SA
Be a square, knit for Mandela Day!
With the relentless ticking clock that draws us closer and closer to deadline day July 18, Nelson Mandela Day, the 67 Blankets for Nelson Mandela initiative spearheaded by theatre personality Carolyn Steyn, changed tack on the weekend, after the cold front hit Johannesburg.
ROBYN SASSEN
PHOTOGRAPH BY ILAN OSSENDRYVER
Together with her publicity team and involved knitters and crocheters from the public, Steyn created a display of the blankets she has received so far, filling up Sandton’s square, before distributing the blankets to various beleaguered institutions and individuals in Alexandra township.
The staff of the SA Jewish Report is supporting the initiative and has nominated several Jewish businesses and communal organisations to follow suit, either by knitting or crocheting blankets, with squares of 150x200cm or 90x110cm, or by knitting or crocheting squares, which will be sewn together into blankets. 67 Blankets for Mandela is hosting an event on June 15 and another on June 30 at the Auto and General Theatre on the Square in Sandton: the ticket fee is one completed handmade blanket.
Operating on a different model is the registered NPO Warm the World, also a knitting-based initiative, which is an ongoing project coined by Justice Sharise Weiner and Ruth Ginsberg. They have placed facilities for the knitting and collection of squares in a variety of places, including doctors’ waiting rooms, hairdressing salons and the like. Their aim is to warm the world one square at a time. Their website is www.warmtheworld.co.za.