Volunteer blog: Lugna Gatan and Great Corner - by Marina

Last year we started a collaboration with Fryshuset in Sweden and two weeks ago we had four people from Fryshuset’s Lugna Gatan here with us. Lugna Gatan works with what The Great Corner is aiming for – to prevent youth from being involved with crime, drugs, violence etc. and to be a support for those who need it. While Project Playgrounds Great Corner still is in the first stage, Lugna Gatan started in 1995 so they were here sharing their knowledge, experiences and different methods with us through various workshops. We have been working with what to think of when you want to build a relationship with someone, how to act when you need to deal with a person who is really upset, teambuilding and so much more.

It has been such an interesting week and we learnt a lot. We can now take these successful methods and with some adjustment make them work here in Langa, as the situation differs from Sweden. For example, most fights in Sweden is with fists but in Langa a lot of people use different weapons so you need to approach this in different ways.

We talked about similarities and differences between how it can be in Sweden and how it can be in South Africa and even if there are big differences, it is also a lot of similarities. People are still people and it doesn’t matter where you are.

The week went by to quickly but we are so grateful for this week, for everything we learnt and to have gotten to know these wonderful persons.

Aron, Tim, Linda and Ali, thank you for everything, you are already missed! We are looking forward to continuing this partnership and collaboration with Lugna Gatan and we can’t wait to see you again!