Womans Day and the 'Charitea'

Womans Day was the 9th August and although we never get involved with celebrations of any kind for our numerous public holidays, this particular day NiQi was invited to be photographer for a charity event, as well as to deliver a speech.  The money collected was to be donated to the Organ Donor Foundation which is having a huge awareness campaign throughout this month too.  As you may know if you have read previous blogs of mine, it was the same day that we put our foal, Titan, down....a very sad day for us indeed.

Anyway NiQi was quite oblivious to any of the events leading up to me fetching her from work and only heard about it on the way to the event after our vet phoned my cell phone several times.  We arrived in Johannesburg just after 1pm and met Fawn, a fellow cystic fibrosis patient and lung transplant recipient.  Fawn was the organiser of the event and if what we saw when we arrived was anything to go by, it promised to be a great time.

While Fawn and her team of ladies finished setting up before all the ladies arrived, NiQi started taking photos.  The colour scheme was black and white and the invitation had said we should dress like a lady.  Having been outside from early morning and given just 15 minutes to have a 'spring clean' and get dressed, I ended up choosing to wear a thin cotton summer dress.  Lucky I thought to grab a short sleeve blouse to wear unbuttoned over it should the weather change....well that may have been my thought at the time, but I did not allow for Johannesburg not being as warm as we were.  I FROZE the whole afternoon.....Jo'burgers arrived dressed to the nines in their winter attire and were obviously not going to be cold at all.  Anyway, mind over matter, I told myself every time I felt a chill going down my spine that it wasn't that bad and I survived until I got in the car to come home and could put the heater on to warm up.

The theme of the tea was obviously about organ donation and the idea was to get as many to sign up as organ donors as possible.  The eats were heavenly...all finger foods...deliciously divine...  There were 2 speakers, NiQi who spoke on the aspect of waiting for an organ donor and how her life has changed in recent years since realizing that to survive she needs a lung transplant; and Alice, who spoke post transplant and how she has received new life since her transplant.

After the speeches there was anticipated expectation of receiving a lucky draw gift.  NiQi and I didn't receive one but that didn't matter as the goody bags that were handed out were 'gift' enough.  We left to come home much later than I had hoped.  If you know me, then you know that our animals come first in my mind as they cannot fend for themselves, so arriving home as darkness was approaching, I had to quickly whip round and check everyone was still alright as well as feed the brood.  After the events of the previous evening and the morning before we left, I must admit the break was welcome and I did enjoy myself.   Fawn managed to get many of the ladies to sign up as organ donors which was great and after listening to both NiQi and Alice speaking, I think that some of them were given a new appreciation for life and saw things from a different perspective.