Monday 29 July 2013

Return of the MAC

After a year long sabbatical, and just like the long awaited return of the Twinkie, I'm back.

When we last left off, I had a tortoise in the garden, curiosity was proven innocent in the cold case investigation of Tuna the cat, training for the Great North Swim was in full swing and the examinations were looming.

In July, I started my placement year at Promethean as an Intern Engineer. During my time there, I learnt a lot and the experience was invaluable. I worked with some amazing people on some amazing projects (SharePoint, I could live without) and truly enjoyed my time there. As you can imagine, my time was mainly taken up working, but I did manage to keep myself occupied with various trips to the Olympics, concerts, conferences and the like. Over the next few months you can probably expect to see all the gory details in dedicated posts - nothing but the best for the readers! - but for now, there's the present.

This month, a group of young people from the UK will travel to Durban, South Africa to take part in a leadership challenge that will engage, inspire, and equip them to make the most of their potential.
Being based in South Africa, young people are pushed beyond their comfort zones, being challenged to achieve things they never thought possible. Building on the pilot from summer 2012, the vision of South Africa Challenge 2013 is to create a financially sustainable scheme that will increase the impact of partner programmes in South Africa that are transforming lives.
-www.sachallengeuk.com
As I write to you, I sit in a stranger's house, in the capital, with two other team members, as we eagerly await the next stage in our journey. For me, the journey began back in February at the Student Enterprise Conference, when I was told how the South Africa Challenge had a vision to take aspiring young leaders out to Durban, to transform lives. Personally, this was something I had to be a part of as it would provide me with the chance to work with some inspiring individuals from both the UK and South Africa.

Tomorrow, our journey continues, after months of careful planning, gruelling preparation and high aspirations. Our flight begins at Gatwick Airport, embarking on a long haul flight to Dubai International Airport where we are graced with a 10 hour wait before our final flight to Durban. Here, the journey is not over, and is only just beginning. I look forward to an intense two weeks, wherein we will be taking in as much as we can, experiencing the culture, living with the locals and starting work on the projects.

With the greatest of intentions, I aim to keep the blog up to date and all of you lovely people can always stay up to date with our social media feeds and the website.
@SAChallengeUK
www.sachallengeuk.com

"The hardest part about eating an elephant, is the first bite."
Ben

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