Cape Town Lady Feeds the Homeless & Needy Despite Being Jobless Herself: “I’m Following in My Mom’s Footsteps”

• A local community worker from Cape Town is doing the absolute most for her neighbourhood by feeding and providing aid to those in need, despite having no job
• Beryl Williams, who is a mom of three, says that her mother inspired her to give back as she would feed the needy even when her own family had very little to eat
• The Lotus River resident also tries to keep her area safe by being a member of the neighbourhood watch and provides clothes and other forms of assistance to under-resourced children

A good Samaritan from the under-resourced neighbourhood of Lotus River in Cape Town is passionate about community service and feeding the downtrodden in her area.

Beryl Williams largely uses money out of her own pocket to fund her feeding scheme and although she is unemployed and not well-to-do herself, the caring mother-of-three still manages to provide a warm plate of food to those in need at least once a week.

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Speaking to Briefly News, the local do-gooder reflected on her charitable endeavours, the inspiration behind her passion for community work and her love for the people of Lotus River and surrounding under-resourced informal settlements.

Beryl’s mother played a significant role in her life path

The community worker, who grew up in Lotus River, notes that she is following in the footsteps of her late mother, Catherine Arries, who would also feed underprivileged people in local Cape Town townships.

Beryl explains that when she was young, it was hard for her to understand why charity was so important to her mother, because her family was also struggling financially at the time:

“My mom used to make sandwiches for the kids in Gugulethu and Nyanga back in the 1980s and I could never understand why because we were so poor. We really had it tough. We had no electricity, used outside toilets and just had to eat whatever was available.”

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Despite the destitute conditions in which Beryl was brought up, her mother always had faith that God would make a way and shared the little they had with those who had even less.

“Whatever we ate, they ate. My mother was a very good-hearted person with lots of love for her community and I ended up being exactly like her. My kids used to tell me, ‘Mommy worries more about the kids outside than about us.’ ”

Now Beryl, who is a grandmother of five, feeds people in Lotus River and the surrounding informal settlements of Riemvasmaak and Phumlani out of her own pocket, mainly on Mondays:

“I have a very good relationship with the people in the area and they know me as ‘Aunty B’. For my birthday in March, I also gave them [local people I feed] a birthday bash and fed more than 200 people. I get some assistance from my best friend, who is a retired teacher from Die Duine Primary School, and when I cook, I get the rolls, bread and doughnuts from Pick n Pay in Constantia.”

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The woman also gets some assistance from members of the Grassy Park police station, who assist her with transport sometimes:

“Captain Wynita Kleinsmith and her assistant, Warrant Officer Carol Strauss, sometimes assists me with transportation and with handing out food to those in need.”

Providing shoes and clothes to kids in need and those affected by fires

In addition to her feeding scheme, Beryl is also a member of the local neighbourhood watch and patrols the area with other members to ensure that the place is safe for residents.

Furthermore, she helps people who live in informal settlements when they are affected by disasters, such as fires and rains that cause their homes to flood:

“I often drive around and look for clothing and shoes for the local kids in the area who have nothing. These people really suffer when it storms and live in terrible conditions.”

The local do-gooder also loves seeing young people in school and helps local kiddies in the area start their educational journeys.

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“I put kids in school. Just before the Covid-19 lockdown, I had to drive around to four primaries for some kids who are 7 to 8 years old and had never seen the inside of a school. To me, that was very heartbreaking. I wish you could have seen their happy faces when I got them in school. They were so excited to finally be there.”

The 55-year-old believes that the work she is doing is very much needed in the Lotus River community because of the number of people who suffer in the area, and as she put it:

“Poverty is rife in the neighbourhood and that is why I am happy to help out, it gives me great pleasure to assist others.”

Despite not having formal employment, the woman is always lending a helping hand and in 2019, she even organised a birthday party for a young lady with cerebral palsy, with the help of Pick ‘n Pay, Cape Argus wrote.

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Furthermore, The Voice reported on Beryl providing a lovely Easter surprise for the kiddies in Phumlani, with food and sweet chocolate treats filling their hungry tummies. How inspiring!

Charity starts at home: Woman inspires Mzansi by preparing 142 meals for needy people in her local community

In a related story by Briefly News, a mom of two had South Africans inspired with her charitable endeavours, with the woman regularly feeding the hungry in her neighbourhood.

The Limpopo-based lady feeds needy people in Thohoyandou and recently prepared 142 meals for those in need. Mzansi netizens were hella inspired by the good Samaritan, with some social media users commenting on a post shared online, thanking her for the excellent work she’s doing.

Source: Briefly News