates to primary medicine and the designing of a community clinic. Apparently clinics are programmed for health services that are related to western health problems and not the immediate needs of the community being served......deeep......overwhelmed with the knowledge I have gained so far.........

They were so helpful and eager to provide me with whatever information that I needed. I left with two building case studies that will be very helpful to my research. We also had some interesting conversations on urban design and how the design/development of Joburg was used to divide white/wealthy areas from black/poor areas through land use and infrastructure........

tomorrow...back to soweto

Back to SOWETO and the Chris Baragwanath Hospital

Looks like SOWETO is my main point of reference for any analysis in Joburg. There is so much info here, I dont even have time to see anywhere else in Joburg!

I visited the Chris Baragwanath Hospital (Phase 1 addition) today with the architects (NOA Architects)....the Principal was kind enough to let me follow them on a site visit. It close to final completion and serves as the main hospital for Soweto residents. It encompases an outpatient bldg, radiology, emergency, and a pharmacy. I attended their client meeting to discuss future phasing. Later, myself and Mr. Okpanum (Principal - the "O" of NOA) had an interesting conversation on a comparison between the challenges of working on a medical facility in a poor vs. wealthy community. The difference has alot to do with having a sense of entitlement and a platform to voice opinions. We also discussed his impressions on defining an "African aesthetic" and how it can be materialised in architecture.......... times like these I wish I could just pull out a tape recorder....good stuff.... he plans on writing a book on healthcare design guidelines in an African context......

Tomorrow, more meetings with architects of health facilities and community organizers......

SOWETO and the Michael Maponya Clinic

Today was the beginning of the hectic week....hectic good...learning so much and I am only on day three!

Visited a small private college in the Joburg inner city. They provide free education to people from the townships, informall settlements and basically disadvantaged communities. It was really inspiring to see how they use the provision of free business education to create change in communities that are struggling. The mission behind the university (CIDA University) is to create "future agents of change" - essentially develope students to work in the business world or create their own businesses that can build their local economies. "Ubuntu" - I am because you are". ........

After a tour of CIDA, I did a tour of SOWETO......which stands for South Western Townships....I though SOWETO was an African term, but was surprised to find that it is an acronym. Soweto is where most Black South Africans live and is a site of extreme historical importance to the Black resistance movement in the 70s. Once an informal settlement is still in the process of being upgraded.

I visited a small community clinic (Michael Maponya) here in Soweto which we just happened upon while driving around. Most of the staff were women and they were so eager to teach me about how their facility is run, and where it began. Their AIDS support services are geared to pregnant women pre/post natal. They work extensively with NGOs in SOWETO to provide services that go beyond primary healthcare.

Also visited Nelson Mandelas old home where he lived before he was put in jail for over 26 years. So much history here......

We didnt have enough time to make it to the Apartheid museum, or to the Mandela Clinic, but i still have a whole month to go!

You can't find a nite like this in lonely planet:)

Saturdy nite 08.29.09



Finally got a cell phone. Contacts, contacts, contacts.... Next week will be super busy full of meetings and site visits. Looking forward to it.



WEnt on a drive by city tour and I realized that Joburg is the "Bean town" (Boston) of Africa. The Nelson Mandela bridge that leads you to the old city centre just like certain bridge in Boston. sorry no pics yet..its like pulling teeth watching the fotos download!

Went to a Jazz festival downtown Joburg (which is where you will find most Black South Africans)....it felt like Harlem...or Oakland....very neosoul. Tried some traditional SouthAfrican cuisine (Mphnusu).....SO delicious....mashed red beans, grilled fish, steamed pumpkin and spinach....gotta learn how to make it.......

First Night....am I in Boston?

Whew...safe and sound in Mandla's house..Sandton,Joburg. Joburg looks and feels like a cold day in Boston.....It was pretty dark, and all i have seen so far are freeways....no pedestrians and loads of tiny cars. Seems like everyone has a two seater. Hung out with Mandlas friends and amazed by the lives of 30 somethings here. Everyone is either about to get on a plane to do business in another African country or just got off of a plane. The conversation went from clients in Abudabi to projects in Senegal, to world politics and its effect on their business. Seems like most people start their own businesses in their 30s after they have had enough of the working world. One of Mandlas friends is the Director of a foundation that provides grants to non-profits providing AIDS support. Another has started a college for poor people living in the townships. Social entrepreneurship seems to be a major direction for highly educated South Africans. Maybe its too early to make that assumption. Stay tuned.....