Verity's Blog

Visiting POWA HeadQuarters

I recently flew up to Joburg for a week's visit for press interviews and to do my first POWA payout. Since I have sold nearly 800 Future CD's, there is quite a bit of cash available to give to POWA.

Donna (my fabulous manager) collected me from the airport and after a quick lunch we headed to the POWA headquarters in Berea. It was quite an introduction to Joburg for me, as they are situated in the heart of Hillbrow and the surrounding area is pretty run down and poverty striken. It was really great to finally meet some of the people responsible for keeping POWA going and to see where they work.

They have 3 houses that their offices and counciling rooms are spread between. Carrie Shelver – who heads up training and public awareness – Nehwoh & Catherine gave us a quick tour and some insight into the incredible work they do for women getting out of abusive situations, from psychological councilling, to legal advice, to getting them into an anonymous shelter if they are in danger.

Missing Women - and the silence is deafening!

This article was written by David Wolstenholme. I am performing at his event The Woman's Show in Feb 2007.

A United Nations report issued in March 2006 states that up to 200 million women are missing worldwide today. Over 50 million of these women are missing in India alone. The regions where women are at the highest risk are India/Pakistan, Middle East and Africa. To put this in perspective, compare this incredible number of missing women – 200 million, to fatalities from all 20^th century wars, which amounts to 190 million. Is it because these are all women that the silence is so deafening?

Pay It Forward in action

A friend of mine , just had the humbling experience of discovering that the woman working for her in her home has in fact completed her honours in Social Studies in her late 40's. Gloria comes from a classic tough South African background and has saved up over the years to do a degree in Anthropology and Xhosa. 

Her problem is that she doesn't have the last R7250 to pay her fees, and as such the university won't release her results & she can't graduate and stand the chance of getting a great job doing what she loves and not having to clean other people's houses...