She did it! Koula completed the Comrades marathon. The whole country was watching when Koula crossed the finish line after more than eleven hours of running and did a shout-out to all the Marang House children. Keep on checking this blog to find how much money she has raised for Marang House with this magnificent achievement.

Also, check out the pictures of the 'Good Luck' party that the kids organised for her.

UPDATE: I can unofficially tell you that Koula raised around ZAR 80.000 for Marang House.

A friendly game of pool turned into a victory for the seven-year-old Muzi. During a 'good luck' party that was organised for Koula and Kabelo, who are running the Comrades ultra-marathon to raise funds for charity, Muzi took the opportunity to challenge his favourite singer to a game of pool. With a little bit of help, Muzi eventually managed to beat the famous kwaito star - a moment that he will not easily forget.

Labels: muzi, video

Yesterday afternoon Koula and Kabelo, joined by Annah and Dieketseng - two of the children who are currently staying at Marang House - were guests on the tv show 'Wild Room'. Wild Room is one of the most popular shows in South Africa and is part of the youth programming on SABC 1, which goes by the name of Yo.TV.

They were on the show to promote the charity angle of the upcoming Comrades ultra-marathon. Kabelo, who is a popular kwaito singer, and Koula, a dj from 5fm, are running the race to raise funds for charity and you can support them by smsing either of their names to 38338 (R10/SMS).

This was the television debut of the young girls, who both are seriously ill. Annah (12) is an insulin dependent diabetic and Dieketseng (15) suffers from chronic renal failure. They both however enjoyed all the attention and the glamour of being on television tremendously.

There is less than one week left for you to support Koula with her admirable attempt to make a difference to the lives of South Africa’s disadvantaged seriously ill children by running the Comrades ultra-marathon. You can help her in the following ways:

Today I accepted the biggest cheque ever on behalf of Marang House. The Independent Cash and Carry Group, its shareholders and suppliers together donated ZAR 650.000 to Marang House.

A total of ZAR 2 million was raised during their recent annual golf day. Smile Foundation received a cheque for ZAR 1,35 million to operate on children with disfigured faces and ZAR 650.000 went towards Marang House to provide a stable home-environment to disadvantaged seriously ill children.

Tonight the controversial television show where three contestants who suffer from chronic renal failure stand a chance to win a new kidney will air on Dutch television. A terminally ill lady, who has not more than a few months to live, will decide during this live television show to whom of the three contestants she will be donating her kidney.

Viewers can sms during the live broadcast to advise the 37-year-old kidney donor on the tough decision to make. The messages will be free of charge and will offer the opportunity to request the necessary documentation to sign up as an organ donor. What took them so long to come up with this clever marketing campaign?

Contrary to the perception that many people outside of the Netherlands might have, BNN – who is the initiator and broadcaster of the show - is not a commercial television channel trying to develop the latest cash-generating format. BNN is one of the public (non-profit) broadcasting organisations in the Netherlands that receives free broadcasting time and government funding to air and produce its television and radio programmes.

BNN’s founder, Bart de Graaff, passed away several years ago after having been sick most of his life. Despite his illness he managed to start up this very successful PBO and he has always tried to promote the interests of all sorts of ill people, specifically those suffering from chronic renal failure. He for instance allowed a camera crew to follow the entire process that he went through as he underwent a kidney transplant himself, also with the aim of persuading people to become donors.

It really seems to me that BNN has honourable intentions to seriously engage in a discussion and encourage citizens to become organ donors by simply confronting them with the harsh reality. They however have a very direct and controversial way of doing this, but nobody can deny that they already managed to grab the attention of both national and international media, without having broadcasted a single thing. To me this is the best marketing campaign promoting organ donation so far. According to a Dutch newspaper, there are even several people already who offered to donate one of their healthy kidney to the loosing contestants.

I am very curious to see how this television show is going to turn out and hopefully the number of organ donors in the Netherlands will drastically increase during the next couple of weeks. Knowing BNN and its programmes, I am confident that tonight's show will be an entertaining and thought-provoking one to watch. I also think that BNN will deal more respectfully with this sensitive subject than you might expect.

Desperation

One easily underestimates the desperation that many patients awaiting a kidney transplant are in. The dialysis treatments and the uncertainty of their future are not the most pleasant circumstances to live with.

As for the children staying at Marang House, all of them for instance always make sure that there is a packed bag next to their bed to leave the house in the middle of the night should a kidney become available. The sadder part is that some kids literally dream that the phone rings with 'the good news' and wake up the nurse to then realise that they have dreamed it all. All the children also love to attend church, mainly because this gives them the opportunity to pray to God for a new kidney.

Another example, in the early days of Marang House we had a little child by the name of Gordon. One afternoon the phone rang with the exciting news that there was a kidney available for Gordon. As there was nobody else available, my late father decided to drive Gordon to the hospital himself. Gordon however was so worried that he would not arrive on time in the hospital that, as small as he was, he managed to lift my little brother out of his baby seat and put him next to the car while my father was inside Marang House collecting the paperwork. Gordon simply wanted to eliminate every possible threat of slowing him down as this kidney transplant was his only chance of survival. The transplant was a success and as far as I know Gordon is living a happy and normal life at the moment.

UPDATE: The Big Donor Show was a HOAX. Well done!