It was with both great excitement and closeted anxiety that I set out on my journey to the only remaining sites the Kimberley team will support—Lime Acres and Danielskuil—two small mining communities about a two-hour drive northeast of Kimberley. Six human bodies traveled happily along together through hot, non air-conditioned desert air, and we bounced and bumped into Danielskuil in the late afternoon. I don’t know what I expected. I don’t know if I expected anything. But what I found was a community that, upon first glance, seemed to consist entirely of a massive De Beers mine, a pretty hefty eyesore of clustered industrial mining equipment, and a nearby small but sprawling township.
The township itself didn’t stand out to me structurally. Like the others I’d seen, it was made up of grids of small, block homes, each individually fenced off. But at some point during my conversations with the local coaches, and the brilliantly alight transition into another desert evening, a transition I’ve begun to fully await and love, I began to see the exception that is Danielskuil. Admittedly, Kimberley does have a charm of its own, but this community alone has really struck me as uniquely, almost strangely beautiful. The coaches in both Lime Acres and Danielskuil seem warmer than those I’ve met in the city. They are blatantly genuine. In my eyes at least, they simply desire to be part of GRS—to be part of a large team and an even grander cause. It’s a quality that seems somewhat standard, and yet I’ve found is as rare as it is inspiring.
I think there was some unnamable appeal in the confluence of my interaction with these people and my perception of their home. As the sun goes down here, light hits red dirt roads, casting warm, brown-orange glow up onto the homes, and dramatic deep pink flowers catch the eye. I’m no wordsmith. My depictions, I’ll be the first to admit, usually come out on the more cliché side of the spectrum from boring to brilliant. But the scene here, despite my self-proclaimed poetic impotence, is truly, and somewhat peacefully, beautiful.
We left these communities in the full dark of a rural, desert night. I couldn’t see the townships as we chugged along home, back to the booming and bustling metropolis of Kimberley on a weekday night.
I’m so excited and eager to begin working with these people. Ever a country type of girl, I can’t wait to return to the rural roots.
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