Sisters Nandipha Mentyis and Thabisa Belwana are determined to keep a soup kitchen going that is a lifeline for more than 100 people.
Sisters Nandipha Mentyis and Thabisa Belwana are determined to keep a soup kitchen going that is a lifeline for more than 100 people.
Their mother Philiswa Cynthia Belwana, who ran the soup kitchen for close to a decade, died rearlier this month.
Cynthia, after whom the soup kitchen was named, had started the project with the Salvation Army's Captain Envoy Masala in 2006.
They started it in a house just across the road from Cynthia's Nonzube Street home with help from students from Rhodes University.
Mentyis and Belwana told Grocott's Mail the project was intended to feed scores of underprivileged people in the township.
Mentyis says her late mother carried on providing meals and soup to people even when Masala left in 2007, adding that Cynthia and the students then decided to run the soup kitchen from her own home.
Mentyis said her mother was encouraged to keep going because the soup kitchen was feeding many people from different age groups and even school kids.
The soup kitchen feeds between 69 and 159 people three days a week.
People come from as far as Joza, Hlalani and other surrounding areas, according to Mentyis.
Meals are served on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 3pm.
"People come from all over the township and the coloured area. Some would just be walking by on their way back from town and stop for a meal," Mentyis said.
Although it's called Cynthia's soup kitchen, the facility doesn't stick to just providing soup.
Belwana told Grocott's Mail that at times they cook meals such as samp and rice.
The soup kitchen is still going strong, according to Belwana, but there are some challenges.
Over the years it has received support from Pick n Pay, Checkers, Fruit & Veg and Tip Top butchery and financial assistance from Makana Bricks.
Belwana said they would very much like to keep the soup kitchen going because it was something their mother was very dedicated to.
"We don't want things to change now that she is not around, in fact we want to do more," she said.
The challenges faced by the soup kitchen range from transport, diminishing support in terms of the food they provide, and lack of administrative capacity to ensure that they get everything they need from their donors on time.
The two sisters have called on anyone who can help with anything to come forward.
They accept anything from clothing and food to blankets.
"We take anything, it doesn't have to be soup – it can be anything, because there are lots of needy people who come here," Belwana said.
Two Mary Waters High School Grade 11 pupils, Zipho Wakashe and Luvo Ndengana, were at the soup kitchen to help out as part of their Life Orientation outreach project on Wednesday.
The two are going to assist Mentyis and Belwana until the end of the month.
anele@grocotts.co.za
