Cape town, South Africa – reaching out!

If you stand on the cliff overlooking the beach in Cape Town, you will see a clear line stretching out across the ocean into the horizon. It looks like a line drawn with a steady hand. It is actually the line that marks the Indian and the Atlantic oceans. The color of the water is distinctly different and even the sand on the beaches have their own particular color and texture. Oh well, just another miracle in nature! In this city, where the two oceans meet, lies a vast community of people committed to the youth.

Just ten years ago Apartheid came to an end and thankfully the youth of today are growing up in freedom with a much greater amount of opportunity than their older siblings or parents. As people in Cape Town settle down to a life of opportunity and movement, many of the youth find themselves caught between religious boundaries that were actually preserved under Apartheid, and the borderless framework of modern-day freedom.

A sense of liberation is in the air. Opportunities now exist to delve, develop and experiment. As always, positive aspects of life are usually clouded by the negative consequences of actions that are done in the name of a trial run for happiness.

In the pursuit of pleasure and relief, the youth are often caught up in the trap of trying to quell overwhelming negative emotions and perceptions. An easy but transient cure for this is often drugs and alcohol. No one is immune from the affects of these evils. If the urge within doesn’t propel the youth to try them, then peer pressure probably will. Only those who have good self-esteem, are assertive in their dealings with others, and have a firm sense of right and wrong will be able to withstand the pressures that lead many young people to illness, despair and addiction.

The Mitchell Plain Islamic Social Welfare Association is a community based and funded project which caters to youth experiencing behavioral problems. It also provides family counseling. The target age of the center is from 11 to 25 years of age.

“The youth we deal with,” the spokesperson said, “are often abused physically or psychologically by parents.” The adolescent unit is for Muslims and non-Muslims and is under the umbrella of the psychiatric hospital in the area.

The aims of the center are simply to advise, counsel and support the youth. Individual and group sessions take place within an Islamic environment and the youth are counseled according to Islamic ethics and teachings. All the people involved in the center are volunteers but at the moment it is running on a skeleton staff because the founders are studying abroad. The need for such services is great.

The spokesperson further commented, “Discipline at school has largely been taken away, parents are busy working and become stressed, and the society offers the kids sexual freedom, alcohol and drugs which are readily available, and this is what happens. We’re here to try to help pick up the pieces.”

This center aims at instilling a feeling of self-worth in the youth and giving them something to work towards. It also provides an advisory and referral service.

“The young people don’t have to pay anything to come here. They can just give a donation. The bills are paid by community donations,” the spokesperson said.

When asked what the center needs, the spokesperson commented directly, “Well, we need to employ full-time people who have a professional background in social work and counseling and who are also strong in their deen. The kids need a solid Islamic identity in order to heal permanently.”

The center has facilities to accommodate fifteen beds and in-patients usually stay about 3-4 weeks but those who are suicidal or severe abuse cases often stay longer.

“Our intention in doing this work is to please Allah and to offer any assistance we can to the young people in need and their families,” the spokesperson said. “There is so much to do.”

[Verily, in the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest.] (Sura Ar-Ra’d, 13:28)